Solar and space physics datasets within a Virtual Observatory: the AstroGrid experience Silvia Dalla * and Nicholas A Walton * School of Physics & Astronomy, University of Manchester, UK Institute of Astronomy, University of Cambridge, UK A PPARC funded project
What is AstroGrid? A PPARC funded project to develop a Virtual Observatory for the UK One of the main partners in Euro-VO Founding member of IVOA (=International Virtual Observatory Alliance, Definition of standards. Interoperability. Both night time astronomy and solar/STP components
AstroGrid components Portal Registry – Lists available resources (datasets, applications…). Harvests registries of other VOs. MySpace – Virtual distributed storage of user files Common Execution Architecture (CEA) - Models how an application is run in the VO. An application is any process that consumes or produces data. Job Execution Service (JES)
Workflow Allows a user to query datasets, call tools and applications, from a single programming environment. Data remotely located at data centers. Applications running on distributed servers. Queries to multiple datasets can be brought together in a single workflow. Allows processing of a large number of ‘events’. Workflows submitted for remote execution. Results collected in a user’s MySpace.
Solar developments Datasets accessible are SURF TRACE archive at MSSL, SOHO/CDS and SOHO/EIT files at the Virtual Solar Observatory. Solar application Solar Movie Maker developed. Solar Event Catalogue part of EGSO accessible from workflow.
Solar science case Obtain VOTable of solar energetic events via query to EGSO/SEC. For each event in list, query TRACE or EIT datasets. Call the movie maker application & generate mpeg movie.
Demo Demo : Portal Demo : Portal
Further info & contact
AstroGrid portal
Locating resources The databases, applications, and other resources available are listed in the AG Registry
Building queries Queries to databases are formulated in ADQL (extension of SQL). Query builder is provided in the portal
Building a workflow Queries to databases, calls to applications, operations on data, are combined into workflows. Workflow submitted for remote execution.
Job Monitor Monitor job execution Provide transcript of workflow execution
AG Science Services In addition to release allowing users to develop own workflow. Launched via a simple interface, requiring just a few input parameters. Currently: Solar Movie Maker and Redshift Maker. Solar Movie Maker: either specify a time range and solar instrument, or an ‘event’ via query to EGSO Solar Event Catalogue. Monitor job execution and download to local machine from AG portal.
AG Science Services
Future plans Complete installation of AstroGrid datacentre software at RAL (UKSSDC + solar archive). Include other main STP datasets. Time series applications. Models. New STP science cases. STP science service? Hands-on AstroGrid Wokshop