Apex II Image Processing System: Application To Space Debris Tracking
- Paper number
IAC-07-A6.1.10
- Author
Mr. Vladimir Kouprianov, Central Astronomical Observatory, RAS, Russia
- Year
2007
- Abstract
We describe the major features of Apex II, a general-purpose software platform for astronomical CCD image processing, being developed at Central (Pulkovo) Observatory of the Russian Academy of Sciences. The package is currently used as the standard tool for initial CCD frame reduction by most of observatories participating in the Pulkovo Cooperation of Optical Observers (PulCOO), which includes primarily observatories of the former Soviet Union. Some general problems solved by Apex II within PulCOO are follow-up observations of fragments of high geocentric orbit objects and near-Earth asteroids, with automated astrometry and photometry pipelines for large sets of observations. Here we focus mostly on specific techniques related to processing of space debris observations, including raw image calibration, positional and photometric measurements, astrometric reduction with correction of optical aberrations, orbit determination, and object identification. Implementation of these techniques for both automated and interactive image reduction in the framework of the Apex II platform is described.
- Abstract document