The HEASARC is a multi-mission astronomy archive for the EUV, X-ray, and
Gamma ray wave bands. Because EUV, X and Gamma rays cannot reach the
Earth's surface it is necessary to place the telescopes and sensors on
spacecraft. The HEASARC now holds the data from 25 observatories covering
over 30 years of X-ray, extreme-ultraviolet and gamma-ray astronomy. Data
and software from many of the older missions were restored by the HEASARC staff.
Examples of these archived missions include
ASCA,
BeppoSAX,
Chandra,
Compton GRO,
HEAO 1,
Einstein Observatory (HEAO 2),
EUVE,
EXOSAT,
HETE-2,
INTEGRAL,
ROSAT,
Rossi XTE,
Suzaku,
Swift, and
XMM-Newton.
The HEASARC scientists
are recognized in their own right as world-class researchers. They provide
the essential ingredient to the HEASARC's success by using the archival
data for their own research.
The HEASARC on-line service is an archive
and database system accessible through the networks that provides rapid access
to the entire HEASARC data holding either directly via ftp, or using the Browse
and
SkyView interfaces to search the HEASARC catalogs and access the
data. The analysis tools to work
on these data (typically running under various unix systems) are also
provided via the networks. A High Energy Astrophysics Learning Center provides
education and outreach activities.
The HEASARC is very active in promoting data format standards and has
promoted the Flexible Image Transport
System (FITS)
as a standard for all level of data. As part of this effort, the FITSIO library of software
has been developed to handle FITS files to be written, read, and
manipulated.
The HEASARC develops multi-mission analysis tools that facilitate the comparison and analysis of
high level data in the archive (e.g. spectral analysis).
The HEASARC will be providing access to new missions that are approved for launch over the coming few
years, such as GLAST (2007).
|
