Focus Session on Multi-dimensional Data

Tuesday May 20

IVOA Interoperability Meeting, May 2014

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The Virtual Observatory (VO) is a framework for interoperable and efficient access to astronomical data and services across all areas of astronomy. The International Virtual Observatory Alliance (IVOA) is an alliance of worldwide VO projects that develops the required standards and coordinates global aspects of the infrastructure.

The definition of standards to enable the use of "Multi-dimensional Data” in the VO is a high priority for IVOA in 2014. A Focus Session at the May 2014 IVOA Interoperability Meeting in Madrid is intended to make significant progress in this area.

This follows the focus sessions at the 2013 Interoperability Meeting in Heidelberg in which members of the broader astronomical community were invited to summarise the kinds of data that they anticipate generating and their needs for making those data available through the VO. The multi-dimensional data focus session provided key input to the IVOA, helping to define the initial directions for development efforts, and members of the IVOA have been developing software and protocols to describe and access multi-dimensional data within the VO.

The topics of this focus session at the 2014 May IVOA Interoperability Meeting include

• Summary of the progress towards the protocols and prototype implementations

• Identification of the next steps in the widespread adoption of the IVOA standards and services.

• Description of the additional functionality or enhancements likely to be needed.