UCD question: how to assign the wavelength-dependen (em) UCD word

Mireille LOUYS mireille.louys at unistra.fr
Tue Mar 8 21:44:05 CET 2022


Dear Bo, Dear Semantics,
thanks for this interesting feedback.


The SVO Filter profile service contains a lot of Filter descriptions and 
you can query what is stored with their search box :
http://svo2.cab.inta-csic.es/theory/fps/index.php?id=Subaru/Suprime.IB505&&mode=search&search_facility=Subaru&search_instrument=Suprime&search_text=suprime#filter 
<http://svo2.cab.inta-csic.es/theory/fps/index.php?id=Subaru/Suprime.IB505&&mode=search&search_facility=Subaru&search_instrument=Suprime&search_text=suprime#filter>

You see that many properties are recorded for a filter, much more than 
the UCD label you can assign on the photometric column.

In the IVOA we can describe filters properties using the Photometry data 
model v1.0:
https://www.ivoa.net/documents/PHOTDM/
The way to provide more information to describe filters and calibration 
zero points at the top of a VOTable catalog was proposed in the
PhotDM1.0 Appendix C.2  Photometric Data in Cone Search  in the doc 
pointed above.

The current update of this spec : PHOTDM1.1 is in progress and discussed 
in the community .
You can see details on the revision process , people involved , etc, here :

https://wiki.ivoa.net/twiki/bin/view/IVOA/PhotDM11RFC

The goal is to set-up a mechanism to allow any filter and calibration 
information to be described in an annotation block at the beginning of a 
VOtable which in turn can be interpreted by a parser application based 
on a library.

This work is in progress and will be shown at the next interoperability 
meeting (April) probably .

Your example is up-to-the point and in sync with our current development.

I hope we can show you examples of this representation for your filters 
in this syntax very soon.

Best regards , Mireille.

PS: So your selection process for ucd , based on the reference 
wavelength/frequency/energy, is appropriate. It is just that not all 
information can be wrapped in just one label.

