ROSAT Status Report #87

March 1, 1994

Note: This status report consists of ROSAT News (#26) from MPE.

SATELLITE STATUS

A new operating mode is now active for ROSAT in which the satellite is angular-momentum stabilized, if there is no startracker information available in the Earth shadow. In this case, the magnetometers (the sources of the attitude-control irregularities) are not used by the control procedure.

This stabilized mode was tested for all of last week with the HRI taken out of focus and has proven to work in a satisfactory manner. Since midnight of Feb 26/27 (UT) we have continued the observing program beginning with 5 days of PSPC observations according to the timeline. Having re-started the program with the PSPC we are now able to continue the monitoring of the satellite behavior for another few days before resuming observations with the HRI, foreseen for March 4.

MISSION PLANNING

The observations performed during February 1994 are listed in file dec93-feb94.obs in directory timeline (ROSAT Service Area).

Note: These observations are also available from heasarc.gsfc.nasa.gov under /rosat/timelines/dec93-feb94.obs

AO-5: Call for Proposals

Please remember that the deadline for ROSAT proposals (HRI only) is March 31, 1994.

REPROCESSING of all pointed observations

The reprocessing of all the pointed ROSAT observations started on February 9. This reprocessing was necessary because data delivered to the PI's from observations before September 19, 1992 contain several errors that may have impacts on the final analysis. Data and analysis protocol will be sent automatically to the (original) PI, who will then own the reprocessed data exclusively for half a year. Thereafter, data will be entered into the public archives.

Together with the start of the reprocessing, all datasets--both from the recent observations and from the reprocessing--will be delivered in the so-called Rationalized Data Format (RDF) that GSFC introduced for all the X-ray satellite projects in which they are involved (e.g. ASCA). To support standardization in data access both the German and the UK data center have agreed to use that format in the future. Proper EXSAS software to make this format EXSAS-compatible is available (available through the EXSAS patch described below).

ROSAT DATA ARCHIVE (RDA)

For easier usage of the on-line data archive, a new version of the intape/rod command now allows the conversion of the FITS datasets directly from disc (available through the EXSAS patch described below).

EXSAS/MIDAS

Up til now, EXSAS users at other institutions only occasionally could make use of new or updated EXSAS software developed in the time between the official EXSAS releases. We now have introduced a clean and, we believe, easy-to-use scheme to make the newest EXSAS updates available at your place. All updates to the last EXSAS release are contained in directory exsas/patch on the ROSAT Service Area . Read file patch.doc in that directory to obtain directions how to install the updated code.

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