Documentation for STPSF

(Formerly WebbPSF, for versions < 2.0)

STPSF is a Python package that computes simulated point spread functions (PSFs) for NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) and Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope. STPSF transforms models of telescope and instrument optical state into PSFs, taking into account detector pixel scales, rotations, filter profiles, and point source spectra. It is rather a tool for transforming optical path difference (OPD) maps, created with observatory systems engineering models, into the resulting PSFs as observed with JWST’s or Roman’s instruments.

Sample PSFs for JWST's instruments.

Sample PSFs for JWST’s instrument suite, all on the same angular scale and display stretch.

Sample PSFs for the filters in the Roman WFI.

Sample PSFs for the filters in the Roman WFI on SCA01. Note that the prism and grism PSFs shown here are monochromatic.

Contributors: STPSF has been developed by Marshall Perrin, Marcio Meléndez, Shannon Osborne, Robel Geda, Brad Sappington, Charles-Philippe Lajoie, Joseph Long, Justin Otor, Jarron Leisenring, Neil Zimmerman, Keira Brooks, and Anand Sivaramakrishnan, with contributions from Alden Jurling, Lauren Chambers, Ewan Douglas, and others.

Getting Started with STPSF

See Using STPSF.

Quickstart Jupyter Notebook

This documentation is complemented by a Jupyter Notebook format quickstart tutorial. Downloading and running that notebook is a great way to get started using STPSF.

Getting Help

For help using or installing stpsf, you can contact the STScI JWST Help Desk at jwsthelp.stsci.edu, category STPSF/JWST Telescope.

What’s new in the latest release?

Contents

Modeling Roman PSFs

How to cite STPSF

In addition to this documentation, STPSF is described in the following references. Users of STPSF are encouraged to cite one of these.

In particular, the 2012 SPIE paper gives a broad overview, the 2014 SPIE paper presents comparisons to instrument cryotest data, and the Technical Report document describes in more detail the relevant optical physics, explains design decisions and motivation for STPSF’s architecture, and presents extensive validation tests demonstrating consistency between STPSF and other PSF simulation packages used throughout the JWST project.

Mailing List

If you would like to receive email announcements of future versions, please contact Marshall Perrin, or visit maillist.stsci.edu to subscribe yourself to the “stpsf-users@maillist.stsci.edu” list.