GREAT-ITN School 2012

The GREAT-ITN is a Marie-Curie Initial Training Network (ITN) which aims at preparing a generation of young researchers for the scientific exploitation of the Gaia mission catalogue data. The GREAT-ITN project will shape a critical mass of new expertise with the fundamental skills required to power the scientific exploitation of Gaia over the coming decade and beyond.

As part of the training programme of the GREAT-ITN, a school was organised by the Instituto de Astrofísica de Canarias in La Laguna (Tenerife, Canary Island, Spain) on September 2012, with the support of the Severo Ochoa programme. It was entitled "The art of observational campaigns" and aimed at providing the students with a deep understanding of all stages of a large observational project, from the conception, through planning organisation, management observations and reduction.

The main aim of the school was to explore the many aspects of developing a large scientific observation programme and how to convert a scientific problem into a feasible observational project. It began with a description of two large observational projects: Gaia and GES, then a detailed view of observation management and logistics was given, together with a view about data treatment and reduction. Also the pre-observations and models developement phase was reviewed. Finally an overview on how the Virtual Observatory tools can be applied in this context and and how to optimize observations in the ESO and the Canary Islands observatories were given.

A working visit to the Observatorio del Teide (OT, Tenerife) to run some observations was also scheduled and some practical exercises were developed by the students.

More information at: The art of observational campaigns GREAT-ITN School