GALAPAGOS: From Pixels to Parameters
Marco Barden, Boris H\"au{\ss}ler, Chien Y. Peng, Daniel H. McIntosh, and Yicheng Guo

TL;DR
GALAPAGOS is an automated software that streamlines the detection, modeling, and cataloging of galaxy images in large surveys by integrating source detection and Sersic profile fitting.
Contribution
It introduces a comprehensive pipeline combining SExtractor and GALFIT for automated, large-scale galaxy analysis with minimal user intervention.
Findings
Successfully processes about 1000 sources per 24 hours on a 2.2 GHz CPU.
Accurately recovers galaxy structural parameters in simulated images.
Effectively handles overlapping survey tiles and multiple source entries.
Abstract
To automate source detection, two-dimensional light-profile Sersic modelling and catalogue compilation in large survey applications, we introduce a new code GALAPAGOS, Galaxy Analysis over Large Areas: Parameter Assessment by GALFITting Objects from SExtractor. Based on a single setup, GALAPAGOS can process a complete set of survey images. It detects sources in the data, estimates a local sky background, cuts postage stamp images for all sources, prepares object masks, performs Sersic fitting including neighbours and compiles all objects in a final output catalogue. For the initial source detection GALAPAGOS applies SExtractor, while GALFIT is incorporated for modelling Sersic profiles. It measures the background sky involved in the Sersic fitting by means of a flux growth curve. GALAPAGOS determines postage stamp sizes based on SExtractor shape parameters. In order to obtain precise…
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