Le 02/03/2022 à 18:00, Bo Milvang-Jensen a écrit :
> Dear Mireille and IVOA semantics list,
>
> Thank you for inviting me to send you my unsolved questions about 
> UCDs, I have two: one in this e-mail and one in the next
>
> Background: These questions have arisen while writing UCDs for the 
> around 1200 table columns in the COSMOS2020 catalogue, paper recently 
> published in Weaver+2022 
> (https://ui.adsabs.harvard.edu/abs/2022ApJS..258...11W/abstract), 
> before publication via ESO's Phase 3. The catalogue contains 
> photometry in around 40 photometric bands/filters, and photo-zs and 
> physical parameters (e.g. stellar mass) computed by two codes.
>
> My first question (i.e. this e-mail) concerns how to select the 
> wavelength-dependent (em) UCD word for a given photometric filter. I 
> have consulted the UCD1+ document, but the only guidance I found was 
> the short description for each UCD word, e.g. "Infrared between 1.0 
> and 1.5 micron". First, I am not sure I understand the motivation for 
> having overlapping words, as shown by this example:
>
> em        Electromagnetic spectrum
> em.IR     Infrared part of the spectrum
> em.IR.NIR Near-Infrared, 1-5 microns
> em.IR.J   Infrared between 1.0 and 1.5 micron
>
> My intuition is to select the most "specific" word (here em.IR.J), but 
> that could be wrong.
>
> Second, my main problem is that I do not know to select the most 
> appropriate em word. For each of my filters I know the central 
> wavelength and the full transmission curve. Some of my filters, e.g. y 
> and Y, have a transmission curve that transmits both below and above 1 
> micron, which is one of the limits used in the descriptions of the UCD 
> words, so if one were to consider the full transmission curve when 
> selecting the em word, these filters could only be given the very 
> general word "em". I have made the choice of only using the central 
> wavelength when assigning the em word, not the full transmission curve.
>
> Here is the full list of filters in COSMOS2020, with their central 
> wavelengths and widths (both in Angstrom), and with the UCD I 
> currently have assigned based on my two principles (most specific 
> word, and central wavelength) [see Weaver+2022 Fig. 2 for the filter 
> curves]:
>
> Label        Description                     lam_cen width UCD
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------- 
>
> GALEX_FUV    GALEX FUV                          1526 224 em.UV.100-200nm
> GALEX_NUV    GALEX NUV                          2307 791 em.UV.200-300nm
> CFHT_u       CFHT/MegaCam u                     3709 518 em.opt.U
> CFHT_ustar   CFHT/MegaCam u*                    3858 598 em.opt.U
> ACS_F814W    HST/ACS F814W                      8333 2511 em.opt.I
> HSC_g        Subaru/HSC HSC-SSP PDR2 g          4847 1383 em.opt.B
> HSC_r        Subaru/HSC HSC-SSP PDR2 r          6219 1547 em.opt.R
> HSC_i        Subaru/HSC HSC-SSP PDR2 i          7699 1471 em.opt.I
> HSC_z        Subaru/HSC HSC-SSP PDR2 z          8894 766 em.opt.I
> HSC_y        Subaru/HSC HSC-SSP PDR2 y          9761 786 em.opt.I
> SC_B         Subaru/SuprimeCam B                4488 892 em.opt.B
> SC_gp        Subaru/SuprimeCam g+               4804 1265 em.opt.B
> SC_V         Subaru/SuprimeCam V                5487 954 em.opt.V
> SC_rp        Subaru/SuprimeCam r+               6305 1376 em.opt.R
> SC_ip        Subaru/SuprimeCam i+               7693 1497 em.opt.I
> SC_zp        Subaru/SuprimeCam z+               8978 847 em.opt.I
> SC_zpp       Subaru/SuprimeCam z++              9063 1335 em.opt.I
> SC_IB427     Subaru/SuprimeCam IB427            4266 207 em.opt.B
> SC_IB464     Subaru/SuprimeCam IB464            4635 218 em.opt.B
> SC_IA484     Subaru/SuprimeCam IA484            4851 229 em.opt.B
> SC_IB505     Subaru/SuprimeCam IB505            5064 231 em.opt.V
> SC_IA527     Subaru/SuprimeCam IA527            5261 243 em.opt.V
> SC_IB574     Subaru/SuprimeCam IB574            5766 273 em.opt.V
> SC_IA624     Subaru/SuprimeCam IA624            6232 300 em.opt.R
> SC_IA679     Subaru/SuprimeCam IA679            6780 336 em.opt.R
> SC_IB709     Subaru/SuprimeCam IB709            7073 316 em.opt.R
> SC_IA738     Subaru/SuprimeCam IA738            7361 324 em.opt.R
> SC_IA767     Subaru/SuprimeCam IA767            7694 365 em.opt.I
> SC_IB827     Subaru/SuprimeCam IB827            8243 343 em.opt.I
> SC_NB711     Subaru/SuprimeCam NB711            7121 72 em.opt.R
> SC_NB816     Subaru/SuprimeCam NB816            8150 120 em.opt.I
> UVISTA_Y     VISTA/VIRCAM UltraVISTA DR4 Y     10216 923 em.IR.J
> UVISTA_J     VISTA/VIRCAM UltraVISTA DR4 J     12525 1718 em.IR.J
> UVISTA_H     VISTA/VIRCAM UltraVISTA DR4 H     16466 2905 em.IR.H
> UVISTA_Ks    VISTA/VIRCAM UltraVISTA DR4 Ks    21557 3074 em.IR.K
> UVISTA_NB118 VISTA/VIRCAM UltraVISTA DR4 NB118 11909 112 em.IR.J
> IRAC_CH1     Spitzer/IRAC ch1                  35686 7443 em.IR.3-4um
> IRAC_CH2     Spitzer/IRAC ch2                  45067 10119 em.IR.4-8um
> IRAC_CH3     Spitzer/IRAC ch3                  57788 14082 em.IR.4-8um
> IRAC_CH4     Spitzer/IRAC ch4                  79958 28796 em.IR.4-8um
>
> However, my ESO Phase 3 scientist Laura (in cc) thought it could be 
> misleading to assign em.IR.J to the Y and NB118 filters, but also said 
> that ESO needed to look into standardizing this. If my UCDs for these 
> two filters could be misleading, so could those for all the 
> intermediate bands (IA, IB), the other narrow bands, and the broad 
> bands that don't have a UCD with its name encoded (e.g. g, z).
>
> I would be interested in your view on this.
>
> Kind regards, Bo
>
> On 3/1/22 5:41 PM, Mireille LOUYS wrote:
>> hi again ,
>> please do not hesitate to send your questions to me , or to the ivoa 
>> semantics list in copy .
>> this helps the community and maintainers like me to be aware of the 
>> trouble you may encounter.
>>
>> many thanks , Mireille
>>
>> Le 25/02/2022 à 16:59, Bo Milvang-Jensen a écrit :
>>>
>>> PS: I have a couple of other questions/problems with the UCD 
>>> standard that I would like to ask/report. What is the best channel?
>>>
>>> Kind regards, Bo
>>

-- 
--
Mireille Louys,  MCF (Associate Professor)
Centre de données CDS		IPSEO, Images, Laboratoire Icube
Observatoire de Strasbourg	Telecom Physique Strasbourg
11 rue de l'Université		300, Bd Sebastien Brandt CS 10413
F- 67000-STRASBOURG		F-67412 ILLKIRCH Cedex
Tel: +33 3 68 85 24 34
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