A4 Refereed article in a conference publication
Automated scheduler for the SOXS instrument: design and performance
Authors: Asquini, Laura; Landoni, Marco; Young, David; Marty, Laurent; Smartt, Stephen; Campana, Sergio; Claudi, Riccardo; Schipani, Pietro; Achren, Jani; Aliverti, Matteo; Araiza-Duran, Jose A.; Arcavi, Iair; Battaini, Federico; Baruffolo, Andrea; Ben-Ami, Sagi; Bianco, Andrea; Bichkovsky, Alex; Brucalassi, Anna; Bruch, Rachel; Capasso, Giulio; Cappellaro, Enrico; Colapietro, Mirko; Cosentino, Rosario; D'Alessio, Francesco; D'Avanzo, Paolo; Della Valle, Massimo; D'Orsi, Sergio; Di Benedetto, Rosario; Di Filippo, Simone; Gal-Yam, Avishay; Genoni, Matteo; Diaz, Marcos Hernandez; Hershko, Ofir; Kotilainen, Jari; Kuncarayakti, Hanindyo; Li Causi, Gianluca; Mattila, Seppo; Munari, Matteo; Pariani, Giorgio; Ventura, Hector Perez; Pignata, Giuliano; Radhakrishnan, Kalyan; Rappaport, Michael; Ricci, Davide; Riva, Marco; Rubin, Adam; Salasnich, Bernardo; Savarese, Salvatore; Stritzinger, Maximilian; Scuderi, Salvatore; Vitali, Fabrizio; Sanchez, Ricardo Zanmar
Editors: Ibsen, Jorge; Chiozzi, Gianluca
Conference name: SPIE Astronomical Telescopes + Instrumentation
Publisher: SPIE-INT SOC OPTICAL ENGINEERING
Publishing place: BELLINGHAM
Publication year: 2024
Journal: Proceedings of SPIE : the International Society for Optical Engineering
Book title : Software and Cyberinfrastructure for Astronomy VIII
Journal acronym: PROC SPIE
Article number: 131012F
Series title: Proceedings of SPIE
Volume: 13101
Number of pages: 7
ISBN: 978-1-5106-7525-4
eISBN: 978-1-5106-7526-1
ISSN: 0277-786X
eISSN: 1996-756X
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1117/12.3018271(external)
Web address : https://doi.org/10.1117/12.3018271(external)
We present the advancements in the development of the scheduler for the Son Of X-shooter (SOXS, 1,2) instrument at the ESO-NTT 3.58-m telescope in La Silla, Chile. SOXS is designed as a single-object spectroscopic facility and features a high-efficiency spectrograph with two arms covering the spectral range of 350-2000 nm and a mean resolving power of approximately R=4500. Its primary purpose is to conduct UV-visible and near-infrared follow-up observations of astrophysical transients, drawing from a broad pool of targets accessible through the streaming services of wide-field telescopes, both current and future, as well as high-energy satellites. The instrument is set to cater to various scientific objectives within the astrophysical community, each entailing specific requirements for observation planning, a challenge that the observing scheduler must address. A notable feature of SOXS is that it will operate at the European Southern Observatory (ESO) in La Silla, without the presence of astronomers on the mountain. This poses a unique challenge for the scheduling process, demanding a fully automated algorithm that is autonomously interacting with the appropriate databases and the La Silla Weather API, and is capable of presenting the operator not only with an ordered list of optimal targets (in terms of observing constraints) but also with optimal backups in the event of changing weather conditions. This requirement imposes the necessity for a scheduler with rapid-response capabilities without compromising the optimization process, ensuring the high quality of observations and best use of the time at the telescope. We thus developed a new highly available and scalable architecture, implementing API Restful applications like Docker Containers, API Gateway, and Python-based Flask frameworks. We provide an overview of the current state of the scheduler, which is now ready for the approaching on-site testing during Commissioning phase, along with insights into its web interface and preliminary performance tests.
