Astronomical pipeline processing using fuzzy logic

Fundamental astronomical questions on the composition of the universe, the abundance of Earth-like planets, and the cause of the brightest explosions in the universe are being attacked by robotic telescopes costing billions of dollars and returning vast pipelines of data. The success of these programs depends on the accuracy of automated real time processing of images never seen by a human, and all predicated on fast and accurate automatic identifications of known astronomical objects and new astronomical transients. In this paper the needs of modern astronomical pipelines are discussed in the light of fuzzy-logic based decision-making. Several specific fuzzy-logic algorithms have been develop for the first time for astronomical purposes, and tested with excellent results on a test pipeline of data from the existing Night Sky Live sky survey. (c) 2006 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.