INTRODUCTION

COROT: ("COnvection, ROtation and Transits"), is a mission with two principal objectives: the study of stellar interiors using asteroseismology techniques, and the discovery of extrasolar planets using the transit method. Successfully launched in December 2006, CoRoT has been providing the astronomical community with a number of revolutionary results on the internal structure of stars and on the physical properties of extrasolar planets.

The need for an archive for the CoRoT data was identified in the early phases of the project. In March 2003, LAEFF was selected, together with the CDS, to be responsible for the long-term storage and maintenance of the CoRoT Final Archive, which will contain all CoRoT data processed in a homogeneous and uniform way. This Final Archive will represent the legacy of the mission for future generations of researchers and educators. In addition to the Final Archive, efficient data management and data interchange mechanisms have been set up to work during the operational phase of CoRoT. In this framework two types of archives have been defined.

The Mission Archive: Located at the Institut d'Astrophysique Spatiale (IAS) in Paris, the Mission Archive is the only access point for CoRoT data during the proprietary period.

The Public Archives: Containing only publicly available data, these are dynamic archives since new data as well as re-calibrations of previous data will be ingested during the mission lifetime. The Public Archives are being developed at the IAS (Paris), CDS (Strasbourg), NStED (Pasadena, California), and LAEX (Madrid). For the sake of integrity, the data are stored at IAS and remotely accessed from the Public Archives.

FUNCTIONALITIES

Archive Search

The CoRoT Public Archive at LAEFF is accessed by means of a web-based fill-in form that permits queries by observing run, observational programme (asteroseismology or exoplanet), type of data (monochromatic or chromatic light curves in the exoplanet channel), CoRoT identification, object name, and coordinates and radius. Searches can be filtered by different criteria like observing date, V magnitude, (B-V) color, spectral type and/or luminosity class. Searches are case-independent, and wildcards (%) are permitted for the CoRoT ID field. The system furthermore incorporates a built-in name resolver allowing queries by any of the names provided by the SIMBAD database. The output fields may be ordered by coordinates or CoRoT identifier. The output format is in HTML with a pre-defined number of results shown per page.

Results from Search

The system provides the following functionalities:

Name resolver: By clicking the object name, a list of equivalent names as provided by SIMBAD is displayed.

Multidownload: Data in FITS format can be retrieved in groups. For multiple-file retrieval it is possible to include or exclude individual datasets. Multiple-file download generates a file in ZIP format. For asteroseismology data, the system also offers the possibility of downloading each of the FITS binary table extensions (Raw, Hel and Helreg) in ASCII format.

FITS Header/Data preview: An interactive plot of the light curve as well as a visualization of the associated FITS header is generated by clicking on the corresponding link. Both raw and clean (only points with status=0) light curves can be visualized. The user can select the columns and the FITS extension (for the asteroseismology programme) to be plotted. Zoom views can be generated by dragging the mouse over the light curve and clicking on the "Zoom" button. The data can be visualized in tabular form by clicking the "Show Data" button. Finally, the appearance of the plot is customizable.

Virtual Observatory services: A discovery tool to obtain complementary astrophysical information on CoRoT targets (catalogues, images and spectra) available from VO services has been developed. Information retrieved from the services is shown as files in VOTable or FITS format.