# Stingray API¶

Library of Time Series Methods For Astronomical X-ray Data.

## Data Classes¶

These classes define basic functionality related to common data types and typical methods that apply to these data types, including basic read/write functionality. Currently implemented are stingray.Lightcurve and stingray.events.EventList.

### Lightcurve¶

class stingray.Lightcurve(time, counts, err=None, input_counts=True, gti=None, err_dist='poisson', mjdref=0, dt=None, skip_checks=False, low_memory=False, mission=None, instr=None, header=None, **other_kw)[source]

Make a light curve object from an array of time stamps and an array of counts.

Parameters
time: Iterable, :class:astropy.time.Time, or :class:astropy.units.Quantity object

A list or array of time stamps for a light curve. Must be a type that can be cast to :class:np.array or :class:List of floats, or that has a value attribute that does (e.g. a :class:astropy.units.Quantity or :class:astropy.time.Time object).

counts: iterable, optional, default None

A list or array of the counts in each bin corresponding to the bins defined in time (note: use input_counts=False to input the count range, i.e. counts/second, otherwise use counts/bin).

err: iterable, optional, default None

A list or array of the uncertainties in each bin corresponding to the bins defined in time (note: use input_counts=False to input the count rage, i.e. counts/second, otherwise use counts/bin). If None, we assume the data is poisson distributed and calculate the error from the average of the lower and upper 1-sigma confidence intervals for the Poissonian distribution with mean equal to counts.

input_counts: bool, optional, default True

If True, the code assumes that the input data in counts is in units of counts/bin. If False, it assumes the data in counts is in counts/second.

gti: 2-d float array, default None

[[gti0_0, gti0_1], [gti1_0, gti1_1], ...] Good Time Intervals. They are not applied to the data by default. They will be used by other methods to have an indication of the “safe” time intervals to use during analysis.

err_dist: str, optional, default None

Statistical distribution used to calculate the uncertainties and other statistical values appropriately. Default makes no assumptions and keep errors equal to zero.

mjdref: float

MJD reference (useful in most high-energy mission data)

skip_checks: bool

If True, the user specifies that data are already sorted and contain no infinite or nan points. Use at your own risk

low_memory: bool

If True, all the lazily evaluated attribute (e.g., countrate and countrate_err if input_counts is True) will _not_ be stored in memory, but calculated every time they are requested.

missionstr

Mission that recorded the data (e.g. NICER)

instrstr

Instrument onboard the mission

The full header of the original FITS file, if relevant

**other_kw :

Used internally. Any other keyword arguments will be ignored

Attributes
time: numpy.ndarray

The array of midpoints of time bins.

bin_lo: numpy.ndarray

The array of lower time stamp of time bins.

bin_hi: numpy.ndarray

The array of higher time stamp of time bins.

counts: numpy.ndarray

The counts per bin corresponding to the bins in time.

counts_err: numpy.ndarray

The uncertainties corresponding to counts

countrate: numpy.ndarray

The counts per second in each of the bins defined in time.

countrate_err: numpy.ndarray

The uncertainties corresponding to countrate

meanrate: float

The mean count rate of the light curve.

meancounts: float

The mean counts of the light curve.

n: int

The number of data points in the light curve.

dt: float

The time resolution of the light curve.

mjdref: float

MJD reference date (tstart / 86400 gives the date in MJD at the start of the observation)

tseg: float

The total duration of the light curve.

tstart: float

The start time of the light curve.

gti: 2-d float array

[[gti0_0, gti0_1], [gti1_0, gti1_1], ...] Good Time Intervals. They indicate the “safe” time intervals to be used during the analysis of the light curve.

err_dist: string

Statistic of the Lightcurve, it is used to calculate the uncertainties and other statistical values appropriately. It propagates to Spectrum classes.

missionstr

Mission that recorded the data (e.g. NICER)

instrstr

Instrument onboard the mission

detector_iditerable

The detector that recoded each photon, if relevant (e.g. XMM, Chandra)

The full header of the original FITS file, if relevant

analyze_lc_chunks(segment_size, func, fraction_step=1, **kwargs)[source]

Analyze segments of the light curve with any function.

Parameters
segment_sizefloat

Length in seconds of the light curve segments

funcfunction

Function accepting a Lightcurve object as single argument, plus possible additional keyword arguments, and returning a number or a tuple - e.g., (result, error) where both result and error are numbers.

Returns
start_timesarray

Lower time boundaries of all time segments.

stop_timesarray

upper time boundaries of all segments.

resultarray of N elements

The result of func for each segment of the light curve

Other Parameters
fraction_stepfloat

If the step is not a full segment_size but less (e.g. a moving window), this indicates the ratio between step step and segment_size (e.g. 0.5 means that the window shifts of half segment_size)

kwargskeyword arguments

These additional keyword arguments, if present, they will be passed to func

Examples

>>> import numpy as np
>>> time = np.arange(0, 10, 0.1)
>>> counts = np.zeros_like(time) + 10
>>> lc = Lightcurve(time, counts, dt=0.1)
>>> # Define a function that calculates the mean
>>> mean_func = lambda x: np.mean(x)
>>> # Calculate the mean in segments of 5 seconds
>>> start, stop, res = lc.analyze_lc_chunks(5, mean_func)
>>> len(res) == 2
True
>>> np.allclose(res, 10)
True

apply_gtis()[source]

Apply GTIs to a light curve. Filters the time, counts, countrate, counts_err and countrate_err arrays for all bins that fall into Good Time Intervals and recalculates mean countrate and the number of bins.

baseline(lam, p, niter=10, offset_correction=False)[source]

Calculate the baseline of the light curve, accounting for GTIs.

Parameters
lamfloat

“smoothness” parameter. Larger values make the baseline stiffer Typically 1e2 < lam < 1e9

pfloat

“asymmetry” parameter. Smaller values make the baseline more “horizontal”. Typically 0.001 < p < 0.1, but not necessary.

Returns
baselinenumpy.ndarray

An array with the baseline of the light curve

Other Parameters
offset_correctionbool, default False

by default, this method does not align to the running mean of the light curve, but it goes below the light curve. Setting align to True, an additional step is done to shift the baseline so that it is shifted to the middle of the light curve noise distribution.

change_mjdref(new_mjdref)[source]

Change the MJD reference time (MJDREF) of the light curve.

Times will be now referred to this new MJDREF

Parameters
new_mjdreffloat

New MJDREF

Returns
new_lclightcurve.Lightcurve object

The new LC shifted by MJDREF

check_lightcurve()[source]

Make various checks on the lightcurve.

It can be slow, use it if you are not sure about your input data.

estimate_chunk_length(*args, **kwargs)[source]

Deprecated alias of estimate_segment_size.

estimate_segment_size(min_total_counts=100, min_time_bins=100)[source]

Estimate a reasonable segment length for chunk-by-chunk analysis.

Choose a reasonable length for time segments, given a minimum number of total counts in the segment, and a minimum number of time bins in the segment.

The user specifies a condition on the total counts in each segment and the minimum number of time bins.

Returns
segment_sizefloat

The length of the light curve chunks that satisfies the conditions

Other Parameters
min_total_countsint

Minimum number of counts for each chunk

min_time_binsint

Minimum number of time bins

Examples

>>> import numpy as np
>>> time = np.arange(150)
>>> count = np.zeros_like(time) + 3
>>> lc = Lightcurve(time, count, dt=1)
>>> lc.estimate_segment_size(min_total_counts=10, min_time_bins=3)
4.0
>>> lc.estimate_segment_size(min_total_counts=10, min_time_bins=5)
5.0
>>> count[2:4] = 1
>>> lc = Lightcurve(time, count, dt=1)
>>> lc.estimate_segment_size(min_total_counts=3, min_time_bins=1)
3.0
>>> # A slightly more complex example
>>> dt=0.2
>>> time = np.arange(0, 1000, dt)
>>> counts = np.random.poisson(100, size=len(time))
>>> lc = Lightcurve(time, counts, dt=dt)
>>> lc.estimate_segment_size(100, 2)
0.4
>>> min_total_bins = 40
>>> lc.estimate_segment_size(100, 40)
8.0

static from_lightkurve(lk, skip_checks=True)[source]

Creates a new Lightcurve from a lightkurve.LightCurve.

Parameters
lklightkurve.LightCurve

A lightkurve LightCurve object

skip_checks: bool

If True, the user specifies that data are already sorted and contain no infinite or nan points. Use at your own risk.

join(other, skip_checks=False)[source]

Join two lightcurves into a single object.

The new Lightcurve object will contain time stamps from both the objects. The counts and countrate attributes in the resulting object will contain the union of the non-overlapping parts of the two individual objects, or the average in case of overlapping time arrays of both Lightcurve objects.

Good Time Intervals are also joined.

Note : Ideally, the time array of both lightcurves should not overlap.

Parameters
otherLightcurve object

The other Lightcurve object which is supposed to be joined with.

skip_checks: bool

If True, the user specifies that data are already sorted and contain no infinite or nan points. Use at your own risk.

Returns
lc_newLightcurve object

The resulting Lightcurve object.

Examples

>>> time1 = [5, 10, 15]
>>> count1 = [300, 100, 400]
>>> time2 = [20, 25, 30]
>>> count2 = [600, 1200, 800]
>>> lc1 = Lightcurve(time1, count1, dt=5)
>>> lc2 = Lightcurve(time2, count2, dt=5)
>>> lc = lc1.join(lc2)
>>> lc.time
array([ 5, 10, 15, 20, 25, 30])
>>> np.allclose(lc.counts, [ 300,  100,  400,  600, 1200,  800])
True

static make_lightcurve(toa, dt, tseg=None, tstart=None, gti=None, mjdref=0, use_hist=False)[source]

Make a light curve out of photon arrival times, with a given time resolution dt. Note that dt should be larger than the native time resolution of the instrument that has taken the data.

Parameters
toa: iterable

list of photon arrival times

dt: float

time resolution of the light curve (the bin width)

tseg: float, optional, default None

The total duration of the light curve. If this is None, then the total duration of the light curve will be the interval between the arrival between the first and the last photon in toa.

Note: If tseg is not divisible by dt (i.e. if tseg/dt is not an integer number), then the last fractional bin will be dropped!

tstart: float, optional, default None

The start time of the light curve. If this is None, the arrival time of the first photon will be used as the start time of the light curve.

gti: 2-d float array

[[gti0_0, gti0_1], [gti1_0, gti1_1], ...] Good Time Intervals

use_histbool

Use np.histogram instead of np.bincounts. Might be advantageous for very short datasets.

Returns
lc: Lightcurve object

A Lightcurve object with the binned light curve

plot(witherrors=False, labels=None, axis=None, title=None, marker='-', save=False, filename=None)[source]

Plot the light curve using matplotlib.

Plot the light curve object on a graph self.time on x-axis and self.counts on y-axis with self.counts_err optionally as error bars.

Parameters
witherrors: boolean, default False

Whether to plot the Lightcurve with errorbars or not

labelsiterable, default None

A list of tuple with xlabel and ylabel as strings.

axislist, tuple, string, default None

Parameter to set axis properties of the matplotlib figure. For example it can be a list like [xmin, xmax, ymin, ymax] or any other acceptable argument for thematplotlib.pyplot.axis() method.

titlestr, default None

The title of the plot.

markerstr, default ‘-’

Line style and color of the plot. Line styles and colors are combined in a single format string, as in 'bo' for blue circles. See matplotlib.pyplot.plot for more options.

saveboolean, optional, default False

If True, save the figure with specified filename.

filenamestr

File name of the image to save. Depends on the boolean save.

static read(filename, format_='pickle', err_dist='gauss', skip_checks=False)[source]

Read a Lightcurve object from file.

Currently supported formats are

• pickle (not recommended for long-term storage)

• hea : FITS Light curves from HEASARC-supported missions.

• any other formats compatible with the writers in astropy.table.Table (ascii.ecsv, hdf5, etc.)

Files that need the astropy.table.Table interface MUST contain at least a time column and a counts or countrate column. The default ascii format is enhanced CSV (ECSV). Data formats supporting the serialization of metadata (such as ECSV and HDF5) can contain all lightcurve attributes such as dt, gti, etc with no significant loss of information. Other file formats might lose part of the metadata, so must be used with care.

Parameters
filename: str

Path and file name for the file to be read.

format_: str

Available options are ‘pickle’, ‘hea’, and any Table-supported format such as ‘hdf5’, ‘ascii.ecsv’, etc.

Returns
lcLightcurve object
Other Parameters
err_dist: str, default=’gauss’

Default error distribution if not specified in the file (e.g. for ASCII files). The default is ‘gauss’ just because it is likely that people using ASCII light curves will want to specify Gaussian error bars, if any.

skip_checksbool

See Lightcurve documentation

rebin(dt_new=None, f=None, method='sum')[source]

Rebin the light curve to a new time resolution. While the new resolution need not be an integer multiple of the previous time resolution, be aware that if it is not, the last bin will be cut off by the fraction left over by the integer division.

Parameters
dt_new: float

The new time resolution of the light curve. Must be larger than the time resolution of the old light curve!

method: {sum | mean | average}, optional, default sum

This keyword argument sets whether the counts in the new bins should be summed or averaged.

Returns
lc_new: Lightcurve object

The Lightcurve object with the new, binned light curve.

Other Parameters
f: float

the rebin factor. If specified, it substitutes dt_new with f*self.dt

shift(time_shift)[source]

Shift the light curve and the GTIs in time.

Parameters
time_shift: float

The time interval by which the light curve will be shifted (in the same units as the time array in Lightcurve

Returns
new_lclightcurve.Lightcurve object

The new LC shifted by time_shift

sort(reverse=False)[source]

Sort a Lightcurve object by time.

A Lightcurve can be sorted in either increasing or decreasing order using this method. The time array gets sorted and the counts array is changed accordingly.

Parameters
reverseboolean, default False

If True then the object is sorted in reverse order.

Returns
lc_new: Lightcurve object

The Lightcurve object with sorted time and counts arrays.

Examples

>>> time = [2, 1, 3]
>>> count = [200, 100, 300]
>>> lc = Lightcurve(time, count, dt=1)
>>> lc_new = lc.sort()
>>> lc_new.time
array([1, 2, 3])
>>> np.allclose(lc_new.counts, [100, 200, 300])
True

sort_counts(reverse=False)[source]

Sort a Lightcurve object in accordance with its counts array.

A Lightcurve can be sorted in either increasing or decreasing order using this method. The counts array gets sorted and the time array is changed accordingly.

Parameters
reverseboolean, default False

If True then the object is sorted in reverse order.

Returns
lc_new: Lightcurve object

The Lightcurve object with sorted time and counts arrays.

Examples

>>> time = [1, 2, 3]
>>> count = [200, 100, 300]
>>> lc = Lightcurve(time, count, dt=1)
>>> lc_new = lc.sort_counts()
>>> lc_new.time
array([2, 1, 3])
>>> np.allclose(lc_new.counts, [100, 200, 300])
True

split(min_gap, min_points=1)[source]

For data with gaps, it can sometimes be useful to be able to split the light curve into separate, evenly sampled objects along those data gaps. This method allows to do this: it finds data gaps of a specified minimum size, and produces a list of new Lightcurve objects for each contiguous segment.

Parameters
min_gapfloat

The length of a data gap, in the same units as the time attribute of the Lightcurve object. Any smaller gaps will be ignored, any larger gaps will be identified and used to split the light curve.

min_pointsint, default 1

The minimum number of data points in each light curve. Light curves with fewer data points will be ignored.

Returns
lc_splititerable of Lightcurve objects

The list of all contiguous light curves

Examples

>>> time = np.array([1, 2, 3, 6, 7, 8, 11, 12, 13])
>>> counts = np.random.rand(time.shape[0])
>>> lc = Lightcurve(time, counts, dt=1, skip_checks=True)
>>> split_lc = lc.split(1.5)

split_by_gti(gti=None, min_points=2)[source]

Split the current Lightcurve object into a list of Lightcurve objects, one for each continuous GTI segment as defined in the gti attribute.

Parameters
min_pointsint, default 1

The minimum number of data points in each light curve. Light curves with fewer data points will be ignored.

Returns
list_of_lcslist

A list of Lightcurve objects, one for each GTI segment

to_lightkurve()[source]

Returns a lightkurve.LightCurve object. This feature requires Lightkurve to be installed (e.g. pip install lightkurve). An ImportError will be raised if this package is not available.

Returns
lightcurvelightkurve.LightCurve

A lightkurve LightCurve object.

truncate(start=0, stop=None, method='index')[source]

Truncate a Lightcurve object.

This method takes a start and a stop point (either as indices, or as times in the same unit as those in the time attribute, and truncates all bins before start and after stop, then returns a new Lightcurve object with the truncated light curve.

Parameters
startint, default 0

Index (or time stamp) of the starting point of the truncation. If no value is set for the start point, then all points from the first element in the time array are taken into account.

stopint, default None

Index (or time stamp) of the ending point (exclusive) of the truncation. If no value of stop is set, then points including the last point in the counts array are taken in count.

method{index | time}, optional, default index

Type of the start and stop values. If set to index then the values are treated as indices of the counts array, or if set to time, the values are treated as actual time values.

Returns
lc_new: Lightcurve object

The Lightcurve object with truncated time and counts arrays.

Examples

>>> time = [1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9]
>>> count = [10, 20, 30, 40, 50, 60, 70, 80, 90]
>>> lc = Lightcurve(time, count, dt=1)
>>> lc_new = lc.truncate(start=2, stop=8)
>>> np.allclose(lc_new.counts, [30, 40, 50, 60, 70, 80])
True
>>> lc_new.time
array([3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8])
>>> # Truncation can also be done by time values
>>> lc_new = lc.truncate(start=6, method='time')
>>> lc_new.time
array([6, 7, 8, 9])
>>> np.allclose(lc_new.counts, [60, 70, 80, 90])
True

write(filename, format_='pickle', **kwargs)[source]

Write a Lightcurve object to file. Currently supported formats are

• pickle (not recommended for long-term storage)

• HDF5

• ASCII

Parameters
filename: str

Path and file name for the output file.

format_: str

Available options are ‘pickle’, ‘hdf5’, ‘ascii’

### EventList¶

class stingray.events.EventList(time=None, energy=None, ncounts=None, mjdref=0, dt=0, notes='', gti=None, pi=None, high_precision=False, mission=None, instr=None, header=None, detector_id=None, ephem=None, timeref=None, timesys=None, **other_kw)[source]

Basic class for event list data. Event lists generally correspond to individual events (e.g. photons) recorded by the detector, and their associated properties. For X-ray data where this type commonly occurs, events are time stamps of when a photon arrived in the detector, and (optionally) the photon energy associated with the event.

Parameters
time: iterable

A list or array of time stamps

Other Parameters
dt: float

The time resolution of the events. Only relevant when using events to produce light curves with similar bin time.

energy: iterable

A list of array of photon energy values in keV

mjdreffloat

The MJD used as a reference for the time array.

ncounts: int

Number of desired data points in event list.

gtis: [[gti0_0, gti0_1], [gti1_0, gti1_1], …]

Good Time Intervals

piinteger, numpy.ndarray

PI channels

notesstr

Any useful annotations

high_precisionbool

Change the precision of self.time to float128. Useful while dealing with fast pulsars.

missionstr

Mission that recorded the data (e.g. NICER)

instrstr

Instrument onboard the mission

The full header of the original FITS file, if relevant

detector_iditerable

The detector that recorded each photon (if the instrument has more than one, e.g. XMM/EPIC-pn)

timerefstr

The time reference, as recorded in the FITS file (e.g. SOLARSYSTEM)

timesysstr

The time system, as recorded in the FITS file (e.g. TDB)

ephemstr

The JPL ephemeris used to barycenter the data, if any (e.g. DE430)

**other_kw :

Used internally. Any other keyword arguments will be ignored

Attributes
time: numpy.ndarray

The array of event arrival times, in seconds from the reference MJD defined in mjdref

energy: numpy.ndarray

The array of photon energy values

ncounts: int

The number of data points in the event list

dt: float

The time resolution of the events. Only relevant when using events to produce light curves with similar bin time.

mjdreffloat

The MJD used as a reference for the time array.

gtis: [[gti0_0, gti0_1], [gti1_0, gti1_1], …]

Good Time Intervals

piinteger, numpy.ndarray

PI channels

high_precisionbool

Change the precision of self.time to float128. Useful while dealing with fast pulsars.

missionstr

Mission that recorded the data (e.g. NICER)

instrstr

Instrument onboard the mission

detector_iditerable

The detector that recoded each photon, if relevant (e.g. XMM, Chandra)

The full header of the original FITS file, if relevant

Apply deadtime filter to this event list.

Additional arguments in kwargs are passed to get_deadtime_mask

Parameters

Value of dead time to apply to data

inplacebool, default False

If True, apply the deadtime to the current event list. Otherwise, return a new event list.

Returns
new_event_listEventList object

Filtered event list. if inplace is True, this is the input object filtered for deadtime, otherwise this is a new object.

Only returned if return_all is True. See get_deadtime_mask for more details.

Examples

>>> events = np.array([1, 1.05, 1.07, 1.08, 1.1, 2, 2.2, 3, 3.1, 3.2])
>>> events = EventList(events)
>>> events.pi=np.array([1, 2, 2, 2, 2, 1, 1, 1, 2, 1])
>>> events.energy=np.array([1, 2, 2, 2, 2, 1, 1, 1, 2, 1])
>>> events.mjdref = 10
>>> filt_events, retval = events.apply_deadtime(0.11, inplace=False,
...                                             verbose=False,
...                                             return_all=True)
>>> filt_events is events
False
>>> expected = np.array([1, 2, 2.2, 3, 3.2])
>>> np.allclose(filt_events.time, expected)
True
>>> np.allclose(filt_events.pi, 1)
True
>>> np.allclose(filt_events.energy, 1)
True
>>> np.allclose(events.pi, 1)
False
>>> filt_events = events.apply_deadtime(0.11, inplace=True,
...                                     verbose=False)
>>> filt_events is events
True


Apply a mask to all array attributes of the event list

Parameters
maskarray of bool

The mask. Has to be of the same length as self.time

Other Parameters
inplacebool

If True, overwrite the current event list. Otherwise, return a new one.

Examples

>>> evt = EventList(time=[0, 1, 2], mission="nustar")
>>> evt.bubuattr = [222, 111, 333]
>>> newev0 = evt.apply_mask([True, True, False], inplace=False);
>>> newev1 = evt.apply_mask([True, True, False], inplace=True);
>>> newev0.mission == "nustar"
True
>>> np.allclose(newev0.time, [0, 1])
True
>>> np.allclose(newev0.bubuattr, [222, 111])
True
>>> np.allclose(newev1.time, [0, 1])
True
>>> evt is newev1
True

array_attrs()[source]

List the names of the array attributes of the event list.

By array attributes, we mean the ones with the same size and shape as self.time

Examples

>>> ev = EventList(time=np.arange(5), pi=np.zeros(5), gti=[[45, 4]])
>>> attrs = ev.array_attrs()
>>> len(attrs)
2
>>> "pi" in attrs and "time" in attrs
True
>>> hasattr(ev, "gti") #  The gti attribute is set, however...
True
>>> "gti" in attrs #  The shape of self.gti is not equal to time! Not an array attr
False

change_mjdref(new_mjdref)[source]

Change the MJD reference time (MJDREF) of the light curve.

