Instrumental response model and detrending for the Dark Energy Camera

Bernstein, G. M.; Abbott, T. M.C.; Desai, S.; Gruen, D.; Gruendl, R. A.; Johnson, M. D.; Lin, H.; Menanteau, F.; Morganson, E.; Neilsen, E.; Paech, K.; Walker, A. R.; Wester, W.; Yanny, B.

doi:10.1088/1538-3873/aa858e

Title: Instrumental response model and detrending for the Dark Energy Camera

Journal Article · Thu Jun 29 00:00:00 EDT 2017 · Publ.Astron.Soc.Pac.

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1088/1538-3873/aa858e· OSTI ID:1469017

Bernstein, G. M. ^[1]; Abbott, T. M.C. ^[2]; Desai, S. ^[3]; Gruen, D. ^[4]; Gruendl, R. A. ^[5]; Johnson, M. D. ^[5]; Lin, H. ^[6]; Menanteau, F. ^[5]; Morganson, E. ^[5]; Neilsen, E. ^[6]; Paech, K. ^[7]; Walker, A. R. ^[2]; Wester, W. ^[6]; Yanny, B. ^[6]

Pennsylvania U.
Cerro-Tololo InterAmerican Obs.
Indian Inst. Tech., Hyderabad
MIT
NCSA, Urbana
Fermilab
Munich U.

We describe the model for the mapping from sky brightness to the digital output of the Dark Energy Camera, and the algorithms adopted by the Dark Energy Survey (DES) for inverting this model to obtain photometric measures of celestial objects from the raw camera output. The calibration aims for fluxes that are uniform across the camera field of view and across the full angular and temporal span of the DES observations, approaching the accuracy limits set by shot noise for the full dynamic range of DES observations. The DES pipeline incorporates several substantive advances over standard detrending techniques, including: principal-components-based sky and fringe subtraction; correction of the "brighter-fatter" nonlinearity; use of internal consistency in on-sky observations to disentangle the influences of quantum efficiency, pixel-size variations, and scattered light in the dome flats; and pixel-by-pixel characterization of instrument spectral response, through combination of internal-consistency constraints with auxiliary calibration data. This article provides conceptual derivations of the detrending/calibration steps, and the procedures for obtaining the necessary calibration data. Other publications will describe the implementation of these concepts for the DES operational pipeline, the detailed methods, and the validation that the techniques can bring DECam photometry and astrometry within ~2 mmag and ~3 mas, respectively, of fundamental atmospheric and statistical limits. The DES techniques should be broadly applicable to wide-field imagers.

View Journal Article

Cite

Export

Save

Research Organization:: SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory (SLAC), Menlo Park, CA (United States); Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory (FNAL), Batavia, IL (United States)

Sponsoring Organization:: USDOE Office of Science (SC), High Energy Physics (HEP)

DOE Contract Number:: AC02-07CH11359

OSTI ID:: 1469017

Report Number(s):: arXiv:1706.09928; FERMILAB-PUB-17-208-AE; 1608214

Journal Information:: Publ.Astron.Soc.Pac., Vol. 129

Country of Publication:: United States

Language:: English

References (24)

