Simons Observatory

The Simons Observatory (S.O.) is an experiment with multiple telescopes that began operating in the Atacama Desert in Chile over the last couple years. It uses a combination of small-aperture telescopes and a large-aperture telescope operating at multiple microwave frequencies to accomplish a range of science goals.

Project Role

I am currently the lead for Software Infrastructure within the Data Management portion of the Simons Observatory project. This involves coordinating effort on the software frameworks that allow the simulation and reduction components to effectively process data. It also involves building tools for working with and curating raw and synthetic data, and deployment of our software stack.

Recent Work

• Ongoing development and customization of TOAST to serve the needs of S.O.

• Performance studies and improvements to enable fast I/O of raw data and telescope sensors.

• Exploration of systematics in the small-aperture telescope data.

• Software deployment of our integrated stack within the conda-forge ecosystem.

Software Tools

More information about the various software packages I work on in Simons Observatory can be found here.

Future Directions

The Genesis Mission presents a unique opportunity to integrate deep learning models and agentic control into our observatory operations. This could lead to dramatic improvements in operational efficiency.