Times will be now referred to this new MJDREF

Parameters
new_mjdreffloat

New MJDREF

Returns
new_lcEventList object

The new LC shifted by MJDREF

filter_energy_range(energy_range, inplace=False, use_pi=False)[source]

Filter the event list from a given energy range.

Parameters
energy_range: [float, float]

Energy range in keV, or in PI channel (if use_pi is True)

Other Parameters
inplacebool, default False

Do the change in place (modify current event list). Otherwise, copy to a new event list.

use_pibool, default False

Use PI channel instead of energy in keV

Examples

>>> events = EventList(time=[0, 1, 2], energy=[0.3, 0.5, 2], pi=[3, 5, 20])
>>> e1 = events.filter_energy_range([0, 1])
>>> np.allclose(e1.time, [0, 1])
True
>>> np.allclose(events.time, [0, 1, 2])
True
>>> e2 = events.filter_energy_range([0, 10], use_pi=True, inplace=True)
>>> np.allclose(e2.time, [0, 1])
True
>>> np.allclose(events.time, [0, 1])
True

static from_astropy_table(ts)[source]

Create an EventList object from data in an Astropy Table.

The table has to define at least a column called time, the rest of columns will form the array attributes of the new event list, while the attributes in table.meta will form the new meta attributes of the event list.

It is strongly advisable to define such attributes and columns using the standard attributes of EventList: time, pi, energy, gti etc.

static from_astropy_timeseries(ts)[source]

Create an EventList object from data in an Astropy TimeSeries

The timeseries has to define at least a column called time, the rest of columns will form the array attributes of the new event list, while the attributes in table.meta will form the new meta attributes of the event list.

It is strongly advisable to define such attributes and columns using the standard attributes of EventList: time, pi, energy, gti etc.

static from_lc(lc)[source]

Create an EventList from a stingray.Lightcurve object. Note that all events in a given time bin will have the same time stamp.

Parameters
lc: :class:stingray.Lightcurve object

Light curve to use for creation of the event list.

Returns
ev: EventList object

The resulting list of photon arrival times generated from the light curve.

static from_pandas(ts)[source]

Create an EventList object from data in a pandas DataFrame.

The dataframe has to define at least a column called time, the rest of columns will form the array attributes of the new event list, while the attributes in ds.attrs will form the new meta attributes of the event list.

It is strongly advisable to define such attributes and columns using the standard attributes of EventList: time, pi, energy, gti etc.

static from_xarray(ts)[source]

Create an EventList object from data in an xarray Dataset.

The dataset has to define at least a column called time, the rest of columns will form the array attributes of the new event list, while the attributes in ds.attrs will form the new meta attributes of the event list.

It is strongly advisable to define such attributes and columns using the standard attributes of EventList: time, pi, energy, gti etc.

get_meta_dict()[source]

Give a dictionary with all non-None meta attributes.

join(other)[source]

Join two EventList objects into one.

If both are empty, an empty EventList is returned.

GTIs are crossed if the event lists are over a common time interval, and appended otherwise.

pi and pha remain None if they are None in both. Otherwise, 0 is used as a default value for the EventList where they were None.

Parameters
otherEventList object

The other EventList object which is supposed to be joined with.

Returns
ev_newEventList object

The resulting EventList object.

meta_attrs()[source]

List the names of the meta attributes of the event list.

By meta attributes, we mean the ones with a different size and shape than self.time

Examples

>>> ev = EventList(time=np.arange(5), pi=np.zeros(5), gti=[[45, 4]])
>>> attrs = ev.meta_attrs()
>>> "pi" in attrs or "time" in attrs
False
>>> "gti" in attrs #  The shape of self.gti is not equal to time! Not an array attr
True

static read(filename, format_='pickle', **kwargs)[source]

Read a EventList object from file.

Currently supported formats are

• pickle (not recommended for long-term storage)

• hea : FITS Event files from (well, some) HEASARC-supported missions.

• any other formats compatible with the writers in astropy.table.Table (ascii.ecsv, hdf5, etc.)

Files that need the astropy.table.Table interface MUST contain at least a time column. Other recognized columns are energy and pi. The default ascii format is enhanced CSV (ECSV). Data formats supporting the serialization of metadata (such as ECSV and HDF5) can contain all eventlist attributes such as mission, gti, etc with no significant loss of information. Other file formats might lose part of the metadata, so must be used with care.

Parameters
filename: str

Path and file name for the file to be read.

format_: str

Available options are ‘pickle’, ‘hea’, and any Table-supported format such as ‘hdf5’, ‘ascii.ecsv’, etc.

Returns
ev: EventList object

The EventList object reconstructed from file

shift(time_shift)[source]

Shift the events and the GTIs in time.

Parameters
time_shift: float

The time interval by which the light curve will be shifted (in the same units as the time array in Lightcurve

Returns
new_evlightcurve.Lightcurve object

The new event list shifted by time_shift

simulate_energies(spectrum)[source]

Assign (simulate) energies to event list from a spectrum.

Parameters
spectrum: 2-d array or list

Energies versus corresponding fluxes. The 2-d array or list must have energies across the first dimension and fluxes across the second one.

simulate_times(lc, use_spline=False, bin_time=None)[source]

Simulate times from an input light curve.

Randomly simulate photon arrival times to an EventList from a stingray.Lightcurve object, using the inverse CDF method.

Parameters
lc: :class:stingray.Lightcurve object
Returns
timesarray-like

Simulated photon arrival times

Other Parameters
use_splinebool

Approximate the light curve with a spline to avoid binning effects

bin_timefloat default None

Ignored and deprecated, maintained for backwards compatibility.

to_astropy_table()[source]

Save the event list to an Astropy Table.

Array attributes (time, pi, energy, etc.) are converted into columns, while meta attributes (mjdref, gti, etc.) are saved into the meta dictionary.

to_astropy_timeseries()[source]

Save the event list to an Astropy timeseries.

Array attributes (time, pi, energy, etc.) are converted into columns, while meta attributes (mjdref, gti, etc.) are saved into the meta dictionary.

to_lc(dt, tstart=None, tseg=None)[source]

Convert event list to a stingray.Lightcurve object.

Parameters
dt: float

Binning time of the light curve

Returns
lc: stingray.Lightcurve object
Other Parameters
tstartfloat

Start time of the light curve

tseg: float

Total duration of light curve

to_lc_iter(dt, segment_size=None)[source]

Convert event list to a generator of Lightcurves.

Parameters
dt: float

Binning time of the light curves

Returns
lc_gen: generator

Generates one stingray.Lightcurve object for each GTI or segment

Other Parameters
segment_sizefloat, default None

Optional segment size. If None, use the GTI boundaries

to_lc_list(dt, segment_size=None)[source]

Convert event list to a list of Lightcurves.

Parameters
dt: float

Binning time of the light curves

Returns
lc_list: List

List containig one stingray.Lightcurve object for each GTI or segment

Other Parameters
segment_sizefloat, default None

Optional segment size. If None, use the GTI boundaries

to_pandas()[source]

Save the event list to a pandas DataFrame.

Array attributes (time, pi, energy, etc.) are converted into columns, while meta attributes (mjdref, gti, etc.) are saved into the ds.attrs dictionary.

to_xarray()[source]

Save the event list to an xarray Dataset.

Array attributes (time, pi, energy, etc.) are converted into columns, while meta attributes (mjdref, gti, etc.) are saved into the ds.attrs dictionary.

write(filename, format_='pickle')[source]

Write an EventList object to file.

Possible file formats are

Parameters
filename: str

Name and path of the file to save the event list to..

format_: str

The file format to store the data in. Available options are pickle, hdf5, ascii, fits

## Fourier Products¶

These classes implement commonly used Fourier analysis products, most importantly Crossspectrum and Powerspectrum, along with the variants for averaged cross/power spectra.

### Crossspectrum¶

class stingray.Crossspectrum(data1=None, data2=None, norm='none', gti=None, lc1=None, lc2=None, power_type='real', dt=None, fullspec=False)[source]

Make a cross spectrum from a (binned) light curve. You can also make an empty Crossspectrum object to populate with your own Fourier-transformed data (this can sometimes be useful when making binned power spectra). Stingray uses the scipy.fft standards for the sign of the Nyquist frequency.

Parameters
data1: :class:stingray.Lightcurve or :class:stingray.events.EventList, optional, default None

The first light curve data for the channel/band of interest.

data2: :class:stingray.Lightcurve or :class:stingray.events.EventList, optional, default None

The light curve data for the reference band.

norm: {frac, abs, leahy, none}, default none

The normalization of the (real part of the) cross spectrum.

power_type: string, optional, default real

Parameter to choose among complete, real part and magnitude of the cross spectrum.

fullspec: boolean, optional, default False

If False, keep only the positive frequencies, or if True, keep all of them .

Other Parameters
gti: 2-d float array

[[gti0_0, gti0_1], [gti1_0, gti1_1], ...] – Good Time intervals. This choice overrides the GTIs in the single light curves. Use with care!

lc1: :class:stingray.Lightcurveobject OR iterable of :class:stingray.Lightcurve objects

For backwards compatibility only. Like data1, but no stingray.events.EventList objects allowed

lc2: :class:stingray.Lightcurveobject OR iterable of :class:stingray.Lightcurve objects

For backwards compatibility only. Like data2, but no stingray.events.EventList objects allowed

dt: float

The time resolution of the light curve. Only needed when constructing light curves in the case where data1, data2 are EventList objects

Attributes
freq: numpy.ndarray

The array of mid-bin frequencies that the Fourier transform samples

power: numpy.ndarray

The array of cross spectra (complex numbers)

power_err: numpy.ndarray

The uncertainties of power. An approximation for each bin given by power_err= power/sqrt(m). Where m is the number of power averaged in each bin (by frequency binning, or averaging more than one spectra). Note that for a single realization (m=1) the error is equal to the power.

df: float

The frequency resolution

m: int

The number of averaged cross-spectra amplitudes in each bin.

n: int

The number of data points/time bins in one segment of the light curves.

nphots1: float

The total number of photons in light curve 1

nphots2: float

The total number of photons in light curve 2

classical_significances(threshold=1, trial_correction=False)[source]

Compute the classical significances for the powers in the power spectrum, assuming an underlying noise distribution that follows a chi-square distributions with 2M degrees of freedom, where M is the number of powers averaged in each bin.

Note that this function will only produce correct results when the following underlying assumptions are fulfilled:

1. The power spectrum is Leahy-normalized

2. There is no source of variability in the data other than the periodic signal to be determined with this method. This is important! If there are other sources of (aperiodic) variability in the data, this method will not produce correct results, but instead produce a large number of spurious false positive detections!

3. There are no significant instrumental effects changing the statistical distribution of the powers (e.g. pile-up or dead time)

By default, the method produces (index,p-values) for all powers in the power spectrum, where index is the numerical index of the power in question. If a threshold is set, then only powers with p-values below that threshold with their respective indices. If trial_correction is set to True, then the threshold will be corrected for the number of trials (frequencies) in the power spectrum before being used.

Parameters
thresholdfloat, optional, default 1

The threshold to be used when reporting p-values of potentially significant powers. Must be between 0 and 1. Default is 1 (all p-values will be reported).

trial_correctionbool, optional, default False

A Boolean flag that sets whether the threshold will be corrected by the number of frequencies before being applied. This decreases the threshold (p-values need to be lower to count as significant). Default is False (report all powers) though for any application where threshold is set to something meaningful, this should also be applied!

Returns
pvalsiterable

A list of (index, p-value) tuples for all powers that have p-values lower than the threshold specified in threshold.

coherence()[source]

Compute Coherence function of the cross spectrum.

Coherence is defined in Vaughan and Nowak, 1996 1. It is a Fourier frequency dependent measure of the linear correlation between time series measured simultaneously in two energy channels.

Returns
cohnumpy.ndarray

Coherence function

References

1

http://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1086/310430/pdf

plot(labels=None, axis=None, title=None, marker='-', save=False, filename=None)[source]

Plot the amplitude of the cross spectrum vs. the frequency using matplotlib.

Parameters
labelsiterable, default None

A list of tuple with xlabel and ylabel as strings.

axislist, tuple, string, default None

Parameter to set axis properties of the matplotlib figure. For example it can be a list like [xmin, xmax, ymin, ymax] or any other acceptable argument for thematplotlib.pyplot.axis() method.

titlestr, default None

The title of the plot.

markerstr, default ‘-’

Line style and color of the plot. Line styles and colors are combined in a single format string, as in 'bo' for blue circles. See matplotlib.pyplot.plot for more options.

saveboolean, optional, default False

If True, save the figure with specified filename.

filenamestr

File name of the image to save. Depends on the boolean save.

rebin(df=None, f=None, method='mean')[source]

Rebin the cross spectrum to a new frequency resolution df.

Parameters
df: float

The new frequency resolution

Returns
bin_cs = Crossspectrum (or one of its subclasses) object

The newly binned cross spectrum or power spectrum. Note: this object will be of the same type as the object that called this method. For example, if this method is called from AveragedPowerspectrum, it will return an object of class AveragedPowerspectrum, too.

Other Parameters
f: float

the rebin factor. If specified, it substitutes df with f*self.df

rebin_log(f=0.01)[source]

Logarithmic rebin of the periodogram. The new frequency depends on the previous frequency modified by a factor f:

$d\nu_j = d\nu_{j-1} (1+f)$
Parameters
f: float, optional, default 0.01

parameter that steers the frequency resolution

Returns
new_specCrossspectrum (or one of its subclasses) object

The newly binned cross spectrum or power spectrum. Note: this object will be of the same type as the object that called this method. For example, if this method is called from AveragedPowerspectrum, it will return an object of class

time_lag()[source]

Calculate the fourier time lag of the cross spectrum. The time lag is calculate using the center of the frequency bins.

### Coherence¶

Convenience function to compute the coherence between two stingray.Lightcurve objects.

stingray.coherence(lc1, lc2)[source]

Estimate coherence function of two light curves. For details on the definition of the coherence, see Vaughan and Nowak, 1996 2.

Parameters
lc1: :class:stingray.Lightcurve object

The first light curve data for the channel of interest.

lc2: :class:stingray.Lightcurve object

The light curve data for reference band

Returns
cohnp.ndarray

The array of coherence versus frequency

References

2

http://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1086/310430/pdf

### Powerspectrum¶

class stingray.Powerspectrum(data=None, norm='frac', gti=None, dt=None, lc=None)[source]

Make a Powerspectrum (also called periodogram) from a (binned) light curve. Periodograms can be normalized by either Leahy normalization, fractional rms normalizaation, absolute rms normalization, or not at all.

You can also make an empty Powerspectrum object to populate with your own fourier-transformed data (this can sometimes be useful when making binned power spectra).

Parameters
data: :class:stingray.Lightcurve object, optional, default None

The light curve data to be Fourier-transformed.

norm: {leahy | frac | abs | none }, optional, default frac

The normaliation of the power spectrum to be used. Options are leahy, frac, abs and none, default is frac.

Other Parameters
gti: 2-d float array

[[gti0_0, gti0_1], [gti1_0, gti1_1], ...] – Good Time intervals. This choice overrides the GTIs in the single light curves. Use with care!

Attributes
norm: {leahy | frac | abs | none }

the normalization of the power spectrun

freq: numpy.ndarray

The array of mid-bin frequencies that the Fourier transform samples

power: numpy.ndarray

The array of normalized squared absolute values of Fourier amplitudes

power_err: numpy.ndarray

The uncertainties of power. An approximation for each bin given by power_err= power/sqrt(m). Where m is the number of power averaged in each bin (by frequency binning, or averaging power spectrum). Note that for a single realization (m=1) the error is equal to the power.

df: float

The frequency resolution

m: int

The number of averaged powers in each bin

n: int

The number of data points in the light curve

nphots: float

The total number of photons in the light curve

_fourier_cross(lc1, lc2, fullspec=False)

Fourier transform the two light curves, then compute the cross spectrum. Computed as CS = lc1 x lc2* (where lc2 is the one that gets complex-conjugated). The user has the option to either get just the positive frequencies or the full spectrum.

Parameters
lc1: :class:stingray.Lightcurve object

One light curve to be Fourier transformed. Ths is the band of interest or channel of interest.

lc2: :class:stingray.Lightcurve object

Another light curve to be Fourier transformed. This is the reference band.

fullspec: boolean. Default is False.

If True, return the whole array of frequencies, or only positive frequencies (False).

Returns
fr: numpy.ndarray

The squared absolute value of the Fourier amplitudes

_make_auxil_pds(lc1, lc2)

Helper method to create the power spectrum of both light curves independently.

Parameters
lc1, lc2

Two light curves used for computing the cross spectrum.

_make_crossspectrum(lc1, lc2, fullspec=False)

Auxiliary method computing the normalized cross spectrum from two light curves. This includes checking for the presence of and applying Good Time Intervals, computing the unnormalized Fourier cross-amplitude, and then renormalizing using the required normalization. Also computes an uncertainty estimate on the cross spectral powers.

Parameters
lc1, lc2

Two light curves used for computing the cross spectrum.

fullspec: boolean, default False

Return full frequency array (True) or just positive frequencies (False)

_normalize_crossspectrum(unnorm_power, tseg)

Normalize the real part of the cross spectrum to Leahy, absolute rms^2, fractional rms^2 normalization, or not at all.

Parameters
unnorm_power: numpy.ndarray

The unnormalized cross spectrum.

tseg: int

The length of the Fourier segment, in seconds.

Returns
power: numpy.nd.array

The normalized co-spectrum (real part of the cross spectrum). For ‘none’ normalization, imaginary part is returned as well.

_phase_lag()

Return the fourier phase lag of the cross spectrum.

_rms_error(powers)[source]

Compute the error on the fractional rms amplitude using error propagation. Note: this uses the actual measured powers, which is not strictly correct. We should be using the underlying power spectrum, but in the absence of an estimate of that, this will have to do.

$r = \sqrt{P}$
$\delta r = \frac{1}{2 * \sqrt{P}} \delta P$
Parameters
powers: iterable

The list of powers used to compute the fractional rms amplitude.

Returns
delta_rms: float

The error on the fractional rms amplitude

classical_significances(threshold=1, trial_correction=False)[source]

Compute the classical significances for the powers in the power spectrum, assuming an underlying noise distribution that follows a chi-square distributions with 2M degrees of freedom, where M is the number of powers averaged in each bin.

Note that this function will only produce correct results when the following underlying assumptions are fulfilled:

1. The power spectrum is Leahy-normalized

2. There is no source of variability in the data other than the periodic signal to be determined with this method. This is important! If there are other sources of (aperiodic) variability in the data, this method will not produce correct results, but instead produce a large number of spurious false positive detections!

3. There are no significant instrumental effects changing the statistical distribution of the powers (e.g. pile-up or dead time)

By default, the method produces (index,p-values) for all powers in the power spectrum, where index is the numerical index of the power in question. If a threshold is set, then only powers with p-values below that threshold with their respective indices. If trial_correction is set to True, then the threshold will be corrected for the number of trials (frequencies) in the power spectrum before being used.

Parameters
thresholdfloat, optional, default 1

The threshold to be used when reporting p-values of potentially significant powers. Must be between 0 and 1. Default is 1 (all p-values will be reported).

trial_correctionbool, optional, default False

A Boolean flag that sets whether the threshold will be corrected by the number of frequencies before being applied. This decreases the threshold (p-values need to be lower to count as significant). Default is False (report all powers) though for any application where threshold is set to something meaningful, this should also be applied!

Returns
pvalsiterable

A list of (index, p-value) tuples for all powers that have p-values lower than the threshold specified in threshold.

coherence()

Compute Coherence function of the cross spectrum.

Coherence is defined in Vaughan and Nowak, 1996 3. It is a Fourier frequency dependent measure of the linear correlation between time series measured simultaneously in two energy channels.

Returns
cohnumpy.ndarray

Coherence function

References

3

http://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1086/310430/pdf

compute_rms(min_freq, max_freq, white_noise_offset=0.0)[source]

Compute the fractional rms amplitude in the power spectrum between two frequencies.

Parameters
min_freq: float

The lower frequency bound for the calculation

max_freq: float

The upper frequency bound for the calculation

Returns
rms: float

The fractional rms amplitude contained between min_freq and max_freq

rms_err: float

The error on the fractional rms amplitude

Other Parameters
white_noise_offsetfloat, default 0

This is the white noise level, in Leahy normalization. In the ideal case, this is 2. Dead time and other instrumental effects can alter it. The user can fit the white noise level outside this function and it will get subtracted from powers here.

modulation_upper_limit(fmin=None, fmax=None, c=0.95)[source]

Upper limit on a sinusoidal modulation.

To understand the meaning of this amplitude: if the modulation is described by:

..math:: p = overline{p} (1 + a * sin(x))

this function returns a.

If it is a sum of sinusoidal harmonics instead ..math:: p = overline{p} (1 + sum_l a_l * sin(lx)) a is equivalent to $$\sqrt(\sum_l a_l^2)$$.

See stingray.stats.power_upper_limit, stingray.stats.amplitude_upper_limit for more information.

Parameters
fmin: float

The minimum frequency to search (defaults to the first nonzero bin)

fmax: float

The maximum frequency to search (defaults to the Nyquist frequency)

Other Parameters
c: float

The confidence value for the upper limit (e.g. 0.95 = 95%)

Examples

>>> pds = Powerspectrum()
>>> pds.norm = "leahy"
>>> pds.freq = np.arange(0., 5.)
>>> # Note: this pds has 40 as maximum value between 2 and 5 Hz
>>> pds.power = np.array([100000, 1, 1, 40, 1])
>>> pds.m = 1
>>> pds.nphots = 30000
>>> pds.modulation_upper_limit(fmin=2, fmax=5, c=0.99)
0.1016...
>>> pds.norm = "frac"
>>> pds.modulation_upper_limit(2, 5, 0.99)
Traceback (most recent call last):
...
ValueError: Modulation upper limit is only available in the Leahy...

plot(labels=None, axis=None, title=None, marker='-', save=False, filename=None)

Plot the amplitude of the cross spectrum vs. the frequency using matplotlib.

Parameters
labelsiterable, default None

A list of tuple with xlabel and ylabel as strings.

axislist, tuple, string, default None

Parameter to set axis properties of the matplotlib figure. For example it can be a list like [xmin, xmax, ymin, ymax] or any other acceptable argument for thematplotlib.pyplot.axis() method.

titlestr, default None

The title of the plot.

markerstr, default ‘-’

Line style and color of the plot. Line styles and colors are combined in a single format string, as in 'bo' for blue circles. See matplotlib.pyplot.plot for more options.

saveboolean, optional, default False

If True, save the figure with specified filename.

filenamestr

File name of the image to save. Depends on the boolean save.

rebin(df=None, f=None, method='mean')[source]

Rebin the power spectrum.

Parameters
df: float

The new frequency resolution

Returns
bin_cs = Powerspectrum object

The newly binned power spectrum.

