astro_maddenI mentioned how the US military sometimes censors astronomy images, and I got a few questions about it, so I thought I’d belay you down into a now vitiated Pan-STARRS dataset.
In 2007, the Panoramic Survey Telescope And Rapid Response System (Pan-STARRS) began taking pictures of the night sky with the largest digital camera that had ever been built. 166 4k monitors worth of pixels per snapshot. The system was designed to gaze deep and wide to catch any signs of motion from asteroids zipping through the solar system. This setup also made it great at picking out manmade satellites. The US Air Force was interested enough in this prospect to fund most of the construction of Pan-STARRS, but with some strings attached. The images had to be passed through a processing pipeline that redacted sections of pixels where satellite trails were found. The Air Force’s heavy-handed algorithm left scientists with data full of crisscrossed swaths of dead space. I spoke with Gene Magnier, the lead of the data analysis system, and he mentioned some cases where up to 50% of the image would be lost to censoring, far worse than they had expected. Changes in funding and the persistent complaints from astronomers eventually put an end to the censoring, but Gene estimates that the project lost about a year of productivity.
I had heard this story but had never seen what the censored images looked like. All of the Pan-STARRS data was eventually reprocessed so you won’t find the censored images in the database today. Gene couldn’t find any examples himself but described what to look for. I eventually wiggled my way into a supernova detection catalog with Pan-STARRS data that Gene confirmed to contain censor lines. I hope these 100x100 cutouts you see here aren’t all we have left of this fascinating moment in the history of space imaging. If anyone has some Pan-STARRS data of a pre-2011 vintage, let me know.
astro_madden I mentioned how the US military sometimes censors astronomy images, and I got a few questions about it, so I thought I’d belay you down into a now vitiated Pan-STARRS dataset.
Show moreIn 2007, the Panoramic Survey Telescope And Rapid Response System (Pan-STARRS) began taking pictures of the night sky with the largest digital camera that had ever been built. 166 4k monitors worth of pixels per snapshot. The system was designed to gaze deep and wide to catch any signs of motion from asteroids zipping through the solar system. This setup also made it great at picking out manmade satellites. The US Air Force was interested enough in this prospect to fund most of the construction of Pan-STARRS, but with some strings attached. The images had to be passed through a processing pipeline that redacted sections of pixels where satellite trails were found. The Air Force’s heavy-handed algorithm left scientists with data full of crisscrossed swaths of dead space. I spoke with Gene Magnier, the lead of the data analysis system, and he mentioned some cases where up to 50% of the image would be lost to censoring, far worse than they had expected. Changes in funding and the persistent complaints from astronomers eventually put an end to the censoring, but Gene estimates that the project lost about a year of productivity.
I had heard this story but had never seen what the censored images looked like. All of the Pan-STARRS data was eventually reprocessed so you won’t find the censored images in the database today. Gene couldn’t find any examples himself but described what to look for. I eventually wiggled my way into a supernova detection catalog with Pan-STARRS data that Gene confirmed to contain censor lines. I hope these 100x100 cutouts you see here aren’t all we have left of this fascinating moment in the history of space imaging. If anyone has some Pan-STARRS data of a pre-2011 vintage, let me know.
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