Euro-VO
The European Virtual Observatory (
Euro-VO)
is an integrated and coordinated program designed to
provide the European astronomical community with tools, systems,
research support, and data interoperability standards necessary to
enable astronomers simplified access to the information they need to
complete their research. The idea of the Euro-VO is to make it feel as if
all the astronomical data and tools are available on
the astronomers desktop, even though they are
actually located on systems spread out over the
whole of Europe and even the rest of the world.
Euro-VO is conceived as having three "arms", each of which is a
meant as a virtual organisation with a variety of partners. The first is
the VO Facility Centre (VOFC), which concentrates on support
of the user community, and training and dissemination. The second is
the Data Centre Alliance (DCA) which co-ordinates the efforts of
organisations around Europe which need to deploy VO services, tools,
and technologies, and shares best practice. The third arm is the
VO Technology Centre (VOTC), whose aim is to co-ordinate the work
of organisations who are developing the backbone technology, responding
to the needs of the VOFC and DCA, as well as the
astronomy community in general.
The VOTECH project was the first project meant to embody the
spirit of the VOTC, and as such was responsible for completing the
design work and feasibility studies on the backbone
software components that will make the Euro-VO
possible.
For more information about Euro-VO overall, see the
Euro-VO homepage and
especially this
introductory explanation, and this
summary of the three arms.
Related Projects and links
-
Virtual Observatory Facility Centre (VOFC). This is an
organisation that provides the Euro-VO with a centralised
registry for resources, standards and certification mechanisms
as well as community support for VO technology take-up and
dissemination and scientific program support using VO
technologies and resources. It is led by ESO and ESA in partnership.
-
Virtual Observatory Technology Centre (VOTC). This is
a partnership of organisations and projects collaborating to design
and build new technology and tools for Euro-VO. The VOTECH project
was the first implementation of this concept, but its work continues
through a variety of funding sources, including the AIDA project
(see below). The VOTC has been led by the UK, through the AstroGrid
consortium (see below).
- Data
Centre Alliance (DCA). The DCA is an alliance of
data centre communities represented at a national level. The DCA
coordinates and assists European Data Centres to take up VO
standards, share best practice for data providers, consolidate
operational requirements for VO-enabled tools and systems and
enable the identification and promotion of scientific
requirements from programs of strategic national interest that
require VO technologies and services. The DCA has been led by
CDS in Strasbourg, and has been
funded by the
EU project VO-DCA.
- AstroGrid. A UK funded
program that has built both a suite of technical software for
data centres and VO projects, and a suite of desktop
applications and related web services for use by astronomers.
The VOExplorer application is particularly useful for
astronomers as a tool for finding and utilizing the myriad of
services available on the VO. AstroGrid also built the VO
infrastructure in the UK which includes registries, data access,
data storage, and security services deployed at a number of UK
institutions. The funded project finishes in December 2009, but
is being continued as an open source project, the AstroGrid
Software Foundation.
-
Astronomical Infrastructure for Data Access (AIDA).
EuroVO-AIDA aims at unifying the digital data collections of
European astronomy, integrating their access mechanisms with
evolving e-technologies, and enhancing the science extracted
from these datasets. The EuroVO-AIDA project builds on the VOTECH
and VO-DCA projects, leading
the transition of Euro-VO into an operational phase. As well as
deployment work, it contains "Joint Research Activities" which
continue the work of the VOTC.
- International Virtual
Observatory Alliance (IVOA).
The International Virtual
Observatory Alliance (IVOA) was formed in June 2002 with a
mission to "facilitate the international coordination and
collaboration necessary for the development and deployment of
the tools, systems and organizational structures necessary to
enable the international utilization of astronomical archives as
an integrated and interoperating virtual observatory."
The work of the IVOA focuses on the development of
standards that enable ubiquitous sharing of information, data,
and services between disparate international institutions.
Staff from VO projects around the world join in a number of
Working Groups aimed at developing a complete set of required
standards. Twice yearly "interoperability workshops" are held
to take forward this programme of work. The work is overseen by
an Executive Committee made of
senior representatives from each national VO project.
VOTECH website is hosted at the Institute for
Astronomy, University of Edinburgh - last updated: 09-Nov-2009
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