Astronomy

Why HDF^® Technologies?

An amazingly broad range of astronomy instruments, such as optical and radio telescopes and the gravitational wave laser interferometer, are collecting unprecedented and unmanageable amounts of data about the very largest in the very smallest objects and phenomena in our universe. Much of this data is so voluminous and arrives at such great speeds that it can only be archived for short periods of time.

What makes HDF5 especially attractive in the world of astronomy is the combination of HDF5’s ability to handle data of any size and fast acquisition rates, to combine and effectively integrate data from many different sources, to run on virtually any computing platform from laptops to petascale computers, and to provide a software ecosystem that includes the best tools for analyzing, visualizing, and archiving this data.

How HDF Technologies are Used

• The LOFAR radio telescope collects 35 TB of data per hour.
• The IceCube Neutrino Observatory uses a grid of more than 5000 light sensors embedded in a cubic kilometer of glacial ice at the South Pole.
• The LIGO gravitational wave experiment has thousands of instruments including accelerometers, seismometers, vacuum monitors and muon detectors whose data must be integrated and analyzed.