Other Parameters
f: float

the rebin factor. If specified, it substitutes df with f*self.df

rebin_log(f=0.01)

Logarithmic rebin of the periodogram. The new frequency depends on the previous frequency modified by a factor f:

$d\nu_j = d\nu_{j-1} (1+f)$
Parameters
f: float, optional, default 0.01

parameter that steers the frequency resolution

Returns
new_specCrossspectrum (or one of its subclasses) object

The newly binned cross spectrum or power spectrum. Note: this object will be of the same type as the object that called this method. For example, if this method is called from AveragedPowerspectrum, it will return an object of class

time_lag()

Calculate the fourier time lag of the cross spectrum. The time lag is calculate using the center of the frequency bins.

### AveragedCrossspectrum¶

class stingray.AveragedCrossspectrum(data1=None, data2=None, segment_size=None, norm='none', gti=None, power_type='real', silent=False, lc1=None, lc2=None, dt=None, fullspec=False, large_data=False, save_all=False)[source]

Make an averaged cross spectrum from a light curve by segmenting two light curves, Fourier-transforming each segment and then averaging the resulting cross spectra.

Parameters
data1: :class:stingray.Lightcurveobject OR iterable of :class:stingray.Lightcurve objects OR :class:stingray.EventList object

A light curve from which to compute the cross spectrum. In some cases, this would be the light curve of the wavelength/energy/frequency band of interest.

data2: :class:stingray.Lightcurveobject OR iterable of :class:stingray.Lightcurve objects OR :class:stingray.EventList object

A second light curve to use in the cross spectrum. In some cases, this would be the wavelength/energy/frequency reference band to compare the band of interest with.

segment_size: float

The size of each segment to average. Note that if the total duration of each Lightcurve object in lc1 or lc2 is not an integer multiple of the segment_size, then any fraction left-over at the end of the time series will be lost. Otherwise you introduce artifacts.

norm: {frac, abs, leahy, none}, default none

The normalization of the (real part of the) cross spectrum.

Other Parameters
gti: 2-d float array

[[gti0_0, gti0_1], [gti1_0, gti1_1], ...] – Good Time intervals. This choice overrides the GTIs in the single light curves. Use with care!

dtfloat

The time resolution of the light curve. Only needed when constructing light curves in the case where data1 or data2 are of :class:EventList

power_type: string, optional, default real

Parameter to choose among complete, real part and magnitude of the cross spectrum.

silentbool, default False

Do not show a progress bar when generating an averaged cross spectrum. Useful for the batch execution of many spectra

lc1: :class:stingray.Lightcurveobject OR iterable of :class:stingray.Lightcurve objects

For backwards compatibility only. Like data1, but no stingray.events.EventList objects allowed

lc2: :class:stingray.Lightcurveobject OR iterable of :class:stingray.Lightcurve objects

For backwards compatibility only. Like data2, but no stingray.events.EventList objects allowed

fullspec: boolean, optional, default False

If True, return the full array of frequencies, otherwise return just the positive frequencies.

large_databool, default False

Use only for data larger than 10**7 data points!! Uses zarr and dask for computation.

save_allbool, default False

Save all intermediate PDSs used for the final average. Use with care. This is likely to fill up your RAM on medium-sized datasets, and to slow down the computation when rebinning.

Attributes
freq: numpy.ndarray

The array of mid-bin frequencies that the Fourier transform samples

power: numpy.ndarray

The array of cross spectra

power_err: numpy.ndarray

The uncertainties of power. An approximation for each bin given by power_err= power/sqrt(m). Where m is the number of power averaged in each bin (by frequency binning, or averaging powerspectrum). Note that for a single realization (m=1) the error is equal to the power.

df: float

The frequency resolution

m: int

The number of averaged cross spectra

n: int

The number of time bins per segment of light curve

nphots1: float

The total number of photons in the first (interest) light curve

nphots2: float

The total number of photons in the second (reference) light curve

gti: 2-d float array

[[gti0_0, gti0_1], [gti1_0, gti1_1], ...] – Good Time intervals. They are calculated by taking the common GTI between the two light curves

classical_significances(threshold=1, trial_correction=False)

Compute the classical significances for the powers in the power spectrum, assuming an underlying noise distribution that follows a chi-square distributions with 2M degrees of freedom, where M is the number of powers averaged in each bin.

Note that this function will only produce correct results when the following underlying assumptions are fulfilled:

1. The power spectrum is Leahy-normalized

2. There is no source of variability in the data other than the periodic signal to be determined with this method. This is important! If there are other sources of (aperiodic) variability in the data, this method will not produce correct results, but instead produce a large number of spurious false positive detections!

3. There are no significant instrumental effects changing the statistical distribution of the powers (e.g. pile-up or dead time)

By default, the method produces (index,p-values) for all powers in the power spectrum, where index is the numerical index of the power in question. If a threshold is set, then only powers with p-values below that threshold with their respective indices. If trial_correction is set to True, then the threshold will be corrected for the number of trials (frequencies) in the power spectrum before being used.

Parameters
thresholdfloat, optional, default 1

The threshold to be used when reporting p-values of potentially significant powers. Must be between 0 and 1. Default is 1 (all p-values will be reported).

trial_correctionbool, optional, default False

A Boolean flag that sets whether the threshold will be corrected by the number of frequencies before being applied. This decreases the threshold (p-values need to be lower to count as significant). Default is False (report all powers) though for any application where threshold is set to something meaningful, this should also be applied!

Returns
pvalsiterable

A list of (index, p-value) tuples for all powers that have p-values lower than the threshold specified in threshold.

coherence()[source]

Averaged Coherence function.

Coherence is defined in Vaughan and Nowak, 1996 4. It is a Fourier frequency dependent measure of the linear correlation between time series measured simultaneously in two energy channels.

Compute an averaged Coherence function of cross spectrum by computing coherence function of each segment and averaging them. The return type is a tuple with first element as the coherence function and the second element as the corresponding uncertainty associated with it.

Note : The uncertainty in coherence function is strictly valid for Gaussian statistics only.

Returns
(coh, uncertainty)tuple of np.ndarray

Tuple comprising the coherence function and uncertainty.

References

4

http://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1086/310430/pdf

plot(labels=None, axis=None, title=None, marker='-', save=False, filename=None)

Plot the amplitude of the cross spectrum vs. the frequency using matplotlib.

Parameters
labelsiterable, default None

A list of tuple with xlabel and ylabel as strings.

axislist, tuple, string, default None

Parameter to set axis properties of the matplotlib figure. For example it can be a list like [xmin, xmax, ymin, ymax] or any other acceptable argument for thematplotlib.pyplot.axis() method.

titlestr, default None

The title of the plot.

markerstr, default ‘-’

Line style and color of the plot. Line styles and colors are combined in a single format string, as in 'bo' for blue circles. See matplotlib.pyplot.plot for more options.

saveboolean, optional, default False

If True, save the figure with specified filename.

filenamestr

File name of the image to save. Depends on the boolean save.

rebin(df=None, f=None, method='mean')

Rebin the cross spectrum to a new frequency resolution df.

Parameters
df: float

The new frequency resolution

Returns
bin_cs = Crossspectrum (or one of its subclasses) object

The newly binned cross spectrum or power spectrum. Note: this object will be of the same type as the object that called this method. For example, if this method is called from AveragedPowerspectrum, it will return an object of class AveragedPowerspectrum, too.

Other Parameters
f: float

the rebin factor. If specified, it substitutes df with f*self.df

rebin_log(f=0.01)

Logarithmic rebin of the periodogram. The new frequency depends on the previous frequency modified by a factor f:

$d\nu_j = d\nu_{j-1} (1+f)$
Parameters
f: float, optional, default 0.01

parameter that steers the frequency resolution

Returns
new_specCrossspectrum (or one of its subclasses) object

The newly binned cross spectrum or power spectrum. Note: this object will be of the same type as the object that called this method. For example, if this method is called from AveragedPowerspectrum, it will return an object of class

time_lag()[source]

Calculate time lag and uncertainty.

Equation from Bendat & Piersol, 2011 [bendat-2011]__.

Returns
lagnp.ndarray

The time lag

lag_errnp.ndarray

The uncertainty in the time lag

### AveragedPowerspectrum¶

class stingray.AveragedPowerspectrum(data=None, segment_size=None, norm='frac', gti=None, silent=False, dt=None, lc=None, large_data=False, save_all=False)[source]

Make an averaged periodogram from a light curve by segmenting the light curve, Fourier-transforming each segment and then averaging the resulting periodograms.

Parameters
data: :class:stingray.Lightcurveobject OR iterable of :class:stingray.Lightcurve objects OR :class:stingray.EventList object

The light curve data to be Fourier-transformed.

segment_size: float

The size of each segment to average. Note that if the total duration of each Lightcurve object in lc is not an integer multiple of the segment_size, then any fraction left-over at the end of the time series will be lost.

norm: {leahy | frac | abs | none }, optional, default frac

The normaliation of the periodogram to be used.

Other Parameters
gti: 2-d float array

[[gti0_0, gti0_1], [gti1_0, gti1_1], ...] – Good Time intervals. This choice overrides the GTIs in the single light curves. Use with care!

silentbool, default False

Do not show a progress bar when generating an averaged cross spectrum. Useful for the batch execution of many spectra

dt: float

The time resolution of the light curve. Only needed when constructing light curves in the case where data is of :class:EventList

large_databool, default False

Use only for data larger than 10**7 data points!! Uses zarr and dask for computation.

save_allbool, default False

Save all intermediate PDSs used for the final average. Use with care. This is likely to fill up your RAM on medium-sized datasets, and to slow down the computation when rebinning.

Attributes
norm: {leahy | frac | abs | none }

the normalization of the periodogram

freq: numpy.ndarray

The array of mid-bin frequencies that the Fourier transform samples

power: numpy.ndarray

The array of normalized squared absolute values of Fourier amplitudes

power_err: numpy.ndarray

The uncertainties of power. An approximation for each bin given by power_err= power/sqrt(m). Where m is the number of power averaged in each bin (by frequency binning, or averaging powerspectrum). Note that for a single realization (m=1) the error is equal to the power.

df: float

The frequency resolution

m: int

The number of averaged periodograms

n: int

The number of data points in the light curve

nphots: float

The total number of photons in the light curve

classical_significances(threshold=1, trial_correction=False)

Compute the classical significances for the powers in the power spectrum, assuming an underlying noise distribution that follows a chi-square distributions with 2M degrees of freedom, where M is the number of powers averaged in each bin.

Note that this function will only produce correct results when the following underlying assumptions are fulfilled:

1. The power spectrum is Leahy-normalized

2. There is no source of variability in the data other than the periodic signal to be determined with this method. This is important! If there are other sources of (aperiodic) variability in the data, this method will not produce correct results, but instead produce a large number of spurious false positive detections!

3. There are no significant instrumental effects changing the statistical distribution of the powers (e.g. pile-up or dead time)

By default, the method produces (index,p-values) for all powers in the power spectrum, where index is the numerical index of the power in question. If a threshold is set, then only powers with p-values below that threshold with their respective indices. If trial_correction is set to True, then the threshold will be corrected for the number of trials (frequencies) in the power spectrum before being used.

Parameters
thresholdfloat, optional, default 1

The threshold to be used when reporting p-values of potentially significant powers. Must be between 0 and 1. Default is 1 (all p-values will be reported).

trial_correctionbool, optional, default False

A Boolean flag that sets whether the threshold will be corrected by the number of frequencies before being applied. This decreases the threshold (p-values need to be lower to count as significant). Default is False (report all powers) though for any application where threshold is set to something meaningful, this should also be applied!

Returns
pvalsiterable

A list of (index, p-value) tuples for all powers that have p-values lower than the threshold specified in threshold.

coherence()

Averaged Coherence function.

Coherence is defined in Vaughan and Nowak, 1996 5. It is a Fourier frequency dependent measure of the linear correlation between time series measured simultaneously in two energy channels.

Compute an averaged Coherence function of cross spectrum by computing coherence function of each segment and averaging them. The return type is a tuple with first element as the coherence function and the second element as the corresponding uncertainty associated with it.

Note : The uncertainty in coherence function is strictly valid for Gaussian statistics only.

Returns
(coh, uncertainty)tuple of np.ndarray

Tuple comprising the coherence function and uncertainty.

References

5

http://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1086/310430/pdf

compute_rms(min_freq, max_freq, white_noise_offset=0.0)

Compute the fractional rms amplitude in the power spectrum between two frequencies.

Parameters
min_freq: float

The lower frequency bound for the calculation

max_freq: float

The upper frequency bound for the calculation

Returns
rms: float

The fractional rms amplitude contained between min_freq and max_freq

rms_err: float

The error on the fractional rms amplitude

Other Parameters
white_noise_offsetfloat, default 0

This is the white noise level, in Leahy normalization. In the ideal case, this is 2. Dead time and other instrumental effects can alter it. The user can fit the white noise level outside this function and it will get subtracted from powers here.

modulation_upper_limit(fmin=None, fmax=None, c=0.95)

Upper limit on a sinusoidal modulation.

To understand the meaning of this amplitude: if the modulation is described by:

..math:: p = overline{p} (1 + a * sin(x))

this function returns a.

If it is a sum of sinusoidal harmonics instead ..math:: p = overline{p} (1 + sum_l a_l * sin(lx)) a is equivalent to $$\sqrt(\sum_l a_l^2)$$.

See stingray.stats.power_upper_limit, stingray.stats.amplitude_upper_limit for more information.

Parameters
fmin: float

The minimum frequency to search (defaults to the first nonzero bin)

fmax: float

The maximum frequency to search (defaults to the Nyquist frequency)

Other Parameters
c: float

The confidence value for the upper limit (e.g. 0.95 = 95%)

Examples

>>> pds = Powerspectrum()
>>> pds.norm = "leahy"
>>> pds.freq = np.arange(0., 5.)
>>> # Note: this pds has 40 as maximum value between 2 and 5 Hz
>>> pds.power = np.array([100000, 1, 1, 40, 1])
>>> pds.m = 1
>>> pds.nphots = 30000
>>> pds.modulation_upper_limit(fmin=2, fmax=5, c=0.99)
0.1016...
>>> pds.norm = "frac"
>>> pds.modulation_upper_limit(2, 5, 0.99)
Traceback (most recent call last):
...
ValueError: Modulation upper limit is only available in the Leahy...

plot(labels=None, axis=None, title=None, marker='-', save=False, filename=None)

Plot the amplitude of the cross spectrum vs. the frequency using matplotlib.

Parameters
labelsiterable, default None

A list of tuple with xlabel and ylabel as strings.

axislist, tuple, string, default None

Parameter to set axis properties of the matplotlib figure. For example it can be a list like [xmin, xmax, ymin, ymax] or any other acceptable argument for thematplotlib.pyplot.axis() method.

titlestr, default None

The title of the plot.

markerstr, default ‘-’

Line style and color of the plot. Line styles and colors are combined in a single format string, as in 'bo' for blue circles. See matplotlib.pyplot.plot for more options.

saveboolean, optional, default False

If True, save the figure with specified filename.

filenamestr

File name of the image to save. Depends on the boolean save.

rebin(df=None, f=None, method='mean')

Rebin the power spectrum.

Parameters
df: float

The new frequency resolution

Returns
bin_cs = Powerspectrum object

The newly binned power spectrum.

Other Parameters
f: float

the rebin factor. If specified, it substitutes df with f*self.df

rebin_log(f=0.01)

Logarithmic rebin of the periodogram. The new frequency depends on the previous frequency modified by a factor f:

$d\nu_j = d\nu_{j-1} (1+f)$
Parameters
f: float, optional, default 0.01

parameter that steers the frequency resolution

Returns
new_specCrossspectrum (or one of its subclasses) object

The newly binned cross spectrum or power spectrum. Note: this object will be of the same type as the object that called this method. For example, if this method is called from AveragedPowerspectrum, it will return an object of class

time_lag()

Calculate time lag and uncertainty.

Equation from Bendat & Piersol, 2011 [bendat-2011]__.

Returns
lagnp.ndarray

The time lag

lag_errnp.ndarray

The uncertainty in the time lag

### Dynamical Powerspectrum¶

class stingray.DynamicalPowerspectrum(lc, segment_size, norm='frac', gti=None, dt=None)[source]

Create a dynamical power spectrum, also often called a spectrogram.

This class will divide a Lightcurve object into segments of length segment_size, create a power spectrum for each segment and store all powers in a matrix as a function of both time (using the mid-point of each segment) and frequency.

This is often used to trace changes in period of a (quasi-)periodic signal over time.

Parameters
lc

The time series of which the Dynamical powerspectrum is to be calculated.

segment_sizefloat, default 1

Length of the segment of light curve, default value is 1 (in whatever units the time array in the Lightcurve object uses).

norm: {leahy | frac | abs | none }, optional, default frac

The normaliation of the periodogram to be used.

Other Parameters
gti: 2-d float array

[[gti0_0, gti0_1], [gti1_0, gti1_1], ...] – Good Time intervals. This choice overrides the GTIs in the single light curves. Use with care!

Attributes
segment_size: float

The size of each segment to average. Note that if the total duration of each Lightcurve object in lc is not an integer multiple of the segment_size, then any fraction left-over at the end of the time series will be lost.

dyn_psnp.ndarray

The matrix of normalized squared absolute values of Fourier amplitudes. The axis are given by the freq and time attributes

norm: {leahy | frac | abs | none}

the normalization of the periodogram

freq: numpy.ndarray

The array of mid-bin frequencies that the Fourier transform samples

df: float

The frequency resolution

dt: float

The time resolution

classical_significances(threshold=1, trial_correction=False)

Compute the classical significances for the powers in the power spectrum, assuming an underlying noise distribution that follows a chi-square distributions with 2M degrees of freedom, where M is the number of powers averaged in each bin.

Note that this function will only produce correct results when the following underlying assumptions are fulfilled:

1. The power spectrum is Leahy-normalized

2. There is no source of variability in the data other than the periodic signal to be determined with this method. This is important! If there are other sources of (aperiodic) variability in the data, this method will not produce correct results, but instead produce a large number of spurious false positive detections!

3. There are no significant instrumental effects changing the statistical distribution of the powers (e.g. pile-up or dead time)

By default, the method produces (index,p-values) for all powers in the power spectrum, where index is the numerical index of the power in question. If a threshold is set, then only powers with p-values below that threshold with their respective indices. If trial_correction is set to True, then the threshold will be corrected for the number of trials (frequencies) in the power spectrum before being used.

Parameters
thresholdfloat, optional, default 1

The threshold to be used when reporting p-values of potentially significant powers. Must be between 0 and 1. Default is 1 (all p-values will be reported).

trial_correctionbool, optional, default False

A Boolean flag that sets whether the threshold will be corrected by the number of frequencies before being applied. This decreases the threshold (p-values need to be lower to count as significant). Default is False (report all powers) though for any application where threshold is set to something meaningful, this should also be applied!

Returns
pvalsiterable

A list of (index, p-value) tuples for all powers that have p-values lower than the threshold specified in threshold.

coherence()

Averaged Coherence function.

Coherence is defined in Vaughan and Nowak, 1996 6. It is a Fourier frequency dependent measure of the linear correlation between time series measured simultaneously in two energy channels.

Compute an averaged Coherence function of cross spectrum by computing coherence function of each segment and averaging them. The return type is a tuple with first element as the coherence function and the second element as the corresponding uncertainty associated with it.

Note : The uncertainty in coherence function is strictly valid for Gaussian statistics only.

Returns
(coh, uncertainty)tuple of np.ndarray

Tuple comprising the coherence function and uncertainty.

References

6

http://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1086/310430/pdf

compute_rms(min_freq, max_freq, white_noise_offset=0.0)

Compute the fractional rms amplitude in the power spectrum between two frequencies.

Parameters
min_freq: float

The lower frequency bound for the calculation

max_freq: float

The upper frequency bound for the calculation

Returns
rms: float

The fractional rms amplitude contained between min_freq and max_freq

rms_err: float

The error on the fractional rms amplitude

Other Parameters
white_noise_offsetfloat, default 0

This is the white noise level, in Leahy normalization. In the ideal case, this is 2. Dead time and other instrumental effects can alter it. The user can fit the white noise level outside this function and it will get subtracted from powers here.

modulation_upper_limit(fmin=None, fmax=None, c=0.95)

Upper limit on a sinusoidal modulation.

To understand the meaning of this amplitude: if the modulation is described by:

..math:: p = overline{p} (1 + a * sin(x))

this function returns a.

If it is a sum of sinusoidal harmonics instead ..math:: p = overline{p} (1 + sum_l a_l * sin(lx)) a is equivalent to $$\sqrt(\sum_l a_l^2)$$.

See stingray.stats.power_upper_limit, stingray.stats.amplitude_upper_limit for more information.

Parameters
fmin: float

The minimum frequency to search (defaults to the first nonzero bin)

fmax: float

The maximum frequency to search (defaults to the Nyquist frequency)

Other Parameters
c: float

The confidence value for the upper limit (e.g. 0.95 = 95%)

Examples

>>> pds = Powerspectrum()
>>> pds.norm = "leahy"
>>> pds.freq = np.arange(0., 5.)
>>> # Note: this pds has 40 as maximum value between 2 and 5 Hz
>>> pds.power = np.array([100000, 1, 1, 40, 1])
>>> pds.m = 1
>>> pds.nphots = 30000
>>> pds.modulation_upper_limit(fmin=2, fmax=5, c=0.99)
0.1016...
>>> pds.norm = "frac"
>>> pds.modulation_upper_limit(2, 5, 0.99)
Traceback (most recent call last):
...
ValueError: Modulation upper limit is only available in the Leahy...

plot(labels=None, axis=None, title=None, marker='-', save=False, filename=None)

Plot the amplitude of the cross spectrum vs. the frequency using matplotlib.

Parameters
labelsiterable, default None

A list of tuple with xlabel and ylabel as strings.

axislist, tuple, string, default None

Parameter to set axis properties of the matplotlib figure. For example it can be a list like [xmin, xmax, ymin, ymax] or any other acceptable argument for thematplotlib.pyplot.axis() method.

titlestr, default None

The title of the plot.

markerstr, default ‘-’

Line style and color of the plot. Line styles and colors are combined in a single format string, as in 'bo' for blue circles. See matplotlib.pyplot.plot for more options.

saveboolean, optional, default False

If True, save the figure with specified filename.

filenamestr

File name of the image to save. Depends on the boolean save.

rebin(df=None, f=None, method='mean')

Rebin the power spectrum.

Parameters
df: float

The new frequency resolution

Returns
bin_cs = Powerspectrum object

The newly binned power spectrum.

Other Parameters
f: float

the rebin factor. If specified, it substitutes df with f*self.df

rebin_frequency(df_new, method='sum')[source]

Rebin the Dynamic Power Spectrum to a new frequency resolution. Rebinning is an in-place operation, i.e. will replace the existing dyn_ps attribute.

While the new resolution need not be an integer multiple of the previous frequency resolution, be aware that if it is not, the last bin will be cut off by the fraction left over by the integer division.

