Space astronomy science platforms focus week

9 Dec 2025, 10:00 → 12 Dec 2025, 12:30 UTC

Virtual

Nigel Hambly (Institute for Astronomy, University of Edinburgh)

Astronomy has entered an era of "big data" science. Traditional access methods that extract small subsets of data for transfer and exploration to client-side applications no longer scale to the size and ambition of current and future large survey missions, both ground- and space-based.

In common with many international astronomical survey projects, ESA Gaia and Euclid teams are developing code-to-data platform facilities that will enable up-scale exploitation of datasets having data volumes of 10s to 100s of terabytes.  

The aim of this virtual meeting is to provide the community with an opportunity to hear about the latest developments in code-to-data platforms for ESA Gaia and Euclid and to see examples of the kind of science exploitation that is becoming possible using them. In addition there is time allocated in the programme for users to bring their specific usage requirements along to one-on-one surgery sessions with astronomers and developers familiar with the platforms to provide an easy introduction to developing their workflows on the available services. 

The meeting will be held entirely online. While activities are planned over the week it will not be necessary to commit an entire week of time. Attendees will be free to dip in and out of presentations as they prefer, and the surgery days are free for attendees to familiarise and work on platform facilities as their time allows. Registration is free but attendance may be limited on a first-come, first-served basis depending on the level of demand. Early-stage researchers and PhD students are particularly encouraged to attend.

Invited (and confirmed) speakers:

Jos de Bruijne and Pedro Garcia-Lario (ESA), Andre Moitinho (University of Lisbon), Anthony Brown (University of Leiden), Marc Drobek (German Centre for Astrophysics), Andy Taylor (University of Edinburgh), Steven Gough-Kelly (University of Lancashire), Alfred Castro and Sagar Malhotra (University of Barcelona)

Organising team:

Nigel Hambly, Brendan O'Brien, Malcolm Illingworth, Simon Harnqvist, Bob Mann (University of Edinburgh); Mark Taylor (University of Bristol); Xavier Luri (University of Barcelona); Nic Walton (University of Cambridge)

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS:

 

 

 

 

Compute resources for UK Cloud-based science platform development for ESA Gaia and Euclid are provided by the UK Science and Technology Facilities Council (STFC) under the auspices of the IRIS initiative. Staff resources are provisioned via grants from the STFC and the Horizon Europe SPACIOUS programme.

Tuesday 9 December

Current facilities: Session block 1

Gaia DMP, SPACIOUS, ESA DataLabs

1 Introduction

Science platform developments for space astronomy will be reviewed as a collaboration of initiatives in the context of the focus week. A broad overview that touches on some of the later contributions will be given, and the schedule will be summarised emphasising the opportunities to engage with developers in surgery sessions on the third day, and in the stand-up "bring and share" session on the final day.

Speaker: Dr Nigel Hambly (Institute for Astronomy, University of Edinburgh)

2 ESA DataLabs: Gaia and Euclid DataLabs, present and planned

Speaker: Dr Jos de Bruijne (ESA)

Current facilities: Session block 2

Gaia DMP, SPACIOUS, ESA DataLabs

3 The SPACIOUS platform: design features from an end-user perspective

Speaker: Dr Brendan O'Brien (IfA, University of Edinburgh)

4 Gaia visualisation services on the SPACIOUS platform

Speaker: Prof. Andre Moitinho (University of Lisbon)

Current facilities: Session block 3

Gaia DMP, SPACIOUS, ESA DataLabs

5 Gaia data analysis services on the SPACIOUS platform

6 SPACIOUS opportunities in the coming year

Speaker: Prof. Xavier Luri (University of Barcelona)

7 Euclid data releases and their exploitation

Speaker: Prof. Andy Taylor (University of Edinburgh)

Future facilities: Session block

Science platforms planned for the future

8 Towards a Gaia Science Exploitation and Data Analysis Platform: Usage Scenarios and Requirements

I will describe our current plans for a Gaia Science Exploitation Platform, at least from the conceptual design, type of user profiles that we expect, usage scenarios and main science and technical requirements, relying in principle on the functionalities (to be) provided by the ESA DataLabs framework complemented potentially with external cloud resources.

Speaker: Pedro Garcia Lario (ESA)

9 From terminal to platform: challenges on building up a Cloud Science Platform in an HPC world at DZA

Speaker: Marc Drobek (German Center for Astrophysics (DZA))

Wednesday 10 December

Example usages: Session block 1

Presentations from existing users on how they are using existing science platforms

10 The Gaia survey selection function and the GaiaUnlimited project

I will present the GaiaUnlimited project which ran between 2021 and 2024 and was aimed at determining the Gaia survey selection function and providing corresponding data and tools. The complications in determining the Gaia selection function will be summarized and the way this was handled will be reviewed. I will also provide an overview of the various tools developed within this project and show some example science cases addressed with the tools. I will also point out the current computational challenges we face in connection the selection function for Gaia DR4 and the role of SPACIOUS.

Speaker: Prof. Anthony Brown (University of Leiden)

11 Heteroscedastic Observations of Large-Amplitude Long-Period Variables

Speaker: Steven Gough-Kelly (Jeremiah Horrocks Institute, University of Lancashire)

12 Star Clusters in the Gaia Era

Speaker: Dr Sagar Malhotra (University of Barcelona)

Example usages: Session block 2

Presentations from existing users on how they are using existing science platforms

13 Deriving the Galactic Star Formation History using Gaia data (science)

Speaker: Dr Marc del Alcázar-Julià (University of Barcelona)

14 Deriving the Galactic Star Formation History using Gaia data (demo)

Speaker: Dr Alfred Castro (University of Barcelona)

Example usages: contributed talks session 1

Presentations from existing users on how they are using existing science platforms

Example usages: contributed talks session 2

Presentations from existing users on how they are using existing science platforms

Thursday 11 December

Surgery: Session block

One-on-one surgery sessions, one hour each, available for attendees to sign-up for as they prefer

Friday 12 December

Bring & share: Session block 1

Following on from surgery sessions, familiarisation with platform services and (hopefully) some hands-on playing, round off the workshop week with a session for participants to share their usage example(s), experiences, feedback and future requirements.

15 Workshop summary and open discussion

A summary of the week and a chance for an open discussion as to science platform design and future requirements

Speaker: Dr Nigel Hambly (Institute for Astronomy, University of Edinburgh)