Frameworks: Target and Observation Manager Systems for Multi-Messenger and Time Domain Science

目前和不久的将来，美国领导的天文学调查提供了一个革命性的机会，通过多种信使和仪器探索物理现象，将引力波探测与中微子特征和电磁对应物联系起来。这种结合为天体物理学和物理界的广泛研究提供了强有力的新见解。这些调查的规模意味着前所未有的pb级数据量及其快速交付必须得到有效管理，以充分发挥其科学潜力，但仅凭这些数据并不能完全表征这些发现。通常需要从具有补充仪器的设施中进行额外的观测，但及时获得这些观测结果可能会给试图识别和表征感兴趣的时间敏感目标的研究人员以及这些设施的基础设施带来严重的技术挑战。创新的新软件工具使研究人员能够通过一个单一的编程界面轻松地建立一个数据库来管理他们科学项目的所有方面，包括进行观测。这些工具的能力正在扩大，以确保它们与其他快速发展的关键科学软件服务无缝集成，特别是进行后续观测的设施范围。这为许多具有里程碑意义的勘探提供了发现和表征链中的关键环节。然而，从历史上看，这种复杂的数据库驱动系统只适用于拥有内部软件团队的大型项目和机构。这使得利用纳税人资助的主要科研设施的科学潜力的不公平现象得以延续。在这个项目中开发的文档齐全的开源软件包，称为TOM（目标和观察管理器）工具包，以及相关的社区发展计划，将使这些专业研究工具对每个人都可用，包括教育工作者和公民科学家。确保研究人员能够快速接收新发现的信息，管理和评估所有感兴趣目标的相关数据，并及时有效地进行后续观测，对于实现现代重大天文调查和任务的科学潜力至关重要。只有当我们能够充分处理数据速率时，实时交付的pb级数据产品才有用。认识到这一点，人们在生成调查数据产品方面投入了大量精力，但大多数研究人员使用这些产品进行科学调查的工具通常是文本文件、电子表格和其他应用程序的临时组合，这些工具不能很好地扩展，也不能与其他关键服务一起操作。大数据时代需要科学项目管理软件与现有服务接口，如发现警报经纪人和望远镜，使科学家能够有效地整理与他们的兴趣相关的信息，并管理后续观测计划的各个方面。现代的、基于浏览器的数据探索和可视化工具使各种科学成为可能，设计良好的公共软件可以确保研究人员花时间使用这些工具进行科学研究，而不是反复地重新发明它们。研究人员和软件工程师之间的合作关系确保科学能够利用处理大数据已经成为标准的行业的最新发展。TOM软件包提供了这个关键的工具集，确保它与该领域不断发展的服务完全集成，并扩展其功能以满足用户的需求。这个项目推进了NSF宇宙大构想窗口的目标。该奖项反映了美国国家科学基金会的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的知识价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

Current and near-future U.S.-led astronomy surveys offer a revolutionary opportunity to explore physical phenomena through multiple messengers and instruments, associating gravitational wave detections with neutrino signatures and electromagnetic counterparts. The combination provides powerful new insights relevant to a broad range of research in the astrophysical and physics communities. The scale of these surveys means that unprecedented, petabyte scale data volumes and their rapid delivery must be managed effectively to fully realize their scientific potential, but these data alone cannot fully characterize the discoveries. Additional observations from facilities with complementary instrumentation are normally required, but obtaining these in a timely manner can present serious technical challenges, both to researchers trying to identify and characterize time-sensitive targets of interest, and to the infrastructure of these facilities. Innovative new software tools enable researchers to easily build a database to manage all aspects of their science projects, including conducting observations, through a single programmatic interface. The capabilities of these tools are expanding to ensure that they are seamlessly integrated with other, rapidly developing linchpin scientific software services, especially the range of facilities where follow-up observations are conducted. This provides a critical link in the chain of discovery and characterization for many landmark surveys. Yet historically, such sophisticated database-driven systems have only been available to larger projects and institutions with in-house software teams. This perpetuates inequitable access to the scientific potential of major taxpayer-funded facilities. The well-documented open source software package to be developed in this project, called the TOM (Target and Observation Manager) toolkit, and an associated community development program, will make these professional research tools accessible to everyone, including educators and citizen scientists. Ensuring that researchers can receive information on new discoveries rapidly, manage and evaluate all relevant data on targets of interest, and conduct follow-up observations in a timely and effective manner, is essential to realizing the scientific potential of modern major astronomical surveys and missions. Petabyte-scale data products, delivered in real-time, are useful only if we can adequately handle the data rate. Recognizing this, much effort has been invested in generating the survey data products, but the tools used by most researchers to do science investigations with these products are often an ad hoc combination of text files, spreadsheets and other applications that do not scale well and are not designed to operate with other key services. The Big Data era demands scientific project management software that interface with existing services, such as discovery alert brokers and telescopes, to enable scientists to effectively collate information relevant to their interests, and to manage all aspects of follow-up observing programs. Modern, browser-based data exploration and visualization tools enable a diverse range of science, and well-designed public software can ensure that researchers spend time using these tools for science instead of repeatedly re-inventing them. A partnership between researchers and software engineers ensures that science can take advantage of the latest developments from industries where handling Big Data is already standard. The TOM software package provides this critical tool set, ensures that it remains fully integrated with the evolving services in the field, and expands its capabilities to meet the needs of users. This project advances the goals of the NSF Windows on the Universe Big Idea.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.