Parameters
df_new: float

The new frequency resolution of the Dynamical Power Spectrum. Must be larger than the frequency resolution of the old Dynamical Power Spectrum!

method: {sum | mean | average}, optional, default sum

This keyword argument sets whether the counts in the new bins should be summed or averaged.

rebin_log(f=0.01)

Logarithmic rebin of the periodogram. The new frequency depends on the previous frequency modified by a factor f:

$d\nu_j = d\nu_{j-1} (1+f)$
Parameters
f: float, optional, default 0.01

parameter that steers the frequency resolution

Returns
new_specCrossspectrum (or one of its subclasses) object

The newly binned cross spectrum or power spectrum. Note: this object will be of the same type as the object that called this method. For example, if this method is called from AveragedPowerspectrum, it will return an object of class

rebin_time(dt_new, method='sum')[source]

Rebin the Dynamic Power Spectrum to a new time resolution. While the new resolution need not be an integer multiple of the previous time resolution, be aware that if it is not, the last bin will be cut off by the fraction left over by the integer division.

Parameters
dt_new: float

The new time resolution of the Dynamical Power Spectrum. Must be larger than the time resolution of the old Dynamical Power Spectrum!

method: {“sum” | “mean” | “average”}, optional, default “sum”

This keyword argument sets whether the counts in the new bins should be summed or averaged.

Returns
time_new: numpy.ndarray

Time axis with new rebinned time resolution.

dynspec_new: numpy.ndarray

New rebinned Dynamical Power Spectrum.

time_lag()

Calculate time lag and uncertainty.

Equation from Bendat & Piersol, 2011 [bendat-2011]__.

Returns
lagnp.ndarray

The time lag

lag_errnp.ndarray

The uncertainty in the time lag

trace_maximum(min_freq=None, max_freq=None)[source]

Return the indices of the maximum powers in each segment Powerspectrum between specified frequencies.

Parameters
min_freq: float, default None

The lower frequency bound.

max_freq: float, default None

The upper frequency bound.

Returns
max_positionsnp.array

The array of indices of the maximum power in each segment having frequency between min_freq and max_freq.

### CrossCorrelation¶

class stingray.CrossCorrelation(lc1=None, lc2=None, cross=None, mode='same')[source]

Make a cross-correlation from light curves or a cross spectrum.

You can also make an empty Crosscorrelation object to populate with your own cross-correlation data.

Parameters
lc1: :class:stingray.Lightcurve object, optional, default None

The first light curve data for correlation calculations.

lc2: :class:stingray.Lightcurve object, optional, default None

The light curve data for the correlation calculations.

cross: :class: stingray.Crossspectrum object, default None

The cross spectrum data for the correlation calculations.

mode: {full, valid, same}, optional, default same

A string indicating the size of the correlation output. See the relevant scipy documentation [scipy-docs] for more details.

References

scipy-docs

https://docs.scipy.org/doc/scipy-0.19.0/reference/generated/scipy.signal.correlate.html

Attributes
lc1: :class:stingray.Lightcurve

The first light curve data for correlation calculations.

lc2: :class:stingray.Lightcurve

The light curve data for the correlation calculations.

cross: :class: stingray.Crossspectrum

The cross spectrum data for the correlation calculations.

corr: numpy.ndarray

An array of correlation data calculated from two light curves

time_lags: numpy.ndarray

An array of all possible time lags against which each point in corr is calculated

dt: float

The time resolution of each light curve (used in time_lag calculations)

time_shift: float

Time lag that gives maximum value of correlation between two light curves. There will be maximum correlation between light curves if one of the light curve is shifted by time_shift.

n: int

Number of points in self.corr (length of cross-correlation data)

auto: bool

An internal flag to indicate whether this is a cross-correlation or an auto-correlation.

cal_timeshift(dt=1.0)[source]

Calculate the cross correlation against all possible time lags, both positive and negative.

Parameters
dt: float, optional, default 1.0

Time resolution of the light curve, should be passed when object is populated with correlation data and no information about light curve can be extracted. Used to calculate time_lags.

Returns
self.time_shift: float

Value of the time lag that gives maximum value of correlation between two light curves.

self.time_lags: numpy.ndarray

An array of time_lags calculated from correlation data

plot(labels=None, axis=None, title=None, marker='-', save=False, filename=None, ax=None)[source]

Plot the Crosscorrelation as function using Matplotlib. Plot the Crosscorrelation object on a graph self.time_lags on x-axis and self.corr on y-axis

Parameters
labelsiterable, default None

A list of tuple with xlabel and ylabel as strings.

axislist, tuple, string, default None

Parameter to set axis properties of matplotlib figure. For example it can be a list like [xmin, xmax, ymin, ymax] or any other acceptable argument for matplotlib.pyplot.axis() function.

titlestr, default None

The title of the plot.

markerstr, default -

Line style and color of the plot. Line styles and colors are combined in a single format string, as in 'bo' for blue circles. See matplotlib.pyplot.plot for more options.

saveboolean, optional (default=False)

If True, save the figure with specified filename.

filenamestr

File name of the image to save. Depends on the boolean save.

axmatplotlib.Axes object

An axes object to fill with the cross correlation plot.

### AutoCorrelation¶

class stingray.AutoCorrelation(lc=None, mode='same')[source]

Make an auto-correlation from a light curve. You can also make an empty Autocorrelation object to populate with your own auto-correlation data.

Parameters
lc: :class:stingray.Lightcurve object, optional, default None

The light curve data for correlation calculations.

mode: {full, valid, same}, optional, default same

A string indicating the size of the correlation output. See the relevant scipy documentation [scipy-docs] for more details.

Attributes
lc1, lc2::class:stingray.Lightcurve

The light curve data for correlation calculations.

corr: numpy.ndarray

An array of correlation data calculated from lightcurve data

time_lags: numpy.ndarray

An array of all possible time lags against which each point in corr is calculated

dt: float

The time resolution of each lightcurve (used in time_lag calculations)

time_shift: float, zero

Max. Value of AutoCorrelation is always at zero lag.

n: int

Number of points in self.corr(Length of auto-correlation data)

cal_timeshift(dt=1.0)

Calculate the cross correlation against all possible time lags, both positive and negative.

Parameters
dt: float, optional, default 1.0

Time resolution of the light curve, should be passed when object is populated with correlation data and no information about light curve can be extracted. Used to calculate time_lags.

Returns
self.time_shift: float

Value of the time lag that gives maximum value of correlation between two light curves.

self.time_lags: numpy.ndarray

An array of time_lags calculated from correlation data

plot(labels=None, axis=None, title=None, marker='-', save=False, filename=None, ax=None)

Plot the Crosscorrelation as function using Matplotlib. Plot the Crosscorrelation object on a graph self.time_lags on x-axis and self.corr on y-axis

Parameters
labelsiterable, default None

A list of tuple with xlabel and ylabel as strings.

axislist, tuple, string, default None

Parameter to set axis properties of matplotlib figure. For example it can be a list like [xmin, xmax, ymin, ymax] or any other acceptable argument for matplotlib.pyplot.axis() function.

titlestr, default None

The title of the plot.

markerstr, default -

Line style and color of the plot. Line styles and colors are combined in a single format string, as in 'bo' for blue circles. See matplotlib.pyplot.plot for more options.

saveboolean, optional (default=False)

If True, save the figure with specified filename.

filenamestr

File name of the image to save. Depends on the boolean save.

axmatplotlib.Axes object

An axes object to fill with the cross correlation plot.

stingray.deadtime.fad.calculate_FAD_correction(lc1, lc2, segment_size, norm='none', gti=None, plot=False, ax=None, smoothing_alg='gauss', smoothing_length=None, verbose=False, tolerance=0.05, strict=False, all_leahy=False, output_file=None, return_objects=False)[source]

Calculate Frequency Amplitude Difference-corrected (cross)power spectra.

Reference: Bachetti & Huppenkothen, 2018, ApJ, 853L, 21

The two input light curve must be strictly simultaneous, and recorded by two independent detectors with similar responses, so that the count rates are similar and dead time is independent. The method does not apply to different energy channels of the same instrument, or to the signal observed by two instruments with very different responses. See the paper for caveats.

Parameters
lc1: class:stingray.ligthtcurve.Lightcurve

Light curve from channel 1

lc2: class:stingray.ligthtcurve.Lightcurve

Light curve from channel 2. Must be strictly simultaneous to lc1 and have the same binning time. Also, it must be strictly independent, e.g. from a different detector. There must be no dead time cross-talk between the two light curves.

segment_size: float

The final Fourier products are averaged over many segments of the input light curves. This is the length of each segment being averaged. Note that the light curve must be long enough to have at least 30 segments, as the result gets better as one averages more and more segments.

norm: {frac, abs, leahy, none}, default none

The normalization of the (real part of the) cross spectrum.

Returns
resultsclass:astropy.table.Table object or dict or str

The content of results depends on whether return_objects is True or False. If return_objects==False, results is a Table with the following columns:

• pds1: the corrected PDS of lc1

• pds2: the corrected PDS of lc2

• cs: the corrected cospectrum

• ptot: the corrected PDS of lc1 + lc2

If return_objects is True, results is a dict, with keys named like the columns listed above but with AveragePowerspectrum or AverageCrossspectrum objects instead of arrays.

Other Parameters
plotbool, default False

Plot diagnostics: check if the smoothed Fourier difference scatter is a good approximation of the data scatter.

axmatplotlib.axes.axes object
If not None and plot is True, use this axis object to produce

the diagnostic plot. Otherwise, create a new figure.

smoothing_alg{‘gauss’, …}

Smoothing algorithm. For now, the only smoothing algorithm allowed is gauss, which applies a Gaussian Filter from scipy.

smoothing_lengthint, default segment_size * 3

Number of bins to smooth in gaussian window smoothing

verbose: bool, default False

Print out information on the outcome of the algorithm (recommended)

tolerancefloat, default 0.05

Accepted relative error on the FAD-corrected Fourier amplitude, to be used as success diagnostics. Should be  stdtheor = 2 / np.sqrt(n) std = (average_corrected_fourier_diff / n).std() np.abs((std - stdtheor) / stdtheor) < tolerance 

strictbool, default False

Decide what to do if the condition on tolerance is not met. If True, raise a RuntimeError. If False, just throw a warning.

all_leahydeprecated bool, default False

Save all spectra in Leahy normalization. Otherwise, leave unnormalized.

output_filestr, default None

Name of an output file (any extension automatically recognized by Astropy is fine)

Get Stingray periodograms from FAD results.

Parameters

Results from calculate_FAD_correction, either as a Table or an output file name

kindstr, one of [‘ptot’, ‘pds1’, ‘pds2’, ‘cs’]

Kind of periodogram to get (E.g., ‘ptot’ -> PDS from the sum of the two light curves, ‘cs’ -> cospectrum, etc.)

Returns
resultsAveragedCrossspectrum or Averagedpowerspectrum object

The periodogram.

stingray.deadtime.model.check_A(rate, td, tb, max_k=100, save_to=None)[source]

Test that A is well-behaved.

Check that Ak ->r0**2tb**2 for k->infty, as per Eq. 43 in Zhang+95.

stingray.deadtime.model.check_B(rate, td, tb, max_k=100, save_to=None)[source]

Check that B->0 for k->infty.

The factorial of a number or array of numbers.

The factorial of non-negative integer n is the product of all positive integers less than or equal to n:

n! = n * (n - 1) * (n - 2) * ... * 1

Parameters
nint or array_like of ints

Input values. If n < 0, the return value is 0.

exactbool, optional

If True, calculate the answer exactly using long integer arithmetic. If False, result is approximated in floating point rapidly using the gamma function. Default is False.

Returns
nffloat or int or ndarray

Factorial of n, as integer or float depending on exact.

Notes

For arrays with exact=True, the factorial is computed only once, for the largest input, with each other result computed in the process. The output dtype is increased to int64 or object if necessary.

With exact=False the factorial is approximated using the gamma function:

$n! = \Gamma(n+1)$

Examples

>>> from scipy.special import factorial
>>> arr = np.array([3, 4, 5])
>>> factorial(arr, exact=False)
array([   6.,   24.,  120.])
>>> factorial(arr, exact=True)
array([  6,  24, 120])
>>> factorial(5, exact=True)
120

stingray.deadtime.model.pds_model_zhang(N, rate, td, tb, limit_k=60)[source]

Calculate the dead-time-modified power spectrum.

Parameters
Nint

The number of spectral bins

ratefloat

Incident count rate

tdfloat

tbfloat

Bin time of the light curve

Returns
freqsarray of floats

Frequency array

powerarray of floats

Power spectrum

Other Parameters
limit_kint

Limit to this value the number of terms in the inner loops of calculations. Check the plots returned by the check_B and check_A functions to test that this number is adequate.

Calculate detected countrate given dead time and incident countrate.

Calculate incident countrate given dead time and detected countrate.

## Higher-Order Fourier and Spectral Timing Products¶

These classes implement higher-order Fourier analysis products (e.g. Bispectrum) and Spectral Timing related methods taking advantage of both temporal and spectral information in modern data sets.

### Bispectrum¶

class stingray.bispectrum.Bispectrum(lc, maxlag=None, window=None, scale='biased')[source]

Makes a Bispectrum object from a stingray.Lightcurve.

Bispectrum is a higher order time series analysis method and is calculated by indirect method as Fourier transform of triple auto-correlation function also called as 3rd order cumulant.

Parameters
lc

The light curve data for bispectrum calculation.

maxlagint, optional, default None

Maximum lag on both positive and negative sides of 3rd order cumulant (Similar to lags in correlation). if None, max lag is set to one-half of length of light curve.

window{uniform, parzen, hamming, hanning, triangular, welch, blackman, flat-top}, optional, default ‘uniform’

Type of window function to apply to the data.

scale{biased, unbiased}, optional, default biased

Flag to decide biased or unbiased normalization for 3rd order cumulant function.

References

1) The biphase explained: understanding the asymmetries invcoupled Fourier components of astronomical timeseries by Thomas J. Maccarone Department of Physics, Box 41051, Science Building, Texas Tech University, Lubbock TX 79409-1051 School of Physics and Astronomy, University of Southampton, SO16 4ES

2) T. S. Rao, M. M. Gabr, An Introduction to Bispectral Analysis and Bilinear Time Series Models, Lecture Notes in Statistics, Volume 24, D. Brillinger, S. Fienberg, J. Gani, J. Hartigan, K. Krickeberg, Editors, Springer-Verlag, New York, NY, 1984.

3) Matlab version of bispectrum under following link. https://www.mathworks.com/matlabcentral/fileexchange/60-bisp3cum

Examples

>> from stingray.lightcurve import Lightcurve
>> from stingray.bispectrum import Bispectrum
>> lc = Lightcurve([1,2,3,4,5],[2,3,1,1,2])
>> bs = Bispectrum(lc,maxlag=1)
>> bs.lags
array([-1.,  0.,  1.])
>> bs.freq
array([-0.5,  0.,  0.5])
>> bs.cum3
array([[-0.2976,  0.1024,  0.1408],
[ 0.1024,  0.144, -0.2976],
[ 0.1408, -0.2976,  0.1024]])
>> bs.bispec_mag
array([[ 1.26336794,  0.0032   ,  0.0032    ],
[ 0.0032   ,  0.16     ,  0.0032    ],
[ 0.0032   ,  0.0032   ,  1.26336794]])
>> bs.bispec_phase
array([[ -9.65946229e-01,   2.25347190e-14,   3.46944695e-14],
[  0.00000000e+00,   3.14159265e+00,   0.00000000e+00],
[ -3.46944695e-14,  -2.25347190e-14,   9.65946229e-01]])

Attributes
lc

The light curve data to compute the Bispectrum.

fsfloat

Sampling frequencies

nint

Total Number of samples of light curve observations.

maxlagint

Maximum lag on both positive and negative sides of 3rd order cumulant (similar to lags in correlation)

signalnumpy.ndarray

Row vector of light curve counts for matrix operations

scale{biased, unbiased}

Flag to decide biased or unbiased normalization for 3rd order cumulant function.

lagsnumpy.ndarray

An array of time lags for which 3rd order cumulant is calculated

freqnumpy.ndarray

An array of freq values for Bispectrum.

cum3numpy.ndarray

A maxlag*2+1 x maxlag*2+1 matrix containing 3rd order cumulant data for different lags.

bispecnumpy.ndarray

A maxlag*2+1 x maxlag*2+1 matrix containing bispectrum data for different frequencies.

bispec_magnumpy.ndarray

Magnitude of the bispectrum

bispec_phasenumpy.ndarray

Phase of the bispectrum

plot_cum3(axis=None, save=False, filename=None)[source]

Plot the 3rd order cumulant as function of time lags using matplotlib. Plot the cum3 attribute on a graph with the lags attribute on x-axis and y-axis and cum3 on z-axis

Parameters
axislist, tuple, string, default None

Parameter to set axis properties of matplotlib figure. For example it can be a list like [xmin, xmax, ymin, ymax] or any other acceptable argument for matplotlib.pyplot.axis() method.

savebool, optionalm, default False

If True, save the figure with specified filename.

filenamestr

File name and path of the image to save. Depends on the boolean save.

Returns
pltmatplotlib.pyplot object

Reference to plot, call show() to display it

plot_mag(axis=None, save=False, filename=None)[source]

Plot the magnitude of bispectrum as function of freq using matplotlib. Plot the bispec_mag attribute on a graph with freq attribute on the x-axis and y-axis and the bispec_mag attribute on the z-axis.

Parameters
axislist, tuple, string, default None

Parameter to set axis properties of matplotlib figure. For example it can be a list like [xmin, xmax, ymin, ymax] or any other acceptable argument for matplotlib.pyplot.axis() method.

savebool, optional, default False

If True, save the figure with specified filename and path.

filenamestr

File name and path of the image to save. Depends on the bool save.

Returns
pltmatplotlib.pyplot object

Reference to plot, call show() to display it

plot_phase(axis=None, save=False, filename=None)[source]

Plot the phase of bispectrum as function of freq using matplotlib. Plot the bispec_phase attribute on a graph with phase attribute on the x-axis and y-axis and the bispec_phase attribute on the z-axis.

Parameters
axislist, tuple, string, default None

Parameter to set axis properties of matplotlib figure. For example it can be a list like [xmin, xmax, ymin, ymax] or any other acceptable argument for matplotlib.pyplot.axis() function.

savebool, optional, default False

If True, save the figure with specified filename and path.

filenamestr

File name and path of the image to save. Depends on the bool save.

Returns
pltmatplotlib.pyplot object

Reference to plot, call show() to display it

### Covariancespectrum¶

class stingray.Covariancespectrum(data, dt=None, band_interest=None, ref_band_interest=None, std=None)[source]

Compute a covariance spectrum for the data. The input data can be either in event data or pre-made light curves. Event data can either be in the form of a numpy.ndarray with (time stamp, energy) pairs or a stingray.events.EventList object. If light curves are formed ahead of time, then a list of stingray.Lightcurve objects should be passed to the object, ideally one light curve for each band of interest.

For the case where the data is input as a list of stingray.Lightcurve objects, the reference band(s) should either be

1. a single stingray.Lightcurve object,

2. a list of stingray.Lightcurve objects with the reference band for each band of interest pre-made, or

3. None, in which case reference bands will formed by combining all light curves except for the band of interest.

In the case of event data, band_interest and ref_band_interest can be (multiple) pairs of energies, and the light curves for the bands of interest and reference bands will be produced dynamically.

Parameters
data{numpy.ndarray | stingray.events.EventList object | list of stingray.Lightcurve objects}

data contains the time series data, either in the form of a 2-D array of (time stamp, energy) pairs for event data, or as a list of light curves. Note : The event list must be in sorted order with respect to the times of arrivals.

dtfloat

The time resolution of the stingray.Lightcurve formed from the energy bin. Only used if data is an event list.

band_interest{None, iterable of tuples}

If None, all possible energy values will be assumed to be of interest, and a covariance spectrum in the highest resolution will be produced. Note: if the input is a list of stingray.Lightcurve objects, then the user may supply their energy values here, for construction of a reference band.

ref_band_interest{None, tuple, stingray.Lightcurve, list of stingray.Lightcurve objects}

Defines the reference band to be used for comparison with the bands of interest. If None, all bands except the band of interest will be used for each band of interest, respectively. Alternatively, a tuple can be given for event list data, which will extract the reference band (always excluding the band of interest), or one may put in a single stingray.Lightcurve object to be used (the same for each band of interest) or a list of stingray.Lightcurve objects, one for each band of interest.

stdfloat or np.array or list of numbers

The term std is used to calculate the excess variance of a band. If std is set to None, default Poisson case is taken and the std is calculated as mean(lc)**0.5. In the case of a single float as input, the same is used as the standard deviation which is also used as the std. And if the std is an iterable of numbers, their mean is used for the same purpose.

References

[1] Wilkinson, T. and Uttley, P. (2009), Accretion disc variability in the hard state of black hole X-ray binaries. Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, 397: 666–676. doi: 10.1111/j.1365-2966.2009.15008.x

Examples

See the notebooks repository for detailed notebooks on the code.

Attributes
unnorm_covarnp.ndarray

An array of arrays with mid point band_interest and their covariance. It is the array-form of the dictionary energy_covar. The covariance values are unnormalized.

covarnp.ndarray

Normalized covariance spectrum.

covar_errornp.ndarray

Errors of the normalized covariance spectrum.

### AveragedCovariancespectrum¶

class stingray.AveragedCovariancespectrum(data, segment_size, dt=None, band_interest=None, ref_band_interest=None, std=None)[source]

Compute a covariance spectrum for the data, defined in [covar spectrum]_ Equation 15.

Parameters
data{numpy.ndarray | list of stingray.Lightcurve objects}

data contains the time series data, either in the form of a 2-D array of (time stamp, energy) pairs for event data, or as a list of stingray.Lightcurve objects. Note : The event list must be in sorted order with respect to the times of arrivals.

segment_sizefloat

The length of each segment in the averaged covariance spectrum. The number of segments will be calculated automatically using the total length of the data set and the segment_size defined here.

dtfloat

The time resolution of the stingray.Lightcurve formed from the energy bin. Only used if data is an event list.

band_interest{None, iterable of tuples}

If None, all possible energy values will be assumed to be of interest, and a covariance spectrum in the highest resolution will be produced. Note: if the input is a list of stingray.Lightcurve objects, then the user may supply their energy values here, for construction of a reference band.

ref_band_interest{None, tuple, stingray.Lightcurve, list of stingray.Lightcurve objects}

Defines the reference band to be used for comparison with the bands of interest. If None, all bands except the band of interest will be used for each band of interest, respectively. Alternatively, a tuple can be given for event list data, which will extract the reference band (always excluding the band of interest), or one may put in a single stingray.Lightcurve object to be used (the same for each band of interest) or a list of stingray.Lightcurve objects, one for each band of interest.

stdfloat or np.array or list of numbers

The term std is used to calculate the excess variance of a band. If std is set to None, default Poisson case is taken and the std is calculated as mean(lc)**0.5. In the case of a single float as input, the same is used as the standard deviation which is also used as the std. And if the std is an iterable of numbers, their mean is used for the same purpose.

