EXTraS - Exploring the X-ray Transient and variable Sky

The EXTraS project makes use of data obtained by XMM-Newton, an ESA science mission funded by ESA Member  States and the USA (NASA). EXTraS is funded within the EU/FP7-Cooperation Space framework and is carried out by a collaboration including INAF (Italy), IUSS (Italy), CNR/IMATI (Italy), University of Leicester (UK), MPE (Germany) and ECAP (Germany).

It harvests the hitherto unexplored temporal domain information buried in the serendipitous data collected by the European Photon Imaging Camera (EPIC) onboard the XMM-Newton mission since its launch. This includes a search for fast transients, missed by standard image analysis, and a search and characterization of variability in hundreds of thousands of sources.

The ECAP/Remeis group worked on an automated classification scheme for new transient sources in the EXTraS project. This included an automated spectral fitting algorithm, catalogue crossmatching tools and machine learning software (performed in R; randomForest (Breiman, 2001)).