High Energy Interest Group (HEIG)

Last updated - 18Dec24 - JE

High Energy Interest group accepted by IVOA Executive committee - November 2024 Interoperability meeting

Chair: Bruno Khélifi (APC, Paris) Vice-chair: Janet Evans (Harvard CfA)

Charter:

The group shall define requirements for the representation of high energy astrophysics data in the VO through:

• development of use cases for data discovery, access and visualization;
• identification of metadata concepts needed by high energy astrophysics data that are not currently supported by the VO;
• contribute to updates and additions to the relevant parts of the IVOA standards framework;
• the group will provide a well identified point of contact for high energy astrophysics projects with IVOA, and actively encourage their use of VO standards and protocols;
• the group will organize sessions focused on high energy astrophysics data at IVOA meetings.

Motivation:

High energy astrophysics (HEA) typically includes X-ray astrophysics and gamma-ray astrophysics of the GeV range (HE), the TeV range (very high energy, VHE), up to the ultra high energy (UHE) above 100 TeV, VHE neutrino astrophysics, and studies of cosmic rays. High energy astrophysics has several domain-specific requirements that need to be fulfilled if HEA data is to be well-served by the VO.

High energy astrophysics observations are based on techniques that are different compared to the optical or radio domains. HEA observatories are generally designed to detect particles, e.g., individual photons, cosmic rays, or neutrinos, with the ability to estimate several characteristics of those particles. This technique is generally named event counting where an event has some probability of being due to the interaction of an astrophysical particle with the detectors. The list of detected events is named an event list and these data sets are typically multi-dimensional and can simultaneously encode event position, time, and spectral information. Instrument Response Functions are required to map the physical properties of the source to the observables, and these mappings are probabilistic and typically not invertible, requiring more complex representations for data sets and their associated calibrations compared to (e.g.) optical data.

The groups and projects that have expressed interest to be involved include current and future X-ray facilities, gamma-ray facilities, and neutrino observatories, as well as high energy astrophysics data archives:

• Chandra X-ray Observatory;
• XMM-Newton;
• Space-based multi-band astronomical Variable Objects Monitor (SVOM);
• High-Energy Stereoscopic System (HESS);
• Cherenkov Telescope Array Observatory (CTAO);
• KM³ Neutrino Telescope (KM3NeT);
• NASA High Energy Astrophysics Science Archive Research Center (HEASARC).

By providing the necessary standards, the IVOA can help to ensure that VO protocols can support further developments in the high energy astrophysics community and enable interoperability and data discovery both within high energy astrophysics and between high energy astrophysics and other wavelengths.

Virtual Observatory and High Energy Astrophysics v1.0 - M. Servillat et al.

• Document in PDF format:
  • https://www.ivoa.net/documents/Notes/VOHE/
• Document source on Github:
  • https://github.com/ivoa/HighEnergyDataNote

Membership

Membership - email alias "HEIG"

~30 subscribers from major projects in the High Energy regime

To be added to the email list, use the following link:

• http://mail.ivoa.net/mailman/listinfo/heig

TCG Roadmap

2024B - https://wiki.ivoa.net/twiki/bin/view/IVOA/2024BRoadmap

HE IG Goals:

• ObsCore continuation - work to get a concrete recommendation to move this forward
• VOEvent - followup/continuation from the side-meeting we had in Malta; form a plan
• DataModel /Event List/High Energy data formats - pursue next steps

Participating Project Links (add your project and link)

• Chandra Science - https://chandra.harvard.edu/index_scientists.html
  • Chandra Data Descriptions - Event list, GTI
• Cherenkov Telescope Array Observatory (CTAO)
  • Data Model Group - https://www.ctao.org/emission-to-discovery/data-and-computing/
• Einstein Probe - https://ep.bao.ac.cn/ep/ ;; https://www.cosmos.esa.int/web/einstein-probe/mission
• Gamma-ray Astronomy Data Formats (GADF) - https://gamma-astro-data-formats.readthedocs.io
• KM3NeT Open Science - openscience.km3net.de
• NASA High Energy Astrophysics Science Archive Research Center (HEASARC) - https://heasarc.gsfc.nasa.gov/
  • FITS data standards (aka "OGIP")
• Space-based multi-band astronomical Variable Objects Monitor (SVOM) - https://www.svom.eu/en/home/
• Very-high-energy Open Data Format (VODF, under construction) - https://vodf.readthedocs.io
• XMM-Newton, XCATDB - https://xcatdb.unistra.fr/4xmmdr14/index.html

HEIG Group Meetings

• Next Mtg: Jan 2025 - Date/Time TBD
  • TBD
• Interop Nov 15-17: HEIG IG proposal to Exec, Plenary on Day 1, 2 presentations in DM WG session
  • Program - https://wiki.ivoa.net/twiki/bin/view/IVOA/InterOpNov2024
• 2024-10-23 @13:00 UTC: Malta Plenary Planning; Session contributions
  • Mtg_Agenda
• 2024-09-27 @14:30 UTC:IVOA Note final/review actions; Malta Plenary; IVOA sessions
  
  • Mtg_Notes
• 2024-08-30 @13:00 UTC: IVOA Note status/feedback, Malta session early planning cont.
  • Mtg_Notes
• 2024-06-28 @13:00 UTC: IVOA Note status/feedback, Malta session early planning
  • Mtg Notes
• 2024-04-03 @14:30 UTC: IVOA Note status/feedback, Sydney session planning, Obscore
  • Mtg Notes
• 2024-01-31 @14:30 UTC: IVOA Note status, Sydney planning, Obscore
  • Mtg Notes
• 2023-12-21 @14:00 UTC: "What makes an event list unique?” “What content should users expect to exist in an Event list instance”
  • Mtg Notes
• 2023-10-18: Discussion and Presentations on Response Files
  • Mtg Notes
• 2023-09-14 : Overview of the Dataset/Cube data models and their applicability to High Energy datasets.
  • Slides & Mtg Notes
• 2023-06-28: IVOA standards for High Energy Astrophysics (French VO Workshop)
  • https://indico.obspm.fr/event/1963/
• 2023-05-11: Presentation at Interop, "DM for High Energy astrophysics", M. Servillat
  • https://wiki.ivoa.net/internal/IVOA/IntropMay3023DM/2023-05-11_IVOA_meeting_-_VOHE.pdf
• 2022-10-11: Virtual Observatory and High Energy Astrophysics (French VO Workshop),
  • https://indico.obspm.fr/event/1489/
• 2021-06-25: IVOA Metadata for high energy astrophysics (ESCAPE European project workshop),
  • https://indico.in2p3.fr/event/24652/