References

Attributes
unnorm_covarnp.ndarray

An array of arrays with mid point band_interest and their covariance. It is the array-form of the dictionary energy_covar. The covariance values are unnormalized.

covarnp.ndarray

Normalized covariance spectrum.

covar_errornp.ndarray

Errors of the normalized covariance spectrum.

### VarEnergySpectrum¶

Abstract base class for spectral timing products including both variability and spectral information.

class stingray.varenergyspectrum.VarEnergySpectrum(events, freq_interval, energy_spec, ref_band=None, bin_time=1, use_pi=False, segment_size=None, events2=None)[source]

Base class for variability-energy spectrum.

This class is only a base for the various variability spectra, and it’s not to be instantiated by itself.

Parameters
events

event list

freq_interval[f0, f1], floats

the frequency range over which calculating the variability quantity

energy_speclist or tuple (emin, emax, N, type)

if a list is specified, this is interpreted as a list of bin edges; if a tuple is provided, this will encode the minimum and maximum energies, the number of intervals, and lin or log.

Other Parameters
ref_band[emin, emax], floats; default None

minimum and maximum energy of the reference band. If None, the full band is used.

use_pibool, default False

Use channel instead of energy

events2

event list for the second channel, if not the same. Useful if the reference band has to be taken from another detector.

Attributes
events1array-like

list of events used to produce the spectrum

events2array-like

if the spectrum requires it, second list of events

freq_intervalarray-like

interval of frequencies used to calculate the spectrum

energy_intervals[[e00, e01], [e10, e11], ...]

energy intervals used for the spectrum

spectrumarray-like

the spectral values, corresponding to each energy interval

spectrum_errorarray-like

the error bars corresponding to spectrum

### RmsEnergySpectrum¶

class stingray.varenergyspectrum.RmsEnergySpectrum(events, freq_interval, energy_spec, ref_band=None, bin_time=1, use_pi=False, segment_size=None, events2=None)[source]

Calculate the rms-Energy spectrum.

For each energy interval, calculate the power density spectrum in fractional r.m.s. normalization. If events2 is specified, the cospectrum is used instead of the PDS.

Parameters
events

event list

freq_interval[f0, f1], list of float

the frequency range over which calculating the variability quantity

energy_speclist or tuple (emin, emax, N, type)

if a list is specified, this is interpreted as a list of bin edges; if a tuple is provided, this will encode the minimum and maximum energies, the number of intervals, and lin or log.

Other Parameters
ref_band[emin, emax], float; default None

minimum and maximum energy of the reference band. If None, the full band is used.

use_pibool, default False

Use channel instead of energy

events2

event list for the second channel, if not the same. Useful if the reference band has to be taken from another detector.

Attributes
events1array-like

list of events used to produce the spectrum

events2array-like

if the spectrum requires it, second list of events

freq_intervalarray-like

interval of frequencies used to calculate the spectrum

energy_intervals[[e00, e01], [e10, e11], ...]

energy intervals used for the spectrum

spectrumarray-like

the spectral values, corresponding to each energy interval

spectrum_errorarray-like

the errorbars corresponding to spectrum

### LagEnergySpectrum¶

class stingray.varenergyspectrum.LagEnergySpectrum(events, freq_interval, energy_spec, ref_band=None, bin_time=1, use_pi=False, segment_size=None, events2=None)[source]

Calculate the lag-energy spectrum.

For each energy interval, calculate the mean lag in the specified frequency range. If events2 is specified, the reference band is taken from the second event list.

Parameters
events

event list

freq_interval[f0, f1], list of float

the frequency range over which calculating the variability quantity

energy_speclist or tuple (emin, emax, N, type)

if a list is specified, this is interpreted as a list of bin edges; if a tuple is provided, this will encode the minimum and maximum energies, the number of intervals, and lin or log.

Other Parameters
ref_band[emin, emax], float; default None

minimum and maximum energy of the reference band. If None, the full band is used.

use_pibool, default False

Use channel instead of energy

events2

event list for the second channel, if not the same. Useful if the reference band has to be taken from another detector.

Attributes
events1array-like

list of events used to produce the spectrum

events2array-like

if the spectrum requires it, second list of events

freq_intervalarray-like

interval of frequencies used to calculate the spectrum

energy_intervals[[e00, e01], [e10, e11], ...]

energy intervals used for the spectrum

spectrumarray-like

the spectral values, corresponding to each energy interval

spectrum_errorarray-like

the errorbars corresponding to spectrum

### ExcessVarianceSpectrum¶

class stingray.varenergyspectrum.ExcessVarianceSpectrum(events, freq_interval, energy_spec, bin_time=1, use_pi=False, segment_size=None, normalization='fvar')[source]

Calculate the Excess Variance spectrum.

For each energy interval, calculate the excess variance in the specified frequency range.

Parameters
events

event list

freq_interval[f0, f1], list of float

the frequency range over which calculating the variability quantity

energy_speclist or tuple (emin, emax, N, type)

if a list is specified, this is interpreted as a list of bin edges; if a tuple is provided, this will encode the minimum and maximum energies, the number of intervals, and lin or log.

Other Parameters
ref_band[emin, emax], floats; default None

minimum and maximum energy of the reference band. If None, the full band is used.

use_pibool, default False

Use channel instead of energy

Attributes
events1array-like

list of events used to produce the spectrum

freq_intervalarray-like

interval of frequencies used to calculate the spectrum

energy_intervals[[e00, e01], [e10, e11], ...]

energy intervals used for the spectrum

spectrumarray-like

the spectral values, corresponding to each energy interval

spectrum_errorarray-like

the errorbars corresponding to spectrum

## Utilities¶

Commonly used utility functionality, including Good Time Interval operations and input/output helper methods.

### Statistical Functions¶

stingray.stats.a_from_pf(p)[source]

Fractional amplitude of modulation from pulsed fraction

If the pulsed profile is defined as p = mean * (1 + a * sin(phase)),

we define “pulsed fraction” as 2a/b, where b = mean + a is the maximum and a is the amplitude of the modulation.

Hence, a = pf / (2 - pf)

Examples

>>> a_from_pf(1)
1.0
>>> a_from_pf(0)
0.0

stingray.stats.a_from_ssig(ssig, ncounts)[source]

Amplitude of a sinusoid corresponding to a given Z/PDS value

From Leahy et al. 1983, given a pulse profile p = lambda * (1 + a * sin(phase)), The theoretical value of Z^2_n is Ncounts / 2 * a^2

Note that if there are multiple sinusoidal components, one can use a = sqrt(sum(a_l)) (Bachetti+2021b)

Examples

>>> a_from_ssig(150, 30000)
0.1

stingray.stats.amplitude_upper_limit(pmeas, counts, n=1, c=0.95, fft_corr=False, nyq_ratio=0)[source]

Upper limit on a sinusoidal modulation, given a measured power in the PDS/Z search.

Eq. 10 in Vaughan+94 and a_from_ssig: they are equivalent but Vaughan+94 corrects further for the response inside an FFT bin and at frequencies close to Nyquist. These two corrections are added by using fft_corr=True and nyq_ratio to the correct $$f / f_{Nyq}$$ of the FFT peak

To understand the meaning of this amplitude: if the modulation is described by:

..math:: p = overline{p} (1 + a * sin(x))

this function returns a.

If it is a sum of sinusoidal harmonics instead ..math:: p = overline{p} (1 + sum_l a_l * sin(lx)) a is equivalent to $$\sqrt(\sum_l a_l^2)$$.

Parameters
pmeas: float

The measured value of power

counts: int

The number of counts in the light curve used to calculate the spectrum

Other Parameters
n: int

The number of summed powers to obtain pmeas. It can be multiple harmonics of the PDS, adjacent bins in a PDS summed to collect all the power in a QPO, or the n in Z^2_n

c: float

The confidence value for the probability (e.g. 0.95 = 95%)

fft_corr: bool

Apply a correction for the expected power concentrated in an FFT bin, which is about 0.773 on average (it’s 1 at the center of the bin, 2/pi at the bin edge.

nyq_ratio: float

Ratio of the frequency of this feature with respect to the Nyquist frequency. Important to know when dealing with FFTs, because the FFT response decays between 0 and f_Nyq similarly to the response inside a frequency bin: from 1 at 0 Hz to ~2/pi at f_Nyq

Examples

>>> aup = amplitude_upper_limit(40, 30000, 1, 0.99)
>>> aup_nyq = amplitude_upper_limit(40, 30000, 1, 0.99, nyq_ratio=1)
>>> np.isclose(aup_nyq, aup / (2 / np.pi))
True
>>> aup_corr = amplitude_upper_limit(40, 30000, 1, 0.99, fft_corr=True)
>>> np.isclose(aup_corr, aup / np.sqrt(0.773))
True

stingray.stats.classical_pvalue(power, nspec)[source]

Note: This is stingray’s original implementation of the probability distribution for the power spectrum. It is superseded by the implementation in pds_probability for practical purposes, but remains here for backwards compatibility and for its educational value as a clear, explicit implementation of the correct probability distribution.

Compute the probability of detecting the current power under the assumption that there is no periodic oscillation in the data.

This computes the single-trial p-value that the power was observed under the null hypothesis that there is no signal in the data.

Important: the underlying assumptions that make this calculation valid are:

1. the powers in the power spectrum follow a chi-square distribution

2. the power spectrum is normalized according to [Leahy 1983]_, such that the powers have a mean of 2 and a variance of 4

3. there is only white noise in the light curve. That is, there is no aperiodic variability that would change the overall shape of the power spectrum.

Also note that the p-value is for a single trial, i.e. the power currently being tested. If more than one power or more than one power spectrum are being tested, the resulting p-value must be corrected for the number of trials (Bonferroni correction).

Mathematical formulation in [Groth 1975]_. Original implementation in IDL by Anna L. Watts.

Parameters
powerfloat

The squared Fourier amplitude of a spectrum to be evaluated

nspecint

The number of spectra or frequency bins averaged in power. This matters because averaging spectra or frequency bins increases the signal-to-noise ratio, i.e. makes the statistical distributions of the noise narrower, such that a smaller power might be very significant in averaged spectra even though it would not be in a single power spectrum.

Returns
pvalfloat

The classical p-value of the observed power being consistent with the null hypothesis of white noise

References

stingray.stats.equivalent_gaussian_Nsigma(p)[source]

Number of Gaussian sigmas corresponding to tail probability.

This function computes the value of the characteristic function of a standard Gaussian distribution for the tail probability equivalent to the provided p-value, and turns this value into units of standard deviations away from the Gaussian mean. This allows the user to make a statement about the signal such as “I detected this pulsation at 4.1 sigma

The example values below are obtained by brute-force integrating the Gaussian probability density function using the mpmath library between Nsigma and +inf.

Examples

>>> np.isclose(equivalent_gaussian_Nsigma(0.15865525393145707), 1,
...                                       atol=0.01)
True
>>> np.isclose(equivalent_gaussian_Nsigma(0.0013498980316301035), 3,
...                                       atol=0.01)
True
>>> np.isclose(equivalent_gaussian_Nsigma(9.865877e-10), 6,
...                                       atol=0.01)
True
>>> np.isclose(equivalent_gaussian_Nsigma(6.22096e-16), 8,
...                                       atol=0.01)
True
>>> np.isclose(equivalent_gaussian_Nsigma(3.0567e-138), 25, atol=0.1)
True

stingray.stats.fold_detection_level(nbin, epsilon=0.01, ntrial=1)[source]

Return the detection level for a folded profile.

See Leahy et al. (1983).

Parameters
nbinint

The number of bins in the profile

epsilonfloat, default 0.01

The fractional probability that the signal has been produced by noise

Returns
detlevfloat

The epoch folding statistics corresponding to a probability epsilon * 100 % that the signal has been produced by noise

Other Parameters
ntrialint

The number of trials executed to find this profile

stingray.stats.fold_profile_logprobability(stat, nbin, ntrial=1)[source]

Calculate the probability of a certain folded profile, due to noise.

Parameters
statfloat

The epoch folding statistics

nbinint

The number of bins in the profile

Returns
logpfloat

The log-probability that the profile has been produced by noise

Other Parameters
ntrialint

The number of trials executed to find this profile

stingray.stats.fold_profile_probability(stat, nbin, ntrial=1)[source]

Calculate the probability of a certain folded profile, due to noise.

Parameters
statfloat

The epoch folding statistics

nbinint

The number of bins in the profile

Returns
pfloat

The probability that the profile has been produced by noise

Other Parameters
ntrialint

The number of trials executed to find this profile

stingray.stats.p_multitrial_from_single_trial(p1, n)[source]

Calculate a multi-trial p-value from a single-trial one.

Calling p the probability of a single success, the Binomial distributions says that the probability at least one outcome in n trials is

$P(k\geq 1) = \sum_{k\geq 1} \binom{n}{k} p^k (1-p)^{(n-k)}$

or more simply, using P(k ≥ 0) = 1

$P(k\geq 1) = 1 - \binom{n}{0} (1-p)^n = 1 - (1-p)^n$
Parameters
p1float

The significance at which we reject the null hypothesis on each single trial.

nint

The number of trials

Returns
pnfloat

The significance at which we reject the null hypothesis after multiple trials

stingray.stats.p_single_trial_from_p_multitrial(pn, n)[source]

Calculate the single-trial p-value from a total p-value

Let us say that we want to reject a null hypothesis at the pn level, after executing n different measurements. This might be the case because, e.g., we want to have a 1% probability of detecting a signal in an entire power spectrum, and we need to correct the detection level accordingly.

The typical procedure is dividing the initial probability (often called _epsilon_) by the number of trials. This is called the Bonferroni correction and it is often a good approximation, when pn is low: p1 = pn / n.

However, if pn is close to 1, this approximation gives incorrect results.

Here we calculate this probability by inverting the Binomial problem. Given that (see p_multitrial_from_single_trial) the probability of getting more than one hit in n trials, given the single-trial probability p, is

$P (k \geq 1) = 1 - (1 - p)^n,$

we get the single trial probability from the multi-trial one from

$p = 1 - (1 - P)^{(1/n)}$

This is also known as Šidák correction.

Parameters
pnfloat

The significance at which we want to reject the null hypothesis after multiple trials

nint

The number of trials

Returns
p1float

The significance at which we reject the null hypothesis on each single trial.

stingray.stats.pds_detection_level(epsilon=0.01, ntrial=1, n_summed_spectra=1, n_rebin=1)[source]

Detection level for a PDS.

Return the detection level (with probability 1 - epsilon) for a Power Density Spectrum of nbins bins, normalized a la Leahy (1983), based on the 2-dof $${\chi}^2$$ statistics, corrected for rebinning (n_rebin) and multiple PDS averaging (n_summed_spectra)

Parameters
epsilonfloat

The single-trial probability value(s)

Other Parameters
ntrialint

The number of independent trials (the independent bins of the PDS)

n_summed_spectraint

The number of power density spectra that have been averaged to obtain this power level

n_rebinint

The number of power density bins that have been averaged to obtain this power level

Examples

>>> np.isclose(pds_detection_level(0.1), 4.6, atol=0.1)
True
>>> np.allclose(pds_detection_level(0.1, n_rebin=[1]), [4.6], atol=0.1)
True

stingray.stats.pds_probability(level, ntrial=1, n_summed_spectra=1, n_rebin=1)[source]

Give the probability of a given power level in PDS.

Return the probability of a certain power level in a Power Density Spectrum of nbins bins, normalized a la Leahy (1983), based on the 2-dof $${\chi}^2$$ statistics, corrected for rebinning (n_rebin) and multiple PDS averaging (n_summed_spectra)

Parameters
levelfloat or array of floats

The power level for which we are calculating the probability

Returns
epsilonfloat

The probability value(s)

Other Parameters
ntrialint

The number of independent trials (the independent bins of the PDS)

n_summed_spectraint

The number of power density spectra that have been averaged to obtain this power level

n_rebinint

The number of power density bins that have been averaged to obtain this power level

stingray.stats.pf_from_a(a)[source]

Pulsed fraction from fractional amplitude of modulation.

If the pulsed profile is defined as p = mean * (1 + a * sin(phase)),

we define “pulsed fraction” as 2a/b, where b = mean + a is the maximum and a is the amplitude of the modulation.

Hence, pulsed fraction = 2a/(1+a)

Examples

>>> pf_from_a(1)
1.0
>>> pf_from_a(0)
0.0

stingray.stats.pf_from_ssig(ssig, ncounts)[source]

Estimate pulsed fraction for a sinusoid from a given Z or PDS power.

See a_from_ssig and pf_from_a for more details

Examples

>>> round(a_from_pf(pf_from_ssig(150, 30000)), 1)
0.1

stingray.stats.pf_upper_limit(*args, **kwargs)[source]

Upper limit on pulsed fraction, given a measured power in the PDS/Z search.

See power_upper_limit and pf_from_ssig. All arguments are the same as amplitude_upper_limit

Parameters
pmeas: float

The measured value of power

counts: int

The number of counts in the light curve used to calculate the spectrum

Other Parameters
n: int

The number of summed powers to obtain pmeas. It can be multiple harmonics of the PDS, adjacent bins in a PDS summed to collect all the power in a QPO, or the n in Z^2_n

c: float

The confidence value for the probability (e.g. 0.95 = 95%)

fft_corr: bool

Apply a correction for the expected power concentrated in an FFT bin, which is about 0.773 on average (it’s 1 at the center of the bin, 2/pi at the bin edge.

nyq_ratio: float

Ratio of the frequency of this feature with respect to the Nyquist frequency. Important to know when dealing with FFTs, because the FFT response decays between 0 and f_Nyq similarly to the response inside a frequency bin: from 1 at 0 Hz to ~2/pi at f_Nyq

Examples

>>> pfup = pf_upper_limit(40, 30000, 1, 0.99)
>>> np.isclose(pfup, 0.13, atol=0.01)
True

stingray.stats.power_confidence_limits(preal, n=1, c=0.95)[source]

Confidence limits on power, given a (theoretical) signal power.

This is to be used when we expect a given power (e.g. from the pulsed fraction measured in previous observations) and we want to know the range of values the measured power could take to a given confidence level. Adapted from Vaughan et al. 1994, noting that, after appropriate normalization of the spectral stats, the distribution of powers in the PDS and the Z^2_n searches is always described by a noncentral chi squared distribution.

Parameters
preal: float

The theoretical signal-generated value of power

Other Parameters
n: int

The number of summed powers to obtain the result. It can be multiple harmonics of the PDS, adjacent bins in a PDS summed to collect all the power in a QPO, or the n in Z^2_n

c: float

The confidence level (e.g. 0.95=95%)

Examples

>>> cl = power_confidence_limits(150, c=0.84)
>>> np.allclose(cl, [127, 176], atol=1)
True

stingray.stats.power_upper_limit(pmeas, n=1, c=0.95)[source]

Upper limit on signal power, given a measured power in the PDS/Z search.

Adapted from Vaughan et al. 1994, noting that, after appropriate normalization of the spectral stats, the distribution of powers in the PDS and the Z^2_n searches is always described by a noncentral chi squared distribution.

Note that Vaughan+94 gives p(pmeas | preal), while we are interested in p(real | pmeas), which is not described by the NCX2 stat. Rather than integrating the CDF of this probability distribution, we start from a reasonable approximation and fit to find the preal that gives pmeas as a (e.g.95%) confidence limit.

As Vaughan+94 shows, this power is always larger than the observed one. This is because we are looking for the maximum signal power that, combined with noise powers, would give the observed power. This involves the possibility that noise powers partially cancel out some signal power.

Parameters
pmeas: float

The measured value of power

Other Parameters
n: int

The number of summed powers to obtain pmeas. It can be multiple harmonics of the PDS, adjacent bins in a PDS summed to collect all the power in a QPO, or the n in Z^2_n

c: float

The confidence value for the probability (e.g. 0.95 = 95%)

Examples

>>> pup = power_upper_limit(40, 1, 0.99)
>>> np.isclose(pup, 75, atol=2)
True

stingray.stats.ssig_from_a(a, ncounts)[source]

Theoretical power in the Z or PDS search for a sinusoid of amplitude a.

From Leahy et al. 1983, given a pulse profile p = lambda * (1 + a * sin(phase)), The theoretical value of Z^2_n is Ncounts / 2 * a^2

Note that if there are multiple sinusoidal components, one can use a = sqrt(sum(a_l)) (Bachetti+2021b)

Examples

>>> round(ssig_from_a(0.1, 30000), 1)
150.0

stingray.stats.ssig_from_pf(pf, ncounts)[source]

Theoretical power in the Z or PDS for a sinusoid of pulsed fraction pf.

See ssig_from_a and a_from_pf for more details

Examples

>>> round(ssig_from_pf(pf_from_a(0.1), 30000), 1)
150.0

stingray.stats.z2_n_detection_level(n=2, epsilon=0.01, ntrial=1, n_summed_spectra=1)[source]

Return the detection level for the Z^2_n statistics.

See Buccheri et al. (1983), Bendat and Piersol (1971).

Parameters
nint, default 2

The n in $Z^2_n$ (number of harmonics, including the fundamental)

epsilonfloat, default 0.01

The fractional probability that the signal has been produced by noise

Returns
detlevfloat

The epoch folding statistics corresponding to a probability epsilon * 100 % that the signal has been produced by noise

Other Parameters
ntrialint

The number of trials executed to find this profile

n_summed_spectraint

Number of Z_2^n periodograms that are being averaged

stingray.stats.z2_n_logprobability(z2, n, ntrial=1, n_summed_spectra=1)[source]

Calculate the probability of a certain folded profile, due to noise.

Parameters
z2float

A Z^2_n statistics value

nint, default 2

The n in $Z^2_n$ (number of harmonics, including the fundamental)

Returns
pfloat

The probability that the Z^2_n value has been produced by noise

Other Parameters
ntrialint

The number of trials executed to find this profile

n_summed_spectraint

Number of Z_2^n periodograms that were averaged to obtain z2

stingray.stats.z2_n_probability(z2, n, ntrial=1, n_summed_spectra=1)[source]

Calculate the probability of a certain folded profile, due to noise.

Parameters
z2float

A Z^2_n statistics value

nint, default 2

The n in $Z^2_n$ (number of harmonics, including the fundamental)

Returns
pfloat

The probability that the Z^2_n value has been produced by noise

Other Parameters
ntrialint

The number of trials executed to find this profile

n_summed_spectraint

Number of Z_2^n periodograms that were averaged to obtain z2

### GTI Functionality¶

stingray.gti.append_gtis(gti0, gti1)[source]

Union of two non-overlapping GTIs.

If the two GTIs “touch”, this is tolerated and the touching GTIs are joined in a single one.

Parameters
gti0: 2-d float array

List of GTIs of the form [[gti0_0, gti0_1], [gti1_0, gti1_1], ...]

gti1: 2-d float array

List of GTIs of the form [[gti0_0, gti0_1], [gti1_0, gti1_1], ...]

