• 1: SOC HOMEPAGE
• 2: MLI CORRECTION
• 3: CLOCK CORRECTION
• 4: BACKGROUND FILTERING

NuSTAR Data Analysis Software and Calibration history

CALDB release history

This list does not include releases that are only for updates to clock correction files that occur approximatly every two weeks. Click on the version number for the release notes and click HERE for a combined ASCII file of all CALDB releases.

Release date	Version	Description
2021-10-26	20211020	This CALDB release contains a major update in the calibration of the NuSTAR observatory based on detailed analysis of more than nine years of observations of the Crab, utilizing both focused and stray light measurements. Details of the analysis are presented in Madsen et al. (2021) JATIS, in prep. (arXiv), which is also available via the HEASARC CALDB documentation page. A detailed summary of this update is also available on the CALDB 20211020 SOC webpage. The overall changes between the previous (CALDB v20211004 and earlier) and this new calibration are primarily off-axis dependent. Users of the updated calibration may see the following changes compared to previous analysis: • A flux increase of ~5% for sources < 1' off-axis      □ A flux increase of ~10% for sources 1' to 2' off-axis      □ A flux increase of ~15% for sources > 4' off-axis • Slopes of power law model components may change by ~0.04 depending on off-axis angle • More accurate high-energy and high off-axis angle corrections • A better agreement in the FPMA and FPMB flux measurements We expect that for most NuSTAR observations this calibration update will have little or no practical change in interpretation results, especially for analysis of low signal-to-noise spectra. This CALDB release also contains an update to the tracking of the NuSTAR detector gain. Details are available in the calibration memo Grefenstette et al. (2021). There is no update to NuSTARDAS required to utilize CALDB v20211020.
2021-02-23	20210210	This CALDB release contains an update to NuSTAR alignment calibration to improve observatory astrometry bringing the source positions on both Focal Plane Modules into better agreement with one another and closer to the J2000 source coordinates. The update is in the CALDB only (no NuSTARDAS update required) and affects the source position of events only and not the energy of events. This alignment update primarily improves observations taken after August 2017, but also adds some improvements across the entire mission lifetime. Before 2017, the astrometric improvement is on the order of a pixel (~2.5 arcsec). From 2017 onwards, the adjustment of the source coordinates steadily increases from one pixel in 2017 up to a possible 4-5 pixels (8 - 10 arcsec) in late 2020. This release also contains an update to the NuSTAR Clock Correction file (v116) as well as a file describing the attenuation due to the beryllium (Be) window covering the detectors. This file is useful for some users performing analysis of stray light (either stray light due to the cosmic X-ray background or stray light due to off-axis, bright X-ray sources) but is not directly used by NuSTARDAS.
2020-11-03	20201101	This CALDB release contains an update to the NuSTAR Clock Correction file that corrects for previous gaps in NuSTAR instrument engineering files. Affected sequenceID's have been reprocessed and redelivered to the NuSTAR archive. A list of these sequenceID's can be found on the DLOG update webpage. The clock correction file in this release (v111) was produced based on the updated engineering files and is expected to provide improved performance than the previous clock file, especially for observations that occurred during the previous gaps.
2020-08-13	20200813	This CALDB update contains required files for the NuSTARDAS v2.0.0 update which implements a new temperature-dependence during the ARF generation. v108 (and later) Clock correction files contain an improvement of the clock offset model that corrects for a ~5ms systematic shift in absolute alignment to UTC time. Corrects for time intervals with no temperature measurements.
2020-05-06	20200429	High resolution clock correction files implemented MLI correction of ARF for FPMA
2019-12-19	20191219	Patch for release 20191213 which updated the gain and badpixel files
2019-12-13	20191213	Update for long term gain tracking and badpixel files
2017-08-21	20170727	CALDB files used for SAA filtering saamode=3
2016-06-06	20160606	Update gain, effective area, line of sight absorption gain v007, DETABS v003, VIGN v007
2016-05-02	20160502	Defines how CHU combinations are split with nusplitsc   requires NuSTARDAS v1.6.0 or later SAAPAR update
2015-03-20	20150316	Gain calibration improvement over the entire mission
2014-07-01	20140414	Adjusted CLC files to improve gain calibration
2014-01-17	20131223	VIGN adjustment (69.5 keV W edge)
2013-11-25	20131007	ARF adjustment to match XMM/Swift/Chandra fluxes (NuSTAR flux -15%) Updates to INSTRMAP, PIXPOS, energy dependent PSF Updated hkrange files
2013-08-14	20130509	Initial CALDB release




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