Abstract

Contributed Talk - Splinter EScience

Tuesday, 16 September 2025, 14:00

Progress in Constructing the SOFIA Data Center

B. Schulz, J. Früh, B. Greiner, M. Hütwohl, C. Iserlohe, T. Keilig, B. Knieling, K. Schindler, A. Siggelkow, M. Wiedemann, O. Zeile
SOFIA Data Center, IRS, Universität Stuttgart

The SOFIA Data Center (SDC) began nominally in July 2024 and became fully operational after most of its members had relocated to the University of Stuttgart at the beginning of this year. We aim to eventually provide reprocessed and improved Far-Infrared SOFIA science data in a VO-compatible astronomical archive and the technical and operational engineering data of the SOFIA telescope in the official data repository of the University of Stuttgart DaRUS. In the first phase we are focusing on several initiatives that include updating the Python based instrument pipelines, building a new pipeline for converting and plate solving of telescope's guide camera images for pointing reconstruction, preparing a new kind of calibration for atmospheric water vapor for every flight and assessing the bulk of available science products. With FIFI-LS being the instrument best known to the team, the work on its data has priority as it will serve as a trailblazer for the other three instruments EXES, FORCAST, and HAWC+, that the SDC will focus on, while the GREAT data is being reprocessed by the University of Cologne. A taking-stock activity of the available data with a relational database is being conducted as part of the preparation for ingesting both, raw- and processed data into the DaCHS VO-publishing infrastructure. In our presentation we will provide details on the progress already made as well as the further plans for the implementation. A dedicated User-Group was established to provide community feedback for this effort and help finding scientists that are interested taking on orphaned and yet unpublished SOFIA data.