1 research outputs found
Fast Algorithms and Efficient Statistics: N-point Correlation Functions
We present here a new algorithm for the fast computation of N-point
correlation functions in large astronomical data sets. The algorithm is based
on kdtrees which are decorated with cached sufficient statistics thus allowing
for orders of magnitude speed-ups over the naive non-tree-based implementation
of correlation functions. We further discuss the use of controlled
approximations within the computation which allows for further acceleration. In
summary, our algorithm now makes it possible to compute exact, all-pairs,
measurements of the 2, 3 and 4-point correlation functions for cosmological
data sets like the Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS; York et al. 2000) and the
next generation of Cosmic Microwave Background experiments (see Szapudi et al.
2000).Comment: To appear in Proceedings of MPA/MPE/ESO Conference "Mining the Sky",
July 31 - August 4, 2000, Garching, German