The brighter-fatter effect and pixel correlations in CCD sensors Antilogus, P.; Astier, P.; Doherty, P. Journal of Instrumentation, Vol. 9, Issue 03 https://doi.org/10.1088/1748-0221/9/03/C03048	journal	March 2014
Intrinsic pixel size variation in an LSST prototype sensor Baumer, M. A.; Roodman, A. Journal of Instrumentation, Vol. 10, Issue 05 https://doi.org/10.1088/1748-0221/10/05/C05024	journal	May 2015
Astrometric Calibration and Performance of the Dark Energy Camera Bernstein, G. M.; Armstrong, R.; Plazas, A. A. Publications of the Astronomical Society of the Pacific, Vol. 129, Issue 977 https://doi.org/10.1088/1538-3873/aa6c55	journal	May 2017
SExtractor: Software for source extraction Bertin, E.; Arnouts, S. Astronomy and Astrophysics Supplement Series, Vol. 117, Issue 2 https://doi.org/10.1051/aas:1996164	journal	June 1996
All-Weather Calibration of Wide-Field Optical and nir Surveys Burke, David L.; Saha, Abhijit; Claver, Jenna The Astronomical Journal, Vol. 147, Issue 1 https://doi.org/10.1088/0004-6256/147/1/19	journal	December 2013
Robust principal component analysis? Candès, Emmanuel J.; Li, Xiaodong; Ma, Yi Journal of the ACM, Vol. 58, Issue 3 https://doi.org/10.1145/1970392.1970395	journal	May 2011
The first and second data releases of the Kilo-Degree Survey de Jong, Jelte T. A.; Verdoes Kleijn, Gijs A.; Boxhoorn, Danny R. Astronomy & Astrophysics, Vol. 582 https://doi.org/10.1051/0004-6361/201526601	journal	October 2015
The Blanco Cosmology Survey: data Acquisition, Processing, Calibration, Quality Diagnostics, and data Release Desai, S.; Armstrong, R.; Mohr, J. J. The Astrophysical Journal, Vol. 757, Issue 1 https://doi.org/10.1088/0004-637X/757/1/83	journal	September 2012
The dark Energy Camera Flaugher, B.; Diehl, H. T.; Honscheid, K. The Astronomical Journal, Vol. 150, Issue 5 https://doi.org/10.1088/0004-6256/150/5/150	journal	October 2015
Characterization and correction of charge-induced pixel shifts in DECam Gruen, D.; Bernstein, G. M.; Jarvis, M. Journal of Instrumentation, Vol. 10, Issue 05 https://doi.org/10.1088/1748-0221/10/05/C05032	journal	May 2015
Care, Feeding, And Use Of Charge-Coupled Device (CCD) Imagers At Palomar Observatory Gunn, James E.; Westphal, James A. Solid State Imagers for Astronomy, SPIE Proceedings https://doi.org/10.1117/12.965831	conference	January 1981
Conference summary Gunn, J. Journal of Instrumentation, Vol. 9, Issue 04 https://doi.org/10.1088/1748-0221/9/04/C04021	journal	April 2014
New wide-field corrector for the Kitt Peak Mayall 4-m telescope Jacoby, George H.; Liang, Ming; Vaughnn, David Astronomical Telescopes & Instrumentation, SPIE Proceedings https://doi.org/10.1117/12.316845	conference	July 1998
Monitoring the atmospheric throughput at Cerro Tololo Inter-American Observatory with aTmCam Li, Ting; DePoy, D. L.; Marshall, Jennifer L. SPIE Astronomical Telescopes + Instrumentation, SPIE Proceedings https://doi.org/10.1117/12.2055167	conference	July 2014
Assessment of Systematic Chromatic Errors that Impact Sub-1% Photometric Precision in Large-Area sky Surveys Li, T. S.; DePoy, D. L.; Marshall, J. L. The Astronomical Journal, Vol. 151, Issue 6 https://doi.org/10.3847/0004-6256/151/6/157	journal	May 2016
K-band galaxy counts McLeod, B. A.; Bernstein, G. M.; Rieke, M. J. The Astrophysical Journal Supplement Series, Vol. 96 https://doi.org/10.1086/192114	journal	January 1995
The Dark Energy Survey data processing and calibration system Mohr, Joseph J.; Armstrong, Robert; Bertin, Emmanuel SPIE Astronomical Telescopes + Instrumentation, SPIE Proceedings https://doi.org/10.1117/12.926785	conference	September 2012
An Improved Photometric Calibration of the Sloan Digital Sky Survey Imaging Data Padmanabhan, Nikhil; Schlegel, David J.; Finkbeiner, Douglas P. The Astrophysical Journal, Vol. 674, Issue 2 https://doi.org/10.1086/524677	journal	February 2008
An update on the status and performance of the Radiometric All-Sky Infrared Camera (RASICAM) Reil, Kevin; Lewis, Peter; Schindler, Rafe H. SPIE Astronomical Telescopes + Instrumentation, SPIE Proceedings https://doi.org/10.1117/12.2056692	conference	August 2014
Theli: Convenient Reduction of Optical, Near-Infrared, and Mid-Infrared Imaging data Schirmer, M. The Astrophysical Journal Supplement Series, Vol. 209, Issue 2 https://doi.org/10.1088/0067-0049/209/2/21	journal	November 2013
Toward 1% Photometry: End‐to‐End Calibration of Astronomical Telescopes and Detectors Stubbs, Christopher W.; Tonry, John L. The Astrophysical Journal, Vol. 646, Issue 2 https://doi.org/10.1086/505138	journal	August 2006
Gaia Data Release 1 : Summary of the astrometric, photometric, and survey properties Brown, A. G. A.; Vallenari, A.; Prusti, T. Astronomy & Astrophysics, Vol. 595 https://doi.org/10.1051/0004-6361/201629512	journal	November 2016
Low-light-level charge-coupled device imaging in astronomy Tyson, J. Anthony Journal of the Optical Society of America A, Vol. 3, Issue 12 https://doi.org/10.1364/JOSAA.3.002131	journal	January 1986
Conference summary Tyson, J. A. Journal of Instrumentation, Vol. 10, Issue 05 https://doi.org/10.1088/1748-0221/10/05/C05022	journal	May 2015

