De Science Archive Operation Group ontvangt en verdeelt gegevens van ESO en de Hubble-ruimtetelescoop, en biedt frontline ondersteuning aan de gebruiker.
Per jaar gaat, in respons op ongeveer 10.000 aanvragen via de website, ongeveer 12 terabyte (TB) aan openbare gegevens door het ESO-archief. Daarnaast worden meer dan 2000 cd's en dvd's met beschermde gegevens naar de verschillende hoofdonderzoekers gestuurd, die uit waarnemingen in service mode zijn voortgekomen. Het complete archief omvat momenteel ongeveer 65 TB aan gegevens, met een aanvoer van ongeveer 15 TB per jaar. Dat zal binnenkort met zeker een factor 10 toenemen, omdat alleen al de nabij-infraroodcamera van de Visible and Infrared Survey Telescope for Astronomy (VISTA) jaarlijks 150 TB aan gegevens zal produceren.
De enterprise-class servers van ESO worden gecoördineerd tussen Duitsland en Chili, en kunnen qua technologie en complexiteit wedijveren met die van grote commerciële ondernemingen, zoals het internationale bankwezen.
Het digitale heelal
Belangrijke doorbraken in de technologie van telescopen, detectors en computers maken nu astronomische surveys mogelijk die enorme hoeveelheden foto's, spectra en catalogi opleveren. Deze gegevensbestanden bestrijken de hemel op alle golflengten, van gamma- en röntgenstraling tot zichtbaar licht, infraroodstraling en radiostraling.
Astronomen ontwikkelen methoden om nieuw onderzoek te doen door deze enorme hoeveelheid gegevens van dit 'digitale heelal' eenvoudig toegankelijk te maken. Deze technieken maken gebruik van de filosofie van grid computing, met naadloze en transparante toegang tot de gegevens via 'Virtuele Sterrenwachten'.
Zoals een echte sterrenwacht telescopen heeft, elk met unieke instrumenten, bestaat een Virtuele Sterrenwacht uit datacentra met elk hun unieke verzamelingen van astronomische gegevens, softwaresystemen en verwerkingsmogelijkheden.
Virtuele Sterrenwachten hebben hun effectiviteit reeds bewezen, bijvoorbeeld door de ontdekking van 31 nieuwe, optisch zwakke verduisterde quasarkandidaten in de hemelvelden van de bestaande Great Observatories Origin Deep Survey (GOODS), waarmee het bekende aantal van deze objecten verviervoudigd is. Deze ontdekking betekent dat surveys van krachtige superzware zwarte gaten hun aantallen tot nu toe met minstens een factor twee hebben onderschat, en mogelijk zelfs met een factor vijf. (Zie ESO-persbericht eso0418.)
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