Collections and Metadata

Searching in MAST is performed in the context of a collection. Categorically, the options are:

• MAST Observations – The observations from all MAST hosted missions. These include HST, JWST, TESS, GALEX, Kepler, and many others; see MAST Data Collection Overview for a complete list of missions.
• Hubble Source Catalog – A collection of tens of thousands of visit-based source lists in the Hubble Legacy Archive (HLA) combined into a single master catalog.
• MAST Catalogs – MAST-hosted collections of source lists, such as the GAIA catalog.
• Virtual Observatory – A worldwide collection of repositories providing astronomical images, catalogs and spectra.
• Special Collections – Mission-specific or custom collections.

Depending upon the collection, there may be additional options for searching. This chapter describes in detail the means to search the various collections.