1. The Astrolabe Project: Identifying and Curating Astronomical ‘Dark Data’ through Development of Cyberinfrastructure Resources
Gretchen Stahlman, PhD Candidate
University of Arizona School of Information
Library and Information Services in Astronomy (LISA) VIII, June 7, 2017

2. Astrolabe
Astrolabe is a new data repository and computational environment being created at University of Arizona (UA).
Partners include:
UA School of Information
UA Department of Astronomy and Steward Observatory
UA University Libraries
CyVerse (formerly the iPlant Collaborative)
American Astronomical Society
Astrolabe has been funded by:
UA Office for Research & Discovery (now RDI)
National Science Foundation ACI

3. The “Astrolabe” Project
Astrolabe has a mission to:
Collect, preserve, disseminate
Provide tools for analysis and data sharing
Expose research data

4. Archive Management
Image credit: Digital Curation Centre,
Image credit:

5. Lifecycle Preservation and Access
Curation “is the active management and appraisal of digital information over its entire life cycle” (Pennock, 2007).
Curation requires insightful knowledge of data and communities.
Resources must be developed to support publication of (and links between) research AND data.

6. “Dark Data” in the Long Tail
Large projects have well-planned data stores, while large amounts of data remain uncurated (Heidorn, 2008).
“Like dark matter, this dark data on the basis of volume may be more important than that which can be easily seen” (p. 281).
Long Tail data require institutions, practices and policies to make these data useful to researchers.

7. Long Tail Distribution in Astronomy

8. The “Top 20%”

9. Curating the Long Tail with Astrolabe

10. General Properties of “Dark Data”
“Dark Data” are typically:
Heterogeneous
Generated through unique procedures
Curated by individual scientists
Not maintained
Obscured or protected
Seldom reused
Currently unnoticed

11. Astronomical Data Common Data Types Common Data Format
Sky images
Light curves
Spectroscopy
Catalogs
Common Data Format
FITS (Flexible Image Transport System)
Culture of Open Access

12. American Astronomical Society (AAS)
Key professional society for astronomers in the US
Hosts two major conferences each year
Non-profit organization
Publishes four major journals
The Astronomical Journal (AJ)
The Astrophysical Journal (ApJ)
The Astrophysical Journal Letters (ApJL)
The Astrophysical Journal Supplements (ApJS)

13. CyVerse.org Discovery Environment Atmosphere Data Store
Use hundreds of Apps and manage data in a simple web interface
Atmosphere
Custom cloud-based scientific analysis platform or use a ready-made one for your area of scientific interest
Data Store
Store, manage, access, and share all the data related to research

14. CyVerse Services

15. Astrolabe Organizational Model

16. July 2015 Workshop Outcomes
Identify mission and clear science use cases
Take advantage of CyVerse cyberinfrastructure and longevity of University of Arizona
Obtain community buy-in and manage expectations
Focus on “low-hanging fruit” such as data not curated elsewhere and data behind figures in journals
Develop a follow-on workshop for additional feedback

17. July 2016 Workshop Outcomes
Physical format of dark data (i.e. historical data stored on tapes)
Author websites archiving data (not typically long-lived)
LSST time domain and serendipitous data cases (follow-up to LSST observations and discovery through historical data)
Searching the literature for references to dark data (for indicative text, broken links, etc.)

18. Astrolabe Timeline 2013 - AAS Strategy Meeting
Workshop #1 in Tucson funded by UA Start for Success seed grant
2016
UA Accelerate for Success awarded for one-year pilot – collaborators include iSchool, Steward, UA Libraries, CyVerse, AAS
Changed name from Arizona Astronomical Data Hub (AADH) to Astrolabe to focus beyond AZ
Established a Board of Directors
Workshop #2 focusing on specifying requirements for Astrolabe system
NSF ACI Grant awarded to develop WorldWide Telescope as Astrolabe front end and visualization tool, with the idea that this could scale to other repositories

19. WorldWide Telescope (WWT)
A screenshot from WWT HTML5 web client – worldwidetelescope.org

20. Current Status of Astrolabe: 2017 Activities and Objectives
Searching for uncurated or “at-risk” data by mining the literature, and by contacting authors individually based on our team’s review of particular types of publications
Recently contracted a developer to accomplish objectives specified in recently-awarded NSF grant (award # ), will hire additional developers
Working on funding proposals for system development, including project to create protocols for migrating data from obsolete media into Astrolabe
Collaborating with CyVerse to develop and optimize interfaces, apps, metadata templates and indexing, cone search and VO
Installed Montage for conversion of FITS to JPEG to TOAST
Designing website as interface to CyVerse data store to facilitate data deposition and reuse

23. Our Team Principal Investigators AAS Affiliate WWT Developer
Bryan Heidorn, PhD, UA School of Information
Dennis Zaritsky, PhD, UA Department of Astronomy
AAS Affiliate
Julie Steffen, AAS Director of Publishing
WWT Developer
Jonathan Fay, AAS Contractor and Microsoft Software Engineer
Postdoctoral Researcher
Huanian Zhang, PhD, UA Department of Astronomy
Graduate Research Associate
Gretchen Stahlman, UA School of Information
Astrolabe Advisory Board Members
Robert Hanisch (NIST)
Chris Lintott (Oxford/AAS)
Barbara Kern (U of Chicago)
Julie Steffen (AAS)
Frank Timmes (AZ State/AAS)
Benjamin Weiner (Steward/UA)
Edwin Henneken (ADS)
Henry “Trae” Winter, Astrolabe Advisory Board Chair (CfA)

24. Thank you! http://astrolabe.arizona.edu
This material is based upon work supported by the National Science Foundation under Grant No