Cited By (11)

The Large Synoptic Survey Telescope and Milky Way Science Rich, R. Michael Proceedings of the International Astronomical Union, Vol. 13, Issue S334 https://doi.org/10.1017/s1743921317009413	journal	July 2017
First Data Release of the All-sky NOAO Source Catalog Nidever, David L.; Dey, Arjun; Olsen, Knut The Astronomical Journal, Vol. 156, Issue 3 https://doi.org/10.3847/1538-3881/aad68f	journal	August 2018
First Cosmology Results Using Type Ia Supernovae from the Dark Energy Survey: Photometric Pipeline and Light-curve Data Release Brout, D.; Sako, M.; Scolnic, D. The Astrophysical Journal, Vol. 874, Issue 1 https://doi.org/10.3847/1538-4357/ab06c1	journal	March 2019
Dark Energy Survey Year 1 Results: Detection of Intracluster Light at Redshift ∼ 0.25 Zhang, Y.; Yanny, B.; Palmese, A. The Astrophysical Journal, Vol. 874, Issue 2 https://doi.org/10.3847/1538-4357/ab0dfd	journal	April 2019
The Dark Energy Survey: Data Release 1 Abbott, T. M. C.; Abdalla, F. B.; Allam, S. The Astrophysical Journal Supplement Series, Vol. 239, Issue 2 https://doi.org/10.3847/1538-4365/aae9f0	journal	November 2018
A Search for Optical Emission from Binary Black Hole Merger GW170814 with the Dark Energy Camera Doctor, Z.; Kessler, R.; Herner, K. The Astrophysical Journal, Vol. 873, Issue 2 https://doi.org/10.3847/2041-8213/ab08a3	journal	March 2019
GROWTH on S190426c: Real-time Search for a Counterpart to the Probable Neutron Star–Black Hole Merger using an Automated Difference Imaging Pipeline for DECam Goldstein, Daniel A.; Andreoni, Igor; Nugent, Peter E. The Astrophysical Journal, Vol. 881, Issue 1 https://doi.org/10.3847/2041-8213/ab3046	journal	August 2019
The Dark Energy Survey: Data Release 1 Abbott, Tmc; Abdalla, Fb; Allam, S. Apollo - University of Cambridge Repository https://doi.org/10.17863/cam.37745	text	January 2018
The Large Synoptic Survey Telescope and Milky Way Science Rich, R. Michael arXiv https://doi.org/10.48550/arxiv.1712.02885	text	January 2017
First Cosmology Results Using Type Ia Supernovae From the Dark Energy Survey: Photometric Pipeline and Light Curve Data Release Brout, D.; Sako, M.; Scolnic, D. arXiv https://doi.org/10.48550/arxiv.1811.02378	text	January 2018
Dark Energy Survey Year 1 results: Detection of Intra-cluster Light at Redshift $\sim$ 0.25 Zhang, Y.; Yanny, B.; Palmese, A. arXiv https://doi.org/10.48550/arxiv.1812.04004	text	January 2018

Similar Records

Instrumental Response Model and Detrending for the Dark Energy Camera

Journal Article · Thu Sep 14 00:00:00 EDT 2017 · Publications of the Astronomical Society of the Pacific · OSTI ID:1469017

Bernstein, G. M.; Abbott, T. M. C.; Desai, S.; +11 more

Photometric Characterization of the Dark Energy Camera

Journal Article · Mon Apr 02 00:00:00 EDT 2018 · Publications of the Astronomical Society of the Pacific · OSTI ID:1469017

Bernstein, G. M.; Abbott, T. M. C.; Armstrong, R.; +9 more

Astrometric calibration and performance of the Dark Energy Camera

Journal Article · Tue May 30 00:00:00 EDT 2017 · Publications of the Astronomical Society of the Pacific · OSTI ID:1469017

Bernstein, G. M.; Armstrong, R.; Plazas, A. A.; +53 more

Related Subjects

79 ASTRONOMY AND ASTROPHYSICS
46 INSTRUMENTATION RELATED TO NUCLEAR SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY

Title: Instrumental response model and detrending for the Dark Energy Camera

Citation Formats

References (24)

Cited By (11)

Similar Records

Related Subjects