R2-D2: Roman and Rubin -- From Data to Discovery
Abstract
The NASA Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope (Roman) and the Vera C. Rubin Observatory Legacy Survey of Space and Time (Rubin), will transform our view of the wide-field sky, with similar sensitivities, but complementary in wavelength, spatial resolution, and time domain coverage. Here we present findings from the AURA Roman+Rubin Synergy Working group, charged by the STScI and NOIRLab Directors to identify frontier science questions in General Astrophysics, beyond the well-covered areas of Dark Energy and Cosmology, that can be uniquely addressed with Roman and Rubin synergies in observing strategy, data products and archiving, joint analysis, and community engagement. This analysis was conducted with input from the community in the form of brief (1-2 paragraph) "science pitches" (see Appendix), and testimony from "outside experts" (included as co-authors). We identify a rich and broad landscape of potential discoveries catalyzed by the combination of exceptional quality and quantity of Roman and Rubin data, and summarize implementation requirements that would facilitate this bounty of additional science with coordination of survey fields, joint coverage of the Galactic plane, bulge, and ecliptic, expansion of General Investigator and Target of Opportunity observing modes, co-location of Roman and Rubin data, and timely distribution of data, transient alerts, catalogs, value-added joint analysis products, and simulations to the broad astronomical community.
Cite
@article{arxiv.2202.12311,
title = {R2-D2: Roman and Rubin -- From Data to Discovery},
author = {Suvi Gezari and Misty Bentz and Kishalay De and K. Decker French and Aaron Meisner and Michelle Ntampaka and Robert Jedicke and Ekta Patel and Daniel Perley and Robyn Sanderson and Christian Aganze and Igor Andreoni and Eric F. Bell and Edo Berger and Ian Dell'Antonio and Ryan Foley and Henry Hsieh and Mansi Kasliwal and Joel Kastner and Charles D. Kilpatrick and J. Davy Kirkpatrick and Casey Lam and Karen Meech and Dante Minniti and Ethan O. Nadler and Daisuke Nagai and Justin Pierel and Irene Shivaei and Rachel Street and Erik J. Tollerud and Benjamin Williams},
journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:2202.12311},
year = {2022}
}
Comments
29 pages, 12 figures, Table of Implementation Recommendations, Appendix of Community Science Pitches, AURA-commissioned whitepaper submitted to the Director of STScI (Ken Sembach) and the Director of NOIRLab (Pat McCarthy)