Returns
gti: 2-d float array

The newly created GTI

Examples

>>> np.allclose(append_gtis([[0, 1]], [[2, 3]]), [[0, 1], [2, 3]])
True
>>> np.allclose(append_gtis([[0, 1], [4, 5]], [[2, 3]]),
...             [[0, 1], [2, 3], [4, 5]])
True
>>> np.allclose(append_gtis([[0, 1]], [[1, 3]]), [[0, 3]])
True

stingray.gti.bin_intervals_from_gtis(gtis, segment_size, time, dt=None, fraction_step=1, epsilon=0.001)[source]

Compute start/stop times of equal time intervals, compatible with GTIs, and map them to the indices of an array of time stamps.

Used to start each FFT/PDS/cospectrum from the start of a GTI, and stop before the next gap in data (end of GTI). In this case, it is necessary to specify the time array containing the times of the light curve bins. Returns start and stop bins of the intervals to use for the PDS

Parameters
gtis2-d float array

List of GTIs of the form [[gti0_0, gti0_1], [gti1_0, gti1_1], ...]

segment_sizefloat

Length of each time segment

timearray-like

Array of time stamps

Returns
spectrum_start_binsarray-like

List of starting bins in the original time array to use in spectral calculations.

spectrum_stop_binsarray-like

List of end bins to use in the spectral calculations.

Other Parameters
dtfloat, default median(diff(time))

Time resolution of the light curve.

epsilonfloat, default 0.001

The tolerance, in fraction of dt, for the comparisons at the borders

fraction_stepfloat

If the step is not a full segment_size but less (e.g. a moving window), this indicates the ratio between step step and segment_size (e.g. 0.5 means that the window shifts of half segment_size)

Examples

>>> time = np.arange(0.5, 13.5)

>>> gtis = [[0, 5], [6, 8], [9, 10]]

>>> segment_size = 2

>>> start_bins, stop_bins = bin_intervals_from_gtis(gtis,segment_size,time)

>>> np.allclose(start_bins, [0, 2, 6])
True
>>> np.allclose(stop_bins, [2, 4, 8])
True
>>> np.allclose(time[start_bins[0]:stop_bins[0]], [0.5, 1.5])
True
>>> np.allclose(time[start_bins[1]:stop_bins[1]], [2.5, 3.5])
True

stingray.gti.check_gtis(gti)[source]

Check if GTIs are well-behaved.

Check that:

1. the shape of the GTI array is correct;

2. no start > end

3. no overlaps.

Parameters
gtilist

A list of GTI (start, stop) pairs extracted from the FITS file.

Raises
TypeError

If GTIs are of the wrong shape

ValueError

If GTIs have overlapping or displaced values

stingray.gti.check_separate(gti0, gti1)[source]

Check if two GTIs do not overlap.

Parameters
gti0: 2-d float array

List of GTIs of form [[gti0_0, gti0_1], [gti1_0, gti1_1], ...]

gti1: 2-d float array

List of GTIs of form [[gti0_0, gti0_1], [gti1_0, gti1_1], ...]

Returns
separate: bool

True if GTIs are mutually exclusive, False if not

Examples

>>> gti0 = [[0, 10]]
>>> gti1 = [[20, 30]]
>>> check_separate(gti0, gti1)
True
>>> gti0 = [[0, 10]]
>>> gti1 = [[0, 10]]
>>> check_separate(gti0, gti1)
False
>>> gti0 = [[0, 10]]
>>> gti1 = [[10, 20]]
>>> check_separate(gti0, gti1)
True
>>> gti0 = [[0, 11]]
>>> gti1 = [[10, 20]]
>>> check_separate(gti0, gti1)
False
>>> gti0 = [[0, 11]]
>>> gti1 = [[10, 20]]
>>> check_separate(gti1, gti0)
False
>>> gti0 = [[0, 10], [30, 40]]
>>> gti1 = [[11, 28]]
>>> check_separate(gti0, gti1)
True

stingray.gti.create_gti_from_condition(time, condition, safe_interval=0, dt=None)[source]

Create a GTI list from a time array and a boolean mask (condition).

Parameters
timearray-like

Array containing time stamps

conditionarray-like

An array of bools, of the same length of time. A possible condition can be, e.g., the result of lc > 0.

Returns
gtis[[gti0_0, gti0_1], [gti1_0, gti1_1], ...]

The newly created GTIs

Other Parameters
safe_intervalfloat or [float, float]

A safe interval to exclude at both ends (if single float) or the start and the end (if pair of values) of GTIs.

dtfloat

The width (in sec) of each bin of the time array. Can be irregular.

stingray.gti.create_gti_mask(time, gtis, safe_interval=None, min_length=0, return_new_gtis=False, dt=None, epsilon=0.001)[source]

Assumes that no overlaps are present between GTIs

Parameters

An array of time stamps

gtis[[g0_0, g0_1], [g1_0, g1_1], ...], float array-like

The list of GTIs

Returns

A mask labelling all time stamps that are included in the GTIs versus those that are not.

new_gtisNx2 array

An array of new GTIs created by this function

Other Parameters
safe_intervalfloat or [float, float], default None

A safe interval to exclude at both ends (if single float) or the start and the end (if pair of values) of GTIs. If None, no safe interval is applied to data.

min_lengthfloat

An optional minimum length for the GTIs to be applied. Only GTIs longer than min_length will be considered when creating the mask.

return_new_gtisbool

If True, return the list of new GTIs (if min_length > 0)

dtfloat

Time resolution of the data, i.e. the interval between time stamps

epsilonfloat

fraction of dt that is tolerated at the borders of a GTI

stingray.gti.create_gti_mask_complete(time, gtis, safe_interval=0, min_length=0, return_new_gtis=False, dt=None, epsilon=0.001)[source]

Create GTI mask, allowing for non-constant dt.

Assumes that no overlaps are present between GTIs

Parameters

An array of time stamps

gtis[[g0_0, g0_1], [g1_0, g1_1], ...], float array-like

The list of GTIs

Returns

A mask labelling all time stamps that are included in the GTIs versus those that are not.

new_gtisNx2 array

An array of new GTIs created by this function

Other Parameters
safe_intervalfloat or [float, float]

A safe interval to exclude at both ends (if single float) or the start and the end (if pair of values) of GTIs.

min_lengthfloat

An optional minimum length for the GTIs to be applied. Only GTIs longer than min_length will be considered when creating the mask.

return_new_gtisbool

If True, return the list of new GTIs (if min_length > 0)

dtfloat

Time resolution of the data, i.e. the interval between time stamps

epsilonfloat

fraction of dt that is tolerated at the borders of a GTI

stingray.gti.cross_gtis(gti_list)[source]

From multiple GTI lists, extract the common intervals EXACTLY.

Parameters
gti_listarray-like

List of GTI arrays, each one in the usual format [[gti0_0, gti0_1], [gti1_0, gti1_1], ...]

Returns
gti0: 2-d float array

[[gti0_0, gti0_1], [gti1_0, gti1_1], ...] The newly created GTIs

cross_two_gtis

Extract the common intervals from two GTI lists EXACTLY

Examples

>>> gti1 = np.array([[1, 2]])
>>> gti2 = np.array([[1, 2]])
>>> newgti = cross_gtis([gti1, gti2])
>>> np.allclose(newgti, [[1, 2]])
True
>>> gti1 = np.array([[1, 4]])
>>> gti2 = np.array([[1, 2], [2, 4]])
>>> newgti = cross_gtis([gti1, gti2])
>>> np.allclose(newgti, [[1, 4]])
True

stingray.gti.cross_two_gtis(gti0, gti1)[source]

Extract the common intervals from two GTI lists EXACTLY.

Parameters
gti0iterable of the form [[gti0_0, gti0_1], [gti1_0, gti1_1], ...]
gti1iterable of the form [[gti0_0, gti0_1], [gti1_0, gti1_1], ...]

The two lists of GTIs to be crossed.

Returns
gtis[[gti0_0, gti0_1], [gti1_0, gti1_1], ...]

The newly created GTIs

cross_gtis

From multiple GTI lists, extract common intervals EXACTLY

Examples

>>> gti1 = np.array([[1, 2]])
>>> gti2 = np.array([[1, 2]])
>>> newgti = cross_two_gtis(gti1, gti2)
>>> np.allclose(newgti, [[1, 2]])
True
>>> gti1 = np.array([[1, 4]])
>>> gti2 = np.array([[1, 2], [2, 4]])
>>> newgti = cross_two_gtis(gti1, gti2)
>>> np.allclose(newgti, [[1, 4]])
True

stingray.gti.generate_indices_of_gti_boundaries(times, gti, dt=0)[source]

Get the indices of events from different GTIs of the observation.

This is a generator, yielding the boundaries of each GTI and the corresponding indices in the time array

Parameters
timesfloat np.array

Array of times

gti[[gti00, gti01], [gti10, gti11], …]

good time intervals

Yields
g0: float

Start time of current GTI

g1: float

End time of current GTI

startidx: int

Start index of the current GTI in the time array

stopidx: int

End index of the current GTI in the time array. Note that this is larger by one, so that time[startidx:stopidx] returns the correct time interval.

Other Parameters
dtfloat

If times are uniformly binned, this is the binning time.

Examples

>>> times = [0.1, 0.2, 0.5, 0.8, 1.1]
>>> gtis = [[0, 0.55], [0.6, 2.1]]
>>> vals = generate_indices_of_gti_boundaries(times, gtis)
>>> v0 = next(vals)
>>> np.allclose(v0[:2], gtis[0])
True
>>> np.allclose(v0[2:], [0, 3])
True

stingray.gti.generate_indices_of_segment_boundaries_binned(times, gti, segment_size, dt=None)[source]

Get the indices of binned times from different segments of the observation.

This is a generator, yielding the boundaries of each segment and the corresponding indices in the time array

Parameters
timesfloat np.array

Array of times, uniformly sampled

gti[[gti00, gti01], [gti10, gti11], …]

good time intervals

segment_sizefloat

length of segments

Yields
t0: float

First time value, from the time array, in the current segment

t1: float

Last time value, from the time array, in the current segment

startidx: int

Start index of the current segment in the time array

stopidx: int

End index of the current segment in the time array. Note that this is larger by one, so that time[startidx:stopidx] returns the correct time interval.

Examples

>>> times = [0.1, 0.2, 0.3, 0.4, 0.5, 0.6, 0.7]
>>> gtis = [[0.05, 0.55]]
>>> vals = generate_indices_of_segment_boundaries_binned(times, gtis, 0.5, dt=0.1)
>>> v0 = next(vals)
>>> np.allclose(v0[:2], [0.1, 0.6])
True
>>> np.allclose(v0[2:], [0, 5])
True

stingray.gti.generate_indices_of_segment_boundaries_unbinned(times, gti, segment_size)[source]

Get the indices of events from different segments of the observation.

This is a generator, yielding the boundaries of each segment and the corresponding indices in the time array

Parameters
timesfloat np.array

Array of times

gti[[gti00, gti01], [gti10, gti11], …]

good time intervals

segment_sizefloat

length of segments

Yields
t0: float

Start time of current segment

t1: float

End time of current segment

startidx: int

Start index of the current segment in the time array

stopidx: int

End index of the current segment in the time array. Note that this is larger by one, so that time[startidx:stopidx] returns the correct time interval.

Examples

>>> times = [0.1, 0.2, 0.5, 0.8, 1.1]
>>> gtis = [[0, 0.55], [0.6, 2.1]]
>>> vals = generate_indices_of_segment_boundaries_unbinned(times, gtis, 0.5)
>>> v0 = next(vals)
>>> np.allclose(v0[:2], [0, 0.5])
True
>>> # Note: 0.5 is not included in the interval
>>> np.allclose(v0[2:], [0, 2])
True
>>> v1 = next(vals)
>>> np.allclose(v1[:2], [0.6, 1.1])
True
>>> # Again: 1.1 is not included in the interval
>>> np.allclose(v1[2:], [3, 4])
True

stingray.gti.get_btis(gtis, start_time=None, stop_time=None)[source]

From GTIs, obtain bad time intervals, i.e. the intervals not covered by the GTIs.

GTIs have to be well-behaved, in the sense that they have to pass check_gtis.

Parameters
gtisiterable

A list of GTIs

start_timefloat

Optional start time of the overall observation (e.g. can be earlier than the first time stamp in gtis.

stop_timefloat

Optional stop time of the overall observation (e.g. can be later than the last time stamp in gtis.

Returns
btisnumpy.ndarray

A list of bad time intervals

stingray.gti.get_gti_extensions_from_pattern(lchdulist, name_pattern='GTI')[source]

Gets the GTI extensions that match a given pattern.

Parameters
lchdulist: :class:astropy.io.fits.HDUList object

The full content of a FITS file.

name_pattern: str

Pattern indicating all the GTI extensions

Returns
ext_list: list

List of GTI extension numbers whose name matches the input pattern

Examples

>>> from astropy.io import fits
>>> start = np.arange(0, 300, 100)
>>> stop = start + 50.
>>> s1 = fits.Column(name='START', array=start, format='D')
>>> s2 = fits.Column(name='STOP', array=stop, format='D')
>>> hdu1 = fits.TableHDU.from_columns([s1, s2], name='GTI005XX')
>>> hdu2 = fits.TableHDU.from_columns([s1, s2], name='GTI00501')
>>> lchdulist = fits.HDUList([hdu1])
>>> gtiextn = get_gti_extensions_from_pattern(
...     lchdulist, name_pattern='GTI005[0-9]+')
>>> np.allclose(gtiextn, [1])
True

stingray.gti.get_gti_from_all_extensions(lchdulist, accepted_gtistrings=['GTI'], det_numbers=None)[source]

Intersect the GTIs from the all accepted extensions.

Parameters
lchdulist: :class:astropy.io.fits.HDUList object

The full content of a FITS file.

accepted_gtistrings: list of str

Base strings of GTI extensions. For missions adding the detector number to GTI extensions like, e.g., XMM and Chandra, this function automatically adds the detector number and looks for all matching GTI extensions (e.g. “STDGTI” will also retrieve “STDGTI05”; “GTI0” will also retrieve “GTI00501”).

Returns
gti_list: [[gti00, gti01], [gti10, gti11], …]

List of good time intervals, as the intersection of all matching GTIs. If there are two matching extensions, with GTIs [[0, 50], [100, 200]] and [[40, 70]] respectively, this function will return [[40, 50]].

Examples

>>> from astropy.io import fits
>>> s1 = fits.Column(name='START', array=[0, 100, 200], format='D')
>>> s2 = fits.Column(name='STOP', array=[50, 150, 250], format='D')
>>> hdu1 = fits.TableHDU.from_columns([s1, s2], name='GTI00501')
>>> s1 = fits.Column(name='START', array=[200, 300], format='D')
>>> s2 = fits.Column(name='STOP', array=[250, 350], format='D')
>>> hdu2 = fits.TableHDU.from_columns([s1, s2], name='STDGTI05')
>>> lchdulist = fits.HDUList([hdu1, hdu2])
>>> gti = get_gti_from_all_extensions(
...     lchdulist, accepted_gtistrings=['GTI0', 'STDGTI'],
...     det_numbers=[5])
>>> np.allclose(gti, [[200, 250]])
True

stingray.gti.get_gti_from_hdu(gtihdu)[source]

Get the GTIs from a given extension.

Parameters
gtihdu: :class:astropy.io.fits.TableHDU object

The GTI hdu

Returns
gti_list: [[gti00, gti01], [gti10, gti11], …]

List of good time intervals

Examples

>>> from astropy.io import fits
>>> start = np.arange(0, 300, 100)
>>> stop = start + 50.
>>> s1 = fits.Column(name='START', array=start, format='D')
>>> s2 = fits.Column(name='STOP', array=stop, format='D')
>>> hdu1 = fits.TableHDU.from_columns([s1, s2], name='GTI00501')
>>> gti = get_gti_from_hdu(hdu1)
>>> np.allclose(gti, [[0, 50], [100, 150], [200, 250]])
True

stingray.gti.get_gti_lengths(gti)[source]

Calculate the length of each Good Time Interval.

Parameters
gti[[gti00, gti01], [gti10, gti11], …]

The list of good time intervals

Returns
lengthsnp.ndarray

List of GTI lengths

Examples

>>> gti = [[0, 1000], [1000, 1001], [3000, 3020]]
>>> np.allclose(get_gti_lengths(gti), [1000, 1, 20])
True

stingray.gti.get_total_gti_length(gti, minlen=0)[source]

Calculate the total exposure during Good Time Intervals.

Parameters
gti[[gti00, gti01], [gti10, gti11], …]

The list of good time intervals

minlenfloat

Minimum GTI length to consider

Returns
lengthfloat

total exposure during GTIs

Examples

>>> gti = [[0, 1000], [1000, 1001], [3000, 3020]]
>>> get_total_gti_length(gti)
1021
>>> get_total_gti_length(gti, minlen=5)
1020

stingray.gti.gti_border_bins(gtis, time, dt=None, epsilon=0.001)[source]

Find the indices in a time array corresponding to the borders of GTIs.

GTIs shorter than the bin time are not returned.

Parameters
gtis2-d float array

List of GTIs of the form [[gti0_0, gti0_1], [gti1_0, gti1_1], ...]

timearray-like

Array of time stamps

Returns
spectrum_start_binsarray-like

List of starting bins of each GTI

spectrum_stop_binsarray-like

List of stop bins of each GTI. The elements corresponding to these bins should not be included.

Other Parameters
dtfloat, default median(diff(time))

Time resolution of the light curve.

epsilonfloat, default 0.001

The tolerance, in fraction of dt, for the comparisons at the borders

fraction_stepfloat

If the step is not a full segment_size but less (e.g. a moving window), this indicates the ratio between step step and segment_size (e.g. 0.5 means that the window shifts of half segment_size)

Examples

>>> times = np.arange(0.5, 13.5)

>>> gti_border_bins([[16., 18.]], times)
Traceback (most recent call last):
...
ValueError: Invalid time interval for the given GTIs

>>> start_bins, stop_bins = gti_border_bins(
...    [[0, 5], [6, 8]], times)

>>> np.allclose(start_bins, [0, 6])
True
>>> np.allclose(stop_bins, [5, 8])
True
>>> np.allclose(times[start_bins[0]:stop_bins[0]], [0.5, 1.5, 2.5, 3.5, 4.5])
True
>>> np.allclose(times[start_bins[1]:stop_bins[1]], [6.5, 7.5])
True

stingray.gti.join_gtis(gti0, gti1)[source]

Union of two GTIs.

If GTIs are mutually exclusive, it calls append_gtis. Otherwise we put the extremes of partially overlapping GTIs on an ideal line and look at the number of opened and closed intervals. When the number of closed and opened intervals is the same, the full GTI is complete and we close it.

In practice, we assign to each opening time of a GTI the value -1, and the value 1 to each closing time; when the cumulative sum is zero, the GTI has ended. The timestamp after each closed GTI is the start of a new one.

(cumsum)   -1   -2         -1   0   -1 -2           -1  -2  -1        0
GTI A      |-----:----------|   :    |--:------------|   |---:--------|
FINAL GTI  |-----:--------------|    |--:--------------------:--------|
GTI B            |--------------|       |--------------------|

Parameters
gti0: 2-d float array

List of GTIs of the form [[gti0_0, gti0_1], [gti1_0, gti1_1], ...]

gti1: 2-d float array

List of GTIs of the form [[gti0_0, gti0_1], [gti1_0, gti1_1], ...]

Returns
gti: 2-d float array

The newly created GTI

Load Good Time Intervals (GTIs) from HDU EVENTS of file fits_file. File is expected to be in FITS format.

Parameters
fits_filestr

File name and path for the fits file with the GTIs to be loaded

gtistringstr

If the name of the extension with the GTIs is not GTI, the alternative name can be set with this parameter

Returns
gti_listlist

A list of GTI (start, stop) pairs extracted from the FITS file.

stingray.gti.time_intervals_from_gtis(gtis, segment_size, fraction_step=1, epsilon=1e-05)[source]

Compute start/stop times of equal time intervals, compatible with GTIs.

Used to start each FFT/PDS/cospectrum from the start of a GTI, and stop before the next gap in data (end of GTI).

Parameters
gtis2-d float array

List of GTIs of the form [[gti0_0, gti0_1], [gti1_0, gti1_1], ...]

segment_sizefloat

Length of the time segments

fraction_stepfloat

If the step is not a full segment_size but less (e.g. a moving window), this indicates the ratio between step step and segment_size (e.g. 0.5 means that the window shifts of half segment_size)

Returns
spectrum_start_timesarray-like

List of starting times to use in the spectral calculations.

spectrum_stop_timesarray-like

List of end times to use in the spectral calculations.

### I/O Functionality¶

stingray.io.common_name(str1, str2, default='common')[source]

Strip two strings of the letters not in common.

Filenames must be of same length and only differ by a few letters.

Parameters
str1str
str2str
Returns
common_strstr

A string containing the parts of the two names in common

Other Parameters
defaultstr

The string to return if common_str is empty

stingray.io.get_file_extension(fname)[source]

Get the extension from the file name.

If g-zipped, add ‘.gz’ to extension.

Examples

>>> get_file_extension('ciao.tar')
'.tar'
>>> get_file_extension('ciao.tar.gz')
'.tar.gz'
>>> get_file_extension('ciao.evt.gz')
'.evt.gz'
>>> get_file_extension('ciao.a.tutti.evt.gz')
'.evt.gz'

stingray.io.get_key_from_mission_info(info, key, default, inst=None, mode=None)[source]

Get the name of a header key or table column from the mission database.

Many entries in the mission database have default values that can be altered for specific instruments or observing modes. Here, if there is a definition for a given instrument and mode, we take that, otherwise we use the default).

Parameters
infodict

Nested dictionary containing all the information for a given mission. It can be nested, e.g. contain some info for a given instrument, and for each observing mode of that instrument.

keystr

The key to read from the info dictionary

defaultobject

The default value. It can be of any type, depending on the expected type for the entry.

Returns
retvalobject

The wanted entry from the info dictionary

Other Parameters
inststr

Instrument

modestr

Observing mode

Examples

>>> info = {'ecol': 'PI', "A": {"ecol": "BLA"}, "C": {"M1": {"ecol": "X"}}}
>>> get_key_from_mission_info(info, "ecol", "BU", inst="A", mode=None)
'BLA'
>>> get_key_from_mission_info(info, "ecol", "BU", inst="B", mode=None)
'PI'
>>> get_key_from_mission_info(info, "ecol", "BU", inst="A", mode="M1")
'BLA'
>>> get_key_from_mission_info(info, "ecol", "BU", inst="C", mode="M1")
'X'
>>> get_key_from_mission_info(info, "ghghg", "BU", inst="C", mode="M1")
'BU'


Read FITS header keywords, also if split in two.

In the case where the keyword is split in two, like

MJDREF = MJDREFI + MJDREFF

in some missions, this function returns the summed value. Otherwise, the content of the single keyword

Parameters
hdrdict_like

The FITS header structure, or a dictionary

keywordstr

The key to read in the header

Returns
valuelong double

The value of the key, or None if something went wrong

stingray.io.lcurve_from_fits(fits_file, gtistring='GTI', timecolumn='TIME', ratecolumn=None, ratehdu=1, fracexp_limit=0.9, outfile=None, noclobber=False, outdir=None)[source]

Load a lightcurve from a fits file.

