Astrometric Calibration of the Sloan Digital Sky Survey
Open accessAbstract
The astrometric calibration of the Sloan Digital Sky Survey is described. For point sources brighter than r ∼ 20, the astrometric accuracy is 45 mas rms per coordinate when reduced against the USNO CCD Astrograph Catalog and 75 mas rms when reduced against Tycho-2, with an additional 20–30 mas systematic error in both cases. The rms errors are dominated by anomalous refraction and random errors in the primary reference catalogs. The relative astrometric accuracy between the r filter and each of the other filters ( u , g , i , z ) is 25–35 mas rms. At the survey limit ( r ∼ 22), the astrometric accuracy is limited by photon statistics to approximately 100 mas rms for typical seeing. Anomalous refraction is shown to contain components correlated over 2° or more on the sky.
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Even SDSS delivers uncorrelated systematic errors at the level of 20-30 mas; the expected image quality for LSST will be twice as good as for SDSS.
“Even a drift-scanning survey such as SDSS delivers uncorrelated systematic errors ( dominated by seeing effects ) at the level of 20 -30 mas ( measured from repeated scans; Pier et al. 2003 ) ; the expected image quality for LSST will be twice as good as for SDSS.”
From LSST: From Science Drivers to Reference Design and Anticipated Data Products (2019) · cites this paper as Pier et al. 2003
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References 23 · Cited by 908
Research works printed but not linked: 5
- Lupton, R., Gunn, J. E., Ivezic ´, Z ˇ., Knapp, G. R., Kent, S., & Yasuda, N. 2001, in ASP Conf. Ser. 238, Astronomical Data Analysis Software and Systems X, ed. F. R. Harnden, Jr., F. A. Primini, & H. E. Payne (San Francisco: ASP), 269
- Naito, I., & Sugawa, C. 1984, in Geodetic Refraction, ed. F. K. Brunner (Berlin: Springer), 181
- Petravick, D., et al. 1994, Proc. SPIE, 2198, 935
- Wallace, P. T. 1994, in ASP Conf. Ser. 61, Astronomical Data Analysis Software and Systems III, ed. D. R. Crabtree, R. J. Hanisch, & J. Barnes (San Francisco: ASP), 481
- Webb, E. K. 1984, in Geodetic Refraction, ed. F. K. Brunner (Berlin: Springer), 85
- Authors
- Pier, J. R., Munn, J. A., Hindsley, R. B., Hennessy, G. S., Kent, S. M., Lupton, R. H., & Ivezić, Ž.
- Affiliations
- United States Naval Observatory (US)
- United States Naval Research Laboratory (US)
- Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory (US)
- Princeton University (US)
- ORCID
- Ivezić, Željko
- Venue
- The Astronomical Journal
- Publisher
- American Astronomical Society
- Published
- 2003-03
- Volume
- 125
- Issue
- 3
- Pages
- 1559-1579
- ISSN
- 0004-6256 (ISSN-L)
- 1538-3881
- OpenAlex
- W1996494007
- Cited by
- 908
- References
- 23
- Citations by year
- 2026: 2 · 2025: 5 · 2024: 4 · 2023: 9 · 2022: 4 · 2021: 5 · 2020: 4 · 2019: 9 · 2018: 21 · 2017: 19 · 2016: 38 · 2015: 25 · 2014: 30 · 2013: 38 · 2012: 48
- FWCI
- 144.66
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- bronze
- doi.org
- Locations
- The Astronomical Journal (publishedVersion)
- arXiv (Cornell University) (submittedVersion)
- arXiv (Cornell University)
- Funders
- National Science Foundation
- U.S. Department of Energy (DE-AC02-76CH03000, DE-AC02-)
- National Aeronautics and Space Administration
- Princeton University
- California Institute of Technology
- University of Washington
- Johns Hopkins University
- University of Pittsburgh
- New Mexico State University
- Jet Propulsion Laboratory
- U.S. Naval Observatory
- Fermilab (DE-AC02-76CH03000)
- Los Alamos National Laboratory
- Topics
- Physical Sciences › Physics and Astronomy › Instrumentation › Astronomy and Astrophysical Research
- Physical Sciences › Physics and Astronomy › Astronomy and Astrophysics › Stellar, planetary, and galactic studies
- Physical Sciences › Engineering › Computational Mechanics › Astronomical Observations and Instrumentation
- Keywords
- Sloan Digital Sky Survey, astrometric calibration, astrometric accuracy, Tycho-2, anomalous refraction, systematic errors, reference catalog, photometric filters, photon statistics, seeing, point source
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