Chandra Data Products

The Chandra X-ray Center (CXC) produces a set of standard data products for every Chandra observation. As soon as the data are processed, these products are made available to the principal investigator (PI) and the designated observer on the proposal. After one year (sometimes sooner), the data are made public in the Chandra Data Archive, and so are available to anyone to analyze.

Standard Data Processing (SDP, also known as "the pipeline") is how the data is processed before it reaches the observer. Information on the most recent updates to the pipeline are available in the SDP Release Notes.

Only a few "primary" products are needed to do almost all Chandra data analysis with CIAO: an event file, the aspect solution, and a bad pixel file. The Data Basics page has further introductory details about the data products. The Introduction to the Data Products thread and the Data Products Guide describe the content and purpose of each Chandra data product in detail.

While we are continually working to improve the quality of data processing, there are limitations involved with some data products. The Data Caveats are a list of the known issues, organized by instrument.