Note

FITS light curve handling is still under testing. Absolute times might be incorrect depending on the light curve format.

Parameters
fits_filestr

File name of the input light curve in FITS format

Returns

Dictionary containing all information needed to create a stingray.Lightcurve object

Other Parameters
gtistringstr

Name of the GTI extension in the FITS file

timecolumnstr

Name of the column containing times in the FITS file

ratecolumnstr

Name of the column containing rates in the FITS file

ratehdustr or int

Name or index of the FITS extension containing the light curve

fracexp_limitfloat

Minimum exposure fraction allowed

noclobberbool

If True, do not overwrite existing files

Load event lists and GTIs from one or more files.

Loads event list from HDU EVENTS of file fits_file, with Good Time intervals. Optionally, returns additional columns of data from the same HDU of the events.

Parameters
fits_filestr
Returns
retvalsObject with the following attributes:
ev_listarray-like

Event times in Mission Epoch Time

gti_list: [[gti0_0, gti0_1], [gti1_0, gti1_1], …]

GTIs in Mission Epoch Time

A dictionary, where each key is the one specified in additional_colums. The data are an array with the values of the specified column in the fits file.

t_startfloat

Start time in Mission Epoch Time

t_stopfloat

Stop time in Mission Epoch Time

pi_listarray-like

Raw Instrument energy channels

cal_pi_listarray-like

Calibrated PI channels (those that can be easily converted to energy values, regardless of the instrument setup.)

energy_listarray-like

Energy of each photon in keV (only for NuSTAR, NICER, XMM)

instrstr

Name of the instrument (e.g. EPIC-pn or FPMA)

missionstr

Name of the instrument (e.g. XMM or NuSTAR)

mjdreffloat

MJD reference time for the mission

Full header of the FITS file, for debugging purposes

detector_idarray-like, int

Detector id for each photon (e.g. each of the CCDs composing XMM’s or Chandra’s instruments)

Other Parameters
additional_columns: list of str, optional

A list of keys corresponding to the additional columns to extract from the event HDU (ex.: [‘PI’, ‘X’])

gtistringstr

Comma-separated list of accepted GTI extensions (default GTI,STDGTI), with or without appended integer number denoting the detector

gti_filestr, default None

External GTI file

hdunamestr or int, default 1

Name of the HDU containing the event list

columnstr, default None

The column containing the time values. If None, we use the name specified in the mission database, and if there is nothing there, “TIME”

return_limits: bool, optional

Return the TSTART and TSTOP keyword values

stingray.io.mkdir_p(path)[source]

Safe mkdir function, found at [so-mkdir].

Parameters
pathstr

The absolute path to the directory to be created

Notes

so-mkdir

http://stackoverflow.com/questions/600268/mkdir-p-functionality-in-python

Return a saved class instance.

Parameters
filename: str

The name of the file to be retrieved.

format_: str

The format used to store file. Supported formats are pickle, hdf5, ascii or fits.

Returns
data{object | astropy.table | dict}
• If format_ is pickle, an object is returned.

• If format_ is ascii, astropy.table object is returned.

• If format_ is hdf5 or ‘fits, a dictionary object is returned.

Read the header key key from HDU hdu of the file fits_file.

Parameters
fits_file: str

The file name and absolute path to the event file.

key: str

The keyword to be read

Returns
valueobject

The value stored under key in fits_file

Other Parameters
hduint

Index of the HDU extension from which the header key to be read.

Search the relevant information about a mission in xselect.mdb.

stingray.io.ref_mjd(fits_file, hdu=1)[source]

Read MJDREFF, MJDREFI or, if failed, MJDREF, from the FITS header.

Parameters
fits_filestr

The file name and absolute path to the event file.

Returns
mjdrefnumpy.longdouble

the reference MJD

Other Parameters
hduint

Index of the HDU extension from which the header key to be read.

stingray.io.rough_calibration(pis, mission)[source]

Make a rough conversion betwenn PI channel and energy.

Only works for NICER, NuSTAR, and XMM.

Parameters
pis: float or array of floats

PI channels in data

mission: str

Mission name

Returns
energiesfloat or array of floats

Energy values

Examples

>>> rough_calibration(0, 'nustar')
1.6
>>> # It's case-insensitive
>>> rough_calibration(1200, 'XMm')
1.2
>>> rough_calibration(10, 'asDf')
Traceback (most recent call last):
...
ValueError: Mission asdf not recognized
>>> rough_calibration(100, 'nicer')
1.0

stingray.io.savefig(filename, **kwargs)[source]

Save a figure plotted by matplotlib.

Note : This function is supposed to be used after the plot function. Otherwise it will save a blank image with no plot.

Parameters
filenamestr

The name of the image file. Extension must be specified in the file name. For example filename with png extension will give a rasterized image while .pdf extension will give a vectorized output.

kwargskeyword arguments

Keyword arguments to be passed to savefig function of matplotlib.pyplot. For example use bbox_inches='tight' to remove the undesirable whitepace around the image.

stingray.io.split_numbers(number, shift=0)[source]

Split high precision number(s) into doubles.

You can specify the number of shifts to move the decimal point.

Parameters
number: long double

The input high precision number which is to be split

Returns
number_I: double

First part of high precision number

number_F: double

Second part of high precision number

Other Parameters
shift: integer

Move the cut by shift decimal points to the right (left if negative)

Examples

>>> n = 12.34
>>> i, f = split_numbers(n)
>>> i == 12
True
>>> np.isclose(f, 0.34)
True
>>> split_numbers(n, 2)
(12.34, 0.0)
>>> split_numbers(n, -1)
(10.0, 2.34)

stingray.io.write(input_, filename, format_='pickle', **kwargs)[source]

Pickle a class instance. For parameters depending on format_, see individual function definitions.

Parameters
object: a class instance

The object to be stored

filename: str

The name of the file to be created

format_: str

The format in which to store file. Formats supported are pickle, hdf5, ascii or fits

### Other Utility Functions¶

stingray.utils.baseline_als(x, y, lam=None, p=None, niter=10, return_baseline=False, offset_correction=False)[source]

Baseline Correction with Asymmetric Least Squares Smoothing.

Parameters
xarray-like

the sample time/number/position

yarray-like

the data series corresponding to x

lamfloat

the lambda parameter of the ALS method. This control how much the baseline can adapt to local changes. A higher value corresponds to a stiffer baseline

pfloat

the asymmetry parameter of the ALS method. This controls the overall slope tolerated for the baseline. A higher value correspond to a higher possible slope

Returns
y_subtractedarray-like, same size as y

The initial time series, subtracted from the trend

baselinearray-like, same size as y

Fitted baseline. Only returned if return_baseline is True

Other Parameters
niterint

The number of iterations to perform

return_baselinebool

return the baseline?

offset_correctionbool

also correct for an offset to align with the running mean of the scan

Examples

>>> x = np.arange(0, 10, 0.01)
>>> y = np.zeros_like(x) + 10
>>> ysub = baseline_als(x, y)
>>> np.all(ysub < 0.001)
True

stingray.utils.contiguous_regions(condition)[source]

Find contiguous True regions of the boolean array condition.

Return a 2D array where the first column is the start index of the region and the second column is the end index, found on [so-contiguous].

Parameters
conditionbool array
Returns
idx[[i0_0, i0_1], [i1_0, i1_1], ...]

A list of integer couples, with the start and end of each True blocks in the original array

Notes

so-contiguous

http://stackoverflow.com/questions/4494404/find-large-number-of-consecutive-values-fulfilling-condition-in-a-numpy-array

stingray.utils.create_window(N, window_type='uniform')[source]

A method to create window functions commonly used in signal processing.

Windows supported are: Hamming, Hanning, uniform (rectangular window), triangular window, blackmann window among others.

Parameters
Nint

Total number of data points in window. If negative, abs is taken.

window_type{uniform, parzen, hamming, hanning, triangular, welch, blackmann, flat-top}, optional, default uniform

Type of window to create.

Returns
window: numpy.ndarray

Window function of length N.

stingray.utils.excess_variance(lc, normalization='fvar')[source]

Calculate the excess variance.

Vaughan et al. 2003, MNRAS 345, 1271 give three measurements of source intrinsic variance: if a light curve has a total variance of $$S^2$$, and each point has an error bar $$\sigma_{err}$$, the excess variance is defined as

$\sigma_{XS} = S^2 - \overline{\sigma_{err}}^2;$

the normalized excess variance is the excess variance divided by the square of the mean intensity:

$\sigma_{NXS} = \dfrac{\sigma_{XS}}{\overline{x}^2};$

the fractional mean square variability amplitude, or $$F_{var}$$, is finally defined as

$F_{var} = \sqrt{\dfrac{\sigma_{XS}}{\overline{x}^2}}$
Parameters
lca Lightcurve object
normalizationstr

if fvar, return the fractional mean square variability $$F_{var}$$. If none, return the unnormalized excess variance variance $$\sigma_{XS}$$. If norm_xs, return the normalized excess variance $$\sigma_{XS}$$

Returns
——-
var_xsfloat
var_xs_errfloat
stingray.utils.find_nearest(array, value)[source]

Return the array value that is closest to the input value (Abigail Stevens: Thanks StackOverflow!)

Parameters
arraynp.array of ints or floats

1-D array of numbers to search through. Should already be sorted from low values to high values.

valueint or float

The value you want to find the closest to in the array.

Returns
array[idx]int or float

The array value that is closest to the input value.

idxint

The index of the array of the closest value.

stingray.utils.genDataPath(dir_path)[source]

Generates data path to chunks.

Parameters
dir_path: string

Path to zarr datastore + Top level directory name for data

Returns
list

List of path’s to datastore

Raises
IOError

If directory does not exist

stingray.utils.get_random_state(random_state=None)[source]

Return a Mersenne Twister pseudo-random number generator.

Parameters
seedinteger or numpy.random.RandomState, optional, default None
Returns
random_statemtrand.RandomState object
stingray.utils.is_int(obj)[source]

Test if object is an integer.

stingray.utils.is_iterable(var)[source]

Test if a variable is an iterable.

Parameters
varobject

The variable to be tested for iterably-ness

Returns
is_iterbool

Returns True if var is an Iterable, False otherwise

stingray.utils.is_string(s)[source]

Portable function to answer whether a variable is a string.

Parameters
sobject

An object that is potentially a string

Returns
isstringbool

A boolean decision on whether s is a string or not

stingray.utils.look_for_array_in_array(array1, array2)[source]

Find a subset of values in an array.

Parameters
array1iterable

An array with values to be searched

array2iterable

A second array which potentially contains a subset of values also contained in array1

Returns ——- array3iterable An array with the subset of values
contained in both array1 and array2
stingray.utils.nearest_power_of_two(x)[source]

Return a number which is nearest to x and is the integral power of two.

Parameters
xint, float
Returns
x_nearestint

Number closest to x and is the integral power of two.

stingray.utils.optimal_bin_time(fftlen, tbin)[source]

Vary slightly the bin time to have a power of two number of bins.

Given an FFT length and a proposed bin time, return a bin time slightly shorter than the original, that will produce a power-of-two number of FFT bins.

Parameters
fftlenint

Number of positive frequencies in a proposed Fourier spectrum

tbinfloat

The proposed time resolution of a light curve

Returns
resfloat

A time resolution that will produce a Fourier spectrum with fftlen frequencies and a number of FFT bins that are a power of two

stingray.utils.order_list_of_arrays(data, order)[source]

Sort an array according to the specified order.

Parameters
dataiterable
Returns
datalist or dict
stingray.utils.poisson_symmetrical_errors(counts)[source]

Optimized version of frequentist symmetrical errors.

Uses a lookup table in order to limit the calls to poisson_conf_interval

Parameters
countsiterable

An array of Poisson-distributed numbers

Returns
errnumpy.ndarray

An array of uncertainties associated with the Poisson counts in counts

Examples

>>> from astropy.stats import poisson_conf_interval
>>> counts = np.random.randint(0, 1000, 100)
>>> # ---- Do it without the lookup table ----
>>> err_low, err_high = poisson_conf_interval(np.asarray(counts),
...                 interval='frequentist-confidence', sigma=1)
>>> err_low -= np.asarray(counts)
>>> err_high -= np.asarray(counts)
>>> err = (np.absolute(err_low) + np.absolute(err_high))/2.0
>>> # Do it with this function
>>> err_thisfun = poisson_symmetrical_errors(counts)
>>> # Test that results are always the same
>>> assert np.allclose(err_thisfun, err)

stingray.utils.rebin_data(x, y, dx_new, yerr=None, method='sum', dx=None)[source]

Rebin some data to an arbitrary new data resolution. Either sum the data points in the new bins or average them.

Parameters
x: iterable

The dependent variable with some resolution, which can vary throughout the time series.

y: iterable

The independent variable to be binned

dx_new: float

The new resolution of the dependent variable x

Returns
xbin: numpy.ndarray

The midpoints of the new bins in x

ybin: numpy.ndarray

The binned quantity y

ybin_err: numpy.ndarray

The uncertainties of the binned values of y.

step_size: float

The size of the binning step

Other Parameters
yerr: iterable, optional

The uncertainties of y, to be propagated during binning.

method: {sum | average | mean}, optional, default sum

The method to be used in binning. Either sum the samples y in each new bin of x, or take the arithmetic mean.

dx: float

The old resolution (otherwise, calculated from difference between time bins)

Examples

>>> x = np.arange(0, 100, 0.01)
>>> y = np.ones(x.size)
>>> yerr = np.ones(x.size)
>>> xbin, ybin, ybinerr, step_size = rebin_data(
...     x, y, 4, yerr=yerr, method='sum', dx=0.01)
>>> np.allclose(ybin, 400)
True
>>> np.allclose(ybinerr, 20)
True
>>> xbin, ybin, ybinerr, step_size = rebin_data(
...     x, y, 4, yerr=yerr, method='mean')
>>> np.allclose(ybin, 1)
True
>>> np.allclose(ybinerr, 0.05)
True

stingray.utils.rebin_data_log(x, y, f, y_err=None, dx=None)[source]

Logarithmic re-bin of some data. Particularly useful for the power spectrum.

The new dependent variable depends on the previous dependent variable modified by a factor f:

$d\nu_j = d\nu_{j-1} (1+f)$
Parameters
x: iterable

The dependent variable with some resolution dx_old = x[1]-x[0]

y: iterable

The independent variable to be binned

f: float

The factor of increase of each bin wrt the previous one.

Returns
xbin: numpy.ndarray

The midpoints of the new bins in x

ybin: numpy.ndarray

The binned quantity y

ybin_err: numpy.ndarray

The uncertainties of the binned values of y

step_size: float

The size of the binning step

Other Parameters
yerr: iterable, optional

The uncertainties of y to be propagated during binning.

method: {sum | average | mean}, optional, default sum

The method to be used in binning. Either sum the samples y in each new bin of x or take the arithmetic mean.

dx: float, optional

The binning step of the initial x

stingray.utils.simon(message, **kwargs)[source]

The Statistical Interpretation MONitor.

A warning system designed to always remind the user that Simon is watching him/her.

Parameters
messagestring

The message that is thrown

kwargsdict

The rest of the arguments that are passed to warnings.warn

stingray.utils.standard_error(xs, mean)[source]

Return the standard error of the mean (SEM) of an array of arrays.

Parameters
xs2-d float array

List of data point arrays.

mean1-d float array

Average of the data points.

Returns
standard_error1-d float array

Standard error of the mean (SEM).

## Modeling¶

This subpackage defines classes and functions related to parametric modelling of various types of data sets. Currently, most functionality is focused on modelling Fourier products (especially power spectra and averaged power spectra), but rudimentary functionality exists for modelling e.g. light curves.

### Log-Likelihood Classes¶

These classes define basic log-likelihoods for modelling time series and power spectra. stingray.modeling.LogLikelihood is an abstract base class, i.e. a template for creating user-defined log-likelihoods and should not be instantiated itself. Based on this base class are several definitions for a stingray.modeling.GaussianLogLikelihood, appropriate for data with normally distributed uncertainties, a stingray.modeling.PoissonLogLikelihood appropriate for photon counting data, and a stingray.modeling.PSDLogLikelihood appropriate for (averaged) power spectra.

class stingray.modeling.LogLikelihood(x, y, model, **kwargs)[source]

Abstract Base Class defining the structure of a LogLikelihood object. This class cannot be called itself, since each statistical distribution has its own definition for the likelihood, which should occur in subclasses.

Parameters
xiterable

x-coordinate of the data. Could be multi-dimensional.

yiterable

y-coordinate of the data. Could be multi-dimensional.

modelan astropy.modeling.FittableModel instance

kwargs :

keyword arguments specific to the individual sub-classes. For details, see the respective docstrings for each subclass

abstract evaluate(parameters)[source]

This is where you define your log-likelihood. Do this, but do it in a subclass!

class stingray.modeling.GaussianLogLikelihood(x, y, yerr, model)[source]

Likelihood for data with Gaussian uncertainties. Astronomers also call this likelihood Chi-Squared, but be aware that this has nothing to do with the likelihood based on the Chi-square distribution, which is also defined as in of PSDLogLikelihood in this module!

Use this class here whenever your data has Gaussian uncertainties.

Parameters
xiterable

x-coordinate of the data

yiterable

y-coordinte of the data

yerriterable

the uncertainty on the data, as standard deviation

modelan astropy.modeling.FittableModel instance

The model to use in the likelihood.

Attributes
xiterable

x-coordinate of the data

yiterable

y-coordinte of the data

yerriterable

the uncertainty on the data, as standard deviation

modelan Astropy Model instance

The model to use in the likelihood.

nparint

The number of free parameters in the model

evaluate(pars, neg=False)[source]

Evaluate the Gaussian log-likelihood for a given set of parameters.

Parameters
parsnumpy.ndarray

An array of parameters at which to evaluate the model and subsequently the log-likelihood. Note that the length of this array must match the free parameters in model, i.e. npar

negbool, optional, default False

If True, return the negative log-likelihood, i.e. -loglike, rather than loglike. This is useful e.g. for optimization routines, which generally minimize functions.

Returns
loglikefloat

The log(likelihood) value for the data and model.

class stingray.modeling.PoissonLogLikelihood(x, y, model)[source]

Likelihood for data with uncertainties following a Poisson distribution. This is useful e.g. for (binned) photon count data.

Parameters
xiterable

x-coordinate of the data

yiterable

y-coordinte of the data

modelan astropy.modeling.FittableModel instance

The model to use in the likelihood.

Attributes
xiterable

x-coordinate of the data

yiterable

y-coordinte of the data

yerriterable

the uncertainty on the data, as standard deviation

modelan astropy.modeling.FittableModel instance

The model to use in the likelihood.

nparint

The number of free parameters in the model

evaluate(pars, neg=False)[source]

Evaluate the log-likelihood for a given set of parameters.

Parameters
parsnumpy.ndarray

An array of parameters at which to evaluate the model and subsequently the log-likelihood. Note that the length of this array must match the free parameters in model, i.e. npar

negbool, optional, default False

If True, return the negative log-likelihood, i.e. -loglike, rather than loglike. This is useful e.g. for optimization routines, which generally minimize functions.

Returns
loglikefloat

The log(likelihood) value for the data and model.

class stingray.modeling.PSDLogLikelihood(freq, power, model, m=1)[source]

A likelihood based on the Chi-square distribution, appropriate for modelling (averaged) power spectra. Note that this is not the same as the statistic astronomers commonly call Chi-Square, which is a fit statistic derived from the Gaussian log-likelihood, defined elsewhere in this module.

Parameters
freqiterable

Array with frequencies

poweriterable

Array with (averaged/singular) powers corresponding to the frequencies in freq

modelan astropy.modeling.FittableModel instance

The model to use in the likelihood.

mint

1/2 of the degrees of freedom

Attributes
xiterable

x-coordinate of the data

yiterable

y-coordinte of the data

yerriterable

the uncertainty on the data, as standard deviation

modelan astropy.modeling.FittableModel instance

The model to use in the likelihood.

nparint

The number of free parameters in the model

evaluate(pars, neg=False)[source]

Evaluate the log-likelihood for a given set of parameters.

Parameters
parsnumpy.ndarray

An array of parameters at which to evaluate the model and subsequently the log-likelihood. Note that the length of this array must match the free parameters in model, i.e. npar

negbool, optional, default False

If True, return the negative log-likelihood, i.e. -loglike, rather than loglike. This is useful e.g. for optimization routines, which generally minimize functions.

Returns
loglikefloat

The log(likelihood) value for the data and model.

class stingray.modeling.LaplaceLogLikelihood(x, y, yerr, model)[source]

A Laplace likelihood for the cospectrum.

Parameters
xiterable

Array with independent variable

yiterable

Array with dependent variable

modelan astropy.modeling.FittableModel instance

The model to use in the likelihood.

yerriterable

Array with the uncertainties on y, in standard deviation

Attributes
xiterable

x-coordinate of the data

yiterable

y-coordinte of the data

yerriterable

the uncertainty on the data, as standard deviation

modelan astropy.modeling.FittableModel instance

The model to use in the likelihood.

nparint

The number of free parameters in the model

evaluate(pars, neg=False)[source]

Evaluate the log-likelihood for a given set of parameters.

Parameters
parsnumpy.ndarray

An array of parameters at which to evaluate the model and subsequently the log-likelihood. Note that the length of this array must match the free parameters in model, i.e. npar

negbool, optional, default False

If True, return the negative log-likelihood, i.e. -loglike, rather than loglike. This is useful e.g. for optimization routines, which generally minimize functions.

Returns
loglikefloat

The log(likelihood) value for the data and model.

### Posterior Classes¶

These classes define basic posteriors for parametric modelling of time series and power spectra, based on the log-likelihood classes defined in Log-Likelihood Classes. stingray.modeling.Posterior is an abstract base class laying out a basic template for defining posteriors. As with the log-likelihood classes above, several posterior classes are defined for a variety of data types.

Note that priors are not pre-defined in these classes, since they are problem dependent and should be set by the user. The convenience function stingray.modeling.set_logprior() can be useful to help set priors for these posterior classes.

class stingray.modeling.Posterior(x, y, model, **kwargs)[source]

Define a Posterior object.

The Posterior describes the Bayesian probability distribution of a set of parameters $$\theta$$ given some observed data $$D$$ and some prior assumptions $$I$$.

It is defined as

$p(\theta | D, I) = p(D | \theta, I) p(\theta | I)/p(D| I)$

where $$p(D | \theta, I)$$ describes the likelihood, i.e. the sampling distribution of the data and the (parametric) model, and $$p(\theta | I)$$ describes the prior distribution, i.e. our information about the parameters $$\theta$$ before we gathered the data. The marginal likelihood $$p(D| I)$$ describes the probability of observing the data given the model assumptions, integrated over the space of all parameters.

Parameters
xiterable

The abscissa or independent variable of the data. This could in principle be a multi-dimensional array.

yiterable

The ordinate or dependent variable of the data.

modelastropy.modeling.models instance

The parametric model supposed to represent the data. For details see the astropy.modeling documentation

kwargs :

keyword arguments related to the subclasses of Posterior. For details, see the documentation of the individual subclasses

References

• Sivia, D. S., and J. Skilling. “Data Analysis: A Bayesian Tutorial. 2006.”

