Abstract
Celestial objects captured in a sensor field-of-view can be used for in-situ sensor calibration and for navigation. One of the limitations on this approach is that the prediction of what objects will be visible to sensors can be highly inaccurate when sensor spectral bands do not match published stellar survey spectral bands. FTI presents Encompass v3.0, a compiled catalog of all known stars, galaxies, globular star clusters, and nebulae detectable in the visible, near-infrared, and mid-infrared portions of the electromagnetic spectrum across the entire sky. Proprietary physics-based modeling techniques enable Encompass users to create radiometrically and astrometrically relatively accurate astronomical inventories to suit a wide range of detector technologies. Derived from the Hubble Space Telescope’s Guide Star Catalog version 2.3 and the AllWISE extension of the space-based Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer, the star catalog contains nearly 1 billion astronomical objects detectable with visible-wavelength sensors (complete to 20 mag at 0.6 um) and nearly 750 million astronomical objects detectable with infrared-wavelength sensors (complete to 17 mag at 3 um) over the whole sky. Object positions are accurate to 2 urad (0.4 arcsec) at all brightness ranges and the catalog supports physics-based spectral modeling for any mission passband between 0.4 and 20 um. Catalogs in derived custom passbands were validated against published astronomical surveys APASS, GLIMPSE, and DIRBE and found to be accurate to better than 0.5 mag--sufficient to determine whether sources will be visible for mission planning purposes. Encompass supports derived program catalogs filtered by brightness and position as well as calibration and reference catalogs filtered to custom source densities. We discuss the challenges of working with a large data set, outline the validation process, and present validation results.
The All-Sky Visible and Infrared Astronomical Catalog Encompass 3.0
Celestial objects captured in a sensor field-of-view can be used for in-situ sensor calibration and for navigation. One of the limitations on this approach is that the prediction of what objects will be visible to sensors can be highly inaccurate when sensor spectral bands do not match published stellar survey spectral bands. FTI presents Encompass v3.0, a compiled catalog of all known stars, galaxies, globular star clusters, and nebulae detectable in the visible, near-infrared, and mid-infrared portions of the electromagnetic spectrum across the entire sky. Proprietary physics-based modeling techniques enable Encompass users to create radiometrically and astrometrically relatively accurate astronomical inventories to suit a wide range of detector technologies. Derived from the Hubble Space Telescope’s Guide Star Catalog version 2.3 and the AllWISE extension of the space-based Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer, the star catalog contains nearly 1 billion astronomical objects detectable with visible-wavelength sensors (complete to 20 mag at 0.6 um) and nearly 750 million astronomical objects detectable with infrared-wavelength sensors (complete to 17 mag at 3 um) over the whole sky. Object positions are accurate to 2 urad (0.4 arcsec) at all brightness ranges and the catalog supports physics-based spectral modeling for any mission passband between 0.4 and 20 um. Catalogs in derived custom passbands were validated against published astronomical surveys APASS, GLIMPSE, and DIRBE and found to be accurate to better than 0.5 mag--sufficient to determine whether sources will be visible for mission planning purposes. Encompass supports derived program catalogs filtered by brightness and position as well as calibration and reference catalogs filtered to custom source densities. We discuss the challenges of working with a large data set, outline the validation process, and present validation results.