The AGILEScience mobile application for the AGILE space mission

Abstract

AGILE is a space mission launched in 2007 to study X-ray and gamma-ray phenomena through data acquired by different payload instruments. The AGILE Team developed an application called AGILEScience that allows to visualize information about the AGILE space mission from mobile devices, such as smartphones and tablets. The AGILEScience application can be downloaded freely for iOS and Android devices.

Beside sharing information about the AGILE space mission with the public for outreach purposes, similarly to what other applications do, the AGILEScience app offers some new and unique features in gamma-ray astrophysics: (i) it gives public access in nearly real-time to the sky view of a gamma-ray satellite for the first time, (ii) it interacts with the AGILE remote gamma-ray data storage and analysis system, allowing data analysis to be sent and results to be visualized, and (iii) it allows the AGILE Team to access a password-protected section of the app to view detailed AGILE pipeline results and submit advanced analyses. The last two features are critical to allow remote and easy access to the results of the AGILE automated pipelines.

In particular, the ability to visualize results and execute manual data analysis from mobile devices is key during the follow-up of transient events and to easily monitor the satellite status via smartphone.