Contents

• aXe User Manual version 1.71
  • 1. Description
    • 1.1 What is aXe?
    • 1.2 Slitless Spectroscopy
    • 1.3 Apertures and Beams
    • 1.4 Pixel Extraction Tables (PET)
    • 1.5 Generating 1D spectra
    • 1.6 Sky Background
      • 1.6.1 Global Background Subtraction
      • 1.6.2 Local Background Subtraction
    • 1.7 Contamination
      • 1.7.1 Geometrical contamination
      • 1.7.2 Quantitative contamination
    • 1.8 Drizzling of PETs
    • 1.9 Optimal weighting
    • 1.10 Extraction parameters in aXe
    • 1.11 Flux conversion
    • 1.12 aXe Visualization
    • 1.13 Acknowledgement
  • 2. Installing aXe
    • 2.1 Requirements
      • 2.1.1 aXe Distribution
    • 2.2 Installing from the aXe source distribution
    • 2.3 Installing from the aXe binary distributions
    • 2.4 Validating the aXe installation
    • 2.5 aXe Mailing List
    • 2.6 aXe Support
  • 3. Using aXe
    • 3.1 The input data
    • 3.2 Preparing the extraction
      • 3.2.1 MultiDrizzle
      • 3.2.2 Master catalogue
      • 3.2.3 Preparing the Input Object Lists
      • 3.2.4 Preparing the fluxcube files
    • 3.3 Extracting spectra
      • 3.3.1 Reduction Strategy
      • 3.3.2 Input Image List
      • 3.3.3 The aXe Configuration Files
      • 3.3.4 Example reductions for the different scenarios
    • 3.4 Computing time
    • 3.5 The requirements
    • 3.6 Tuning tips
      • 3.6.1 Wavelength dependence of the PSF
      • 3.6.2 Extraction of higher grism orders
      • 3.6.3 Limits for contamination
  • 4. aXe tasks
    • 4.1 IOLPREP
      • 4.1.1 Usage
      • 4.1.2 Parameters
      • 4.1.3 Output
    • 4.2 FCUBEPREP
      • 4.2.1 Usage
      • 4.2.2 Parameters
      • 4.2.3 Output
    • 4.3 AXEPREP
      • 4.3.1 Usage
      • 4.3.2 Parameters
    • 4.4 AXECORE
      • 4.4.1 Usage
      • 4.4.2 Parameters
      • 4.4.3 Output
    • 4.5 DRZPREP
      • 4.5.1 Usage
      • 4.5.2 Parameters
      • 4.5.3 Output
    • 4.6 AXEDRIZZLE
      • 4.6.1 Usage
      • 4.6.2 Parameters
      • 4.6.3 Output
    • 4.7 SEX2GOL
      • 4.7.1 Usage
      • 4.7.2 Parameters
      • 4.7.3 Output
    • 4.8 GOL2AF
      • 4.8.1 Usage
      • 4.8.2 Parameters
      • 4.8.3 Output
    • 4.9 BACKEST
      • 4.9.1 Usage
      • 4.9.2 Parameters
      • 4.9.3 Output
    • 4.10 AF2PET
      • 4.10.1 Usage
      • 4.10.2 Parameters
      • 4.10.3 Output
    • 4.11 PETCONT
      • 4.11.1 Usage
      • 4.11.2 Parameters
      • 4.11.3 Output
    • 4.12 PETFF
      • 4.12.1 Usage
      • 4.12.2 Parameters
      • 4.12.3 Output
    • 4.13 PET2SPC
      • 4.13.1 Usage
      • 4.13.2 Parameters
      • 4.13.3 Output
    • 4.14 STAMPS
      • 4.14.1 Usage
      • 4.14.2 Parameters
      • 4.14.3 Output
    • 4.15 DRZ2PET
      • 4.15.1 Usage
      • 4.15.2 Parameters
      • 4.15.3 Output
    • 4.16 AXEGPS
      • 4.16.1 Usage
      • 4.16.2 Parameters
      • 4.16.3 Output
  • 5. Configuration of aXe tasks
    • 5.1 Environment Variables
    • 5.2 Configuration Files
      • 5.2.1 Main Configuration File
      • 5.2.2 Example of a Main Configuration file
  • 6. aXe Calibration Files
    • 6.1 Sensitivity Curve
    • 6.2 Flat field
  • 7. File Formats
    • 7.1 Input Images
    • 7.2 Fluxcube file
    • 7.3 Input Image List
    • 7.4 Input Object List
    • 7.5 Grism Object List
    • 7.6 Aperture File
    • 7.7 Background Estimate File
    • 7.8 Pixel Extraction Table
    • 7.9 The Drizzle Prepare File
    • 7.10 The 2D Drizzled Grism Image
    • 7.11 Extracted Spectra File
    • 7.12 Stamp Image File
    • 7.13 Weight Image File
    • 7.14 Contamination File
  • 8. Virtual slits
  • Bibliography
  • Index