• Gelman, Andrew, et al. Bayesian data analysis. Vol. 2. Boca Raton, FL, USA: Chapman & Hall/CRC, 2014.

• von Toussaint, Udo. “Bayesian inference in physics.” Reviews of Modern Physics 83.3 (2011): 943.

• Hogg, David W. “Probability Calculus for inference”. arxiv: 1205.4446

logposterior(t0, neg=False)[source]

Definition of the log-posterior. Requires methods loglikelihood and logprior to both be defined.

Note that loglikelihood is set in the subclass of Posterior appropriate for your problem at hand, as is logprior.

Parameters
t0numpy.ndarray

An array of parameters at which to evaluate the model and subsequently the log-posterior. Note that the length of this array must match the free parameters in model, i.e. npar

negbool, optional, default False

If True, return the negative log-posterior, i.e. -lpost, rather than lpost. This is useful e.g. for optimization routines, which generally minimize functions.

Returns
lpostfloat

The value of the log-posterior for the given parameters t0

class stingray.modeling.GaussianPosterior(x, y, yerr, model, priors=None)[source]

A general class for two-dimensional data following a Gaussian sampling distribution.

Parameters
xnumpy.ndarray

independent variable

ynumpy.ndarray

dependent variable

yerrnumpy.ndarray

measurement uncertainties for y

modelinstance of any subclass of astropy.modeling.FittableModel

The model for the power spectrum.

priorsdict of form {"parameter name": function}, optional

A dictionary with the definitions for the prior probabilities. For each parameter in model, there must be a prior defined with a key of the exact same name as stored in model.param_names. The item for each key is a function definition defining the prior (e.g. a lambda function or a scipy.stats.distribution.pdf. If priors = None, then no prior is set. This means priors need to be added by hand using the set_logprior() function defined in this module. Note that it is impossible to call a Posterior object itself or the self.logposterior method without defining a prior.

logposterior(t0, neg=False)

Definition of the log-posterior. Requires methods loglikelihood and logprior to both be defined.

Note that loglikelihood is set in the subclass of Posterior appropriate for your problem at hand, as is logprior.

Parameters
t0numpy.ndarray

An array of parameters at which to evaluate the model and subsequently the log-posterior. Note that the length of this array must match the free parameters in model, i.e. npar

negbool, optional, default False

If True, return the negative log-posterior, i.e. -lpost, rather than lpost. This is useful e.g. for optimization routines, which generally minimize functions.

Returns
lpostfloat

The value of the log-posterior for the given parameters t0

class stingray.modeling.PoissonPosterior(x, y, model, priors=None)[source]

Posterior for Poisson light curve data. Primary intended use is for modelling X-ray light curves, but alternative uses are conceivable.

Parameters
xnumpy.ndarray

The independent variable (e.g. time stamps of a light curve)

ynumpy.ndarray

The dependent variable (e.g. counts per bin of a light curve)

modelinstance of any subclass of astropy.modeling.FittableModel

The model for the power spectrum.

priorsdict of form {"parameter name": function}, optional

A dictionary with the definitions for the prior probabilities. For each parameter in model, there must be a prior defined with a key of the exact same name as stored in model.param_names. The item for each key is a function definition defining the prior (e.g. a lambda function or a scipy.stats.distribution.pdf. If priors = None, then no prior is set. This means priors need to be added by hand using the set_logprior() function defined in this module. Note that it is impossible to call a Posterior object itself or the self.logposterior method without defining a prior.

Attributes
xnumpy.ndarray

The independent variable (list of frequencies) stored in ps.freq

ynumpy.ndarray

The dependent variable (list of powers) stored in ps.power

modelinstance of any subclass of astropy.modeling.FittableModel

The model for the power spectrum.

logposterior(t0, neg=False)

Definition of the log-posterior. Requires methods loglikelihood and logprior to both be defined.

Note that loglikelihood is set in the subclass of Posterior appropriate for your problem at hand, as is logprior.

Parameters
t0numpy.ndarray

An array of parameters at which to evaluate the model and subsequently the log-posterior. Note that the length of this array must match the free parameters in model, i.e. npar

negbool, optional, default False

If True, return the negative log-posterior, i.e. -lpost, rather than lpost. This is useful e.g. for optimization routines, which generally minimize functions.

Returns
lpostfloat

The value of the log-posterior for the given parameters t0

class stingray.modeling.PSDPosterior(freq, power, model, priors=None, m=1)[source]

Posterior distribution for power spectra. Uses an exponential distribution for the errors in the likelihood, or a $$\chi^2$$ distribution with $$2M$$ degrees of freedom, where $$M$$ is the number of frequency bins or power spectra averaged in each bin.

Parameters
ps

the stingray.Powerspectrum object containing the data

modelinstance of any subclass of astropy.modeling.FittableModel

The model for the power spectrum.

priorsdict of form {"parameter name": function}, optional

A dictionary with the definitions for the prior probabilities. For each parameter in model, there must be a prior defined with a key of the exact same name as stored in model.param_names. The item for each key is a function definition defining the prior (e.g. a lambda function or a scipy.stats.distribution.pdf. If priors = None, then no prior is set. This means priors need to be added by hand using the set_logprior() function defined in this module. Note that it is impossible to call a Posterior object itself or the self.logposterior method without defining a prior.

mint, default 1

The number of averaged periodograms or frequency bins in ps. Useful for binned/averaged periodograms, since the value of m will change the likelihood function!

Attributes
ps

the stingray.Powerspectrum object containing the data

xnumpy.ndarray

The independent variable (list of frequencies) stored in ps.freq

ynumpy.ndarray

The dependent variable (list of powers) stored in ps.power

modelinstance of any subclass of astropy.modeling.FittableModel

The model for the power spectrum.

logposterior(t0, neg=False)

Definition of the log-posterior. Requires methods loglikelihood and logprior to both be defined.

Note that loglikelihood is set in the subclass of Posterior appropriate for your problem at hand, as is logprior.

Parameters
t0numpy.ndarray

An array of parameters at which to evaluate the model and subsequently the log-posterior. Note that the length of this array must match the free parameters in model, i.e. npar

negbool, optional, default False

If True, return the negative log-posterior, i.e. -lpost, rather than lpost. This is useful e.g. for optimization routines, which generally minimize functions.

Returns
lpostfloat

The value of the log-posterior for the given parameters t0

class stingray.modeling.LaplacePosterior(x, y, yerr, model, priors=None)[source]

A general class for two-dimensional data following a Gaussian sampling distribution.

Parameters
xnumpy.ndarray

independent variable

ynumpy.ndarray

dependent variable

yerrnumpy.ndarray

measurement uncertainties for y, in standard deviation

modelinstance of any subclass of astropy.modeling.FittableModel

The model for the power spectrum.

priorsdict of form {"parameter name": function}, optional

A dictionary with the definitions for the prior probabilities. For each parameter in model, there must be a prior defined with a key of the exact same name as stored in model.param_names. The item for each key is a function definition defining the prior (e.g. a lambda function or a scipy.stats.distribution.pdf. If priors = None, then no prior is set. This means priors need to be added by hand using the set_logprior() function defined in this module. Note that it is impossible to call a Posterior object itself or the self.logposterior method without defining a prior.

logposterior(t0, neg=False)

Definition of the log-posterior. Requires methods loglikelihood and logprior to both be defined.

Note that loglikelihood is set in the subclass of Posterior appropriate for your problem at hand, as is logprior.

Parameters
t0numpy.ndarray

An array of parameters at which to evaluate the model and subsequently the log-posterior. Note that the length of this array must match the free parameters in model, i.e. npar

negbool, optional, default False

If True, return the negative log-posterior, i.e. -lpost, rather than lpost. This is useful e.g. for optimization routines, which generally minimize functions.

Returns
lpostfloat

The value of the log-posterior for the given parameters t0

### Parameter Estimation Classes¶

These classes implement functionality related to parameter estimation. They define basic fit and sample methods using scipy.optimize and emcee, respectively, for optimization and Markov Chain Monte Carlo sampling. stingray.modeling.PSDParEst implements some more advanced functionality for modelling power spectra, including both frequentist and Bayesian searches for (quasi-)periodic signals.

class stingray.modeling.ParameterEstimation(fitmethod='BFGS', max_post=True)[source]

Parameter estimation of two-dimensional data, either via optimization or MCMC. Note: optimization with bounds is not supported. If something like this is required, define (uniform) priors in the ParametricModel instances to be used below.

Parameters
fitmethodstring, optional, default L-BFGS-B

Any of the strings allowed in scipy.optimize.minimize in the method keyword. Sets the fit method to be used.

max_postbool, optional, default True

If True, then compute the Maximum-A-Posteriori estimate. If False, compute a Maximum Likelihood estimate.

calibrate_lrt(lpost1, t1, lpost2, t2, sample=None, neg=True, max_post=False, nsim=1000, niter=200, nwalkers=500, burnin=200, namestr='test', seed=None)[source]

Calibrate the outcome of a Likelihood Ratio Test via MCMC.

In order to compare models via likelihood ratio test, one generally aims to compute a p-value for the null hypothesis (generally the simpler model). There are two special cases where the theoretical distribution used to compute that p-value analytically given the observed likelihood ratio (a chi-square distribution) is not applicable:

• the models are not nested (i.e. Model 1 is not a special, simpler case of Model 2),

• the parameter values fixed in Model 2 to retrieve Model 1 are at the edges of parameter space (e.g. if one must set, say, an amplitude to zero in order to remove a component in the more complex model, and negative amplitudes are excluded a priori)

In these cases, the observed likelihood ratio must be calibrated via simulations of the simpler model (Model 1), using MCMC to take into account the uncertainty in the parameters. This function does exactly that: it computes the likelihood ratio for the observed data, and produces simulations to calibrate the likelihood ratio and compute a p-value for observing the data under the assumption that Model 1 istrue.

If max_post=True, the code will use MCMC to sample the posterior of the parameters and simulate fake data from there.

If max_post=False, the code will use the covariance matrix derived from the fit to simulate data sets for comparison.

Parameters
lpost1object of a subclass of Posterior

The Posterior object for model 1

t1iterable

The starting parameters for model 1

lpost2object of a subclass of Posterior

The Posterior object for model 2

t2iterable

The starting parameters for model 2

negbool, optional, default True

Boolean flag to decide whether to use the negative log-likelihood or log-posterior

max_post: bool, optional, default False

If True, set the internal state to do the optimization with the log-likelihood rather than the log-posterior.

Returns
pvaluefloat [0,1]

p-value ‘n stuff

compute_lrt(lpost1, t1, lpost2, t2, neg=True, max_post=False)[source]

This function computes the Likelihood Ratio Test between two nested models.

Parameters
lpost1object of a subclass of Posterior

The Posterior object for model 1

t1iterable

The starting parameters for model 1

lpost2object of a subclass of Posterior

The Posterior object for model 2

t2iterable

The starting parameters for model 2

negbool, optional, default True

Boolean flag to decide whether to use the negative log-likelihood or log-posterior

max_post: bool, optional, default False

If True, set the internal state to do the optimization with the log-likelihood rather than the log-posterior.

Returns
lrtfloat

The likelihood ratio for model 2 and model 1

res1OptimizationResults object

Contains the result of fitting lpost1

res2OptimizationResults object

Contains the results of fitting lpost2

fit(lpost, t0, neg=True, scipy_optimize_options=None)[source]

Do either a Maximum-A-Posteriori (MAP) or Maximum Likelihood (ML) fit to the data.

MAP fits include priors, ML fits do not.

Parameters
lpostPosterior (or subclass) instance

and instance of class Posterior or one of its subclasses that defines the function to be minimized (either in loglikelihood or logposterior)

t0{list | numpy.ndarray}

List/array with set of initial parameters

negbool, optional, default True

Boolean to be passed to lpost, setting whether to use the negative posterior or the negative log-likelihood. Useful for optimization routines, which are generally defined as minimization routines.

scipy_optimize_optionsdict, optional, default None

A dictionary with options for scipy.optimize.minimize, directly passed on as keyword arguments.

Returns
res

An object containing useful summaries of the fitting procedure. For details, see documentation of class:OptimizationResults.

sample(lpost, t0, cov=None, nwalkers=500, niter=100, burnin=100, threads=1, print_results=True, plot=False, namestr='test', pool=False)[source]

Sample the Posterior distribution defined in lpost using MCMC. Here we use the emcee package, but other implementations could in principle be used.

Parameters
lpostinstance of a Posterior subclass

and instance of class Posterior or one of its subclasses that defines the function to be minimized (either in loglikelihood or logposterior)

t0iterable

list or array containing the starting parameters. Its length must match lpost.model.npar.

nwalkersint, optional, default 500

The number of walkers (chains) to use during the MCMC procedure. The more walkers are used, the slower the estimation will be, but the better the final distribution is likely to be.

niterint, optional, default 100

The number of iterations to run the MCMC chains for. The larger this number, the longer the estimation will take, but the higher the chance that the walkers have actually converged on the true posterior distribution.

burninint, optional, default 100

The number of iterations to run the walkers before convergence is assumed to have occurred. This part of the chain will be discarded before sampling from what is then assumed to be the posterior distribution desired.

threadsDEPRECATED int, optional, default 1

The number of threads for parallelization. Default is 1, i.e. no parallelization With the change to the new emcee version 3, threads is deprecated. Use the pool keyword argument instead. This will no longer have any effect.

print_resultsbool, optional, default True

Boolean flag setting whether the results of the MCMC run should be printed to standard output. Default: True

plotbool, optional, default False

Boolean flag setting whether summary plots of the MCMC chains should be produced. Default: False

namestrstr, optional, default test

Optional string for output file names for the plotting.

poolbool, default False

If True, use pooling to parallelize the operation.

Returns
resclass:SamplingResults object

An object of class SamplingResults summarizing the results of the MCMC run.

simulate_lrts(s_all, lpost1, t1, lpost2, t2, max_post=True, seed=None)[source]

Simulate likelihood ratios. For details, see definitions in the subclasses that implement this task.

class stingray.modeling.PSDParEst(ps, fitmethod='BFGS', max_post=True)[source]

Parameter estimation for parametric modelling of power spectra.

This class contains functionality that allows parameter estimation and related tasks that involve fitting a parametric model to an (averaged) power spectrum.

Parameters
psclass:stingray.Powerspectrum or class:stingray.AveragedPowerspectrum object

The power spectrum to be modelled

fitmethodstr, optional, default BFGS

A string allowed by scipy.optimize.minimize as a valid fitting method

max_postbool, optional, default True

If True, do a Maximum-A-Posteriori (MAP) fit, i.e. fit with priors, otherwise do a Maximum Likelihood fit instead

calibrate_highest_outlier(lpost, t0, sample=None, max_post=False, nsim=1000, niter=200, nwalkers=500, burnin=200, namestr='test', seed=None)[source]

Calibrate the highest outlier in a data set using MCMC-simulated power spectra.

In short, the procedure does a MAP fit to the data, computes the statistic

$\max{(T_R = 2(\mathrm{data}/\mathrm{model}))}$

and then does an MCMC run using the data and the model, or generates parameter samples from the likelihood distribution using the derived covariance in a Maximum Likelihood fit. From the (posterior) samples, it generates fake power spectra. Each fake spectrum is fit in the same way as the data, and the highest data/model outlier extracted as for the data. The observed value of $$T_R$$ can then be directly compared to the simulated distribution of $$T_R$$ values in order to derive a p-value of the null hypothesis that the observed $$T_R$$ is compatible with being generated by noise.

Parameters
lpost

An instance of class stingray.modeling.PSDPosterior that defines the function to be minimized (either in loglikelihood or logposterior)

t0{list | numpy.ndarray}

List/array with set of initial parameters

sampleSamplingResults instance, optional, default None

If a sampler has already been run, the SamplingResults instance can be fed into this method here, otherwise this method will run a sampler automatically

max_post: bool, optional, default False

If True, do MAP fits on the power spectrum to find the highest data/model outlier Otherwise, do a Maximum Likelihood fit. If True, the simulated power spectra will be generated from an MCMC run, otherwise the method will employ the approximated covariance matrix for the parameters derived from the likelihood surface to generate samples from that likelihood function.

nsimint, optional, default 1000

Number of fake power spectra to simulate from the posterior sample. Note that this number sets the resolution of the resulting p-value. For nsim=1000, the highest resolution that can be achieved is $$10^{-3}$$.

niterint, optional, default 200

If sample is None, this variable will be used to set the number of steps in the MCMC procedure after burn-in.

nwalkersint, optional, default 500

If sample is None, this variable will be used to set the number of MCMC chains run in parallel in the sampler.

burninint, optional, default 200

If sample is None, this variable will be used to set the number of burn-in steps to be discarded in the initial phase of the MCMC run

namestrstr, optional, default test

A string to be used for storing MCMC output and plots to disk

seedint, optional, default None

An optional number to seed the random number generator with, for reproducibility of the results obtained with this method.

Returns
pvalfloat

The p-value that the highest data/model outlier is produced by random noise, calibrated using simulated power spectra from an MCMC run.

References

For more details on the procedure employed here, see

calibrate_lrt(lpost1, t1, lpost2, t2, sample=None, neg=True, max_post=False, nsim=1000, niter=200, nwalkers=500, burnin=200, namestr='test', seed=None)

Calibrate the outcome of a Likelihood Ratio Test via MCMC.

In order to compare models via likelihood ratio test, one generally aims to compute a p-value for the null hypothesis (generally the simpler model). There are two special cases where the theoretical distribution used to compute that p-value analytically given the observed likelihood ratio (a chi-square distribution) is not applicable:

• the models are not nested (i.e. Model 1 is not a special, simpler case of Model 2),

• the parameter values fixed in Model 2 to retrieve Model 1 are at the edges of parameter space (e.g. if one must set, say, an amplitude to zero in order to remove a component in the more complex model, and negative amplitudes are excluded a priori)

In these cases, the observed likelihood ratio must be calibrated via simulations of the simpler model (Model 1), using MCMC to take into account the uncertainty in the parameters. This function does exactly that: it computes the likelihood ratio for the observed data, and produces simulations to calibrate the likelihood ratio and compute a p-value for observing the data under the assumption that Model 1 istrue.

If max_post=True, the code will use MCMC to sample the posterior of the parameters and simulate fake data from there.

If max_post=False, the code will use the covariance matrix derived from the fit to simulate data sets for comparison.

Parameters
lpost1object of a subclass of Posterior

The Posterior object for model 1

t1iterable

The starting parameters for model 1

lpost2object of a subclass of Posterior

The Posterior object for model 2

t2iterable

The starting parameters for model 2

negbool, optional, default True

Boolean flag to decide whether to use the negative log-likelihood or log-posterior

max_post: bool, optional, default False

If True, set the internal state to do the optimization with the log-likelihood rather than the log-posterior.

Returns
pvaluefloat [0,1]

p-value ‘n stuff

compute_lrt(lpost1, t1, lpost2, t2, neg=True, max_post=False)

This function computes the Likelihood Ratio Test between two nested models.

Parameters
lpost1object of a subclass of Posterior

The Posterior object for model 1

t1iterable

The starting parameters for model 1

lpost2object of a subclass of Posterior

The Posterior object for model 2

t2iterable

The starting parameters for model 2

negbool, optional, default True

Boolean flag to decide whether to use the negative log-likelihood or log-posterior

max_post: bool, optional, default False

If True, set the internal state to do the optimization with the log-likelihood rather than the log-posterior.

Returns
lrtfloat

The likelihood ratio for model 2 and model 1

res1OptimizationResults object

Contains the result of fitting lpost1

res2OptimizationResults object

Contains the results of fitting lpost2

fit(lpost, t0, neg=True, scipy_optimize_options=None)[source]

Do either a Maximum-A-Posteriori (MAP) or Maximum Likelihood (ML) fit to the power spectrum.

MAP fits include priors, ML fits do not.

Parameters
lpost

An instance of class stingray.modeling.PSDPosterior that defines the function to be minimized (either in loglikelihood or logposterior)

t0{list | numpy.ndarray}

List/array with set of initial parameters

negbool, optional, default True

Boolean to be passed to lpost, setting whether to use the negative posterior or the negative log-likelihood.

scipy_optimize_optionsdict, optional, default None

A dictionary with options for scipy.optimize.minimize, directly passed on as keyword arguments.

Returns
res

An object containing useful summaries of the fitting procedure. For details, see documentation of OptimizationResults.

plotfits(res1, res2=None, save_plot=False, namestr='test', log=False)[source]

Plotting method that allows to plot either one or two best-fit models with the data.

Plots a power spectrum with the best-fit model, as well as the data/model residuals for each model.

Parameters
res1

Output of a successful fitting procedure

res2OptimizationResults object, optional, default None

Optional output of a second successful fitting procedure, e.g. with a competing model

save_plotbool, optional, default False

If True, the resulting figure will be saved to a file

namestrstr, optional, default test

If save_plot is True, this string defines the path and file name for the output plot

logbool, optional, default False

If True, plot the axes logarithmically.

sample(lpost, t0, cov=None, nwalkers=500, niter=100, burnin=100, threads=1, print_results=True, plot=False, namestr='test')[source]

Sample the posterior distribution defined in lpost using MCMC. Here we use the emcee package, but other implementations could in principle be used.

Parameters
lpostinstance of a Posterior subclass

and instance of class Posterior or one of its subclasses that defines the function to be minimized (either in loglikelihood or logposterior)

t0iterable

list or array containing the starting parameters. Its length must match lpost.model.npar.

nwalkersint, optional, default 500

The number of walkers (chains) to use during the MCMC procedure. The more walkers are used, the slower the estimation will be, but the better the final distribution is likely to be.

niterint, optional, default 100

The number of iterations to run the MCMC chains for. The larger this number, the longer the estimation will take, but the higher the chance that the walkers have actually converged on the true posterior distribution.

burninint, optional, default 100

The number of iterations to run the walkers before convergence is assumed to have occurred. This part of the chain will be discarded before sampling from what is then assumed to be the posterior distribution desired.

threadsint, optional, default 1

The number of threads for parallelization. Default is 1, i.e. no parallelization

print_resultsbool, optional, default True

Boolean flag setting whether the results of the MCMC run should be printed to standard output

plotbool, optional, default False

Boolean flag setting whether summary plots of the MCMC chains should be produced

namestrstr, optional, default test

Optional string for output file names for the plotting.

Returns
res

An object containing useful summaries of the sampling procedure. For details see documentation of SamplingResults.

simulate_highest_outlier(s_all, lpost, t0, max_post=True, seed=None)[source]

Simulate $$n$$ power spectra from a model and then find the highest data/model outlier in each.

The data/model outlier is defined as

$\max{(T_R = 2(\mathrm{data}/\mathrm{model}))} .$
Parameters
s_allnumpy.ndarray

A list of parameter values derived either from an approximation of the likelihood surface, or from an MCMC run. Has dimensions (n, ndim), where n is the number of simulated power spectra to generate, and ndim the number of model parameters.

lpostinstance of a Posterior subclass

an instance of class Posterior or one of its subclasses that defines the function to be minimized (either in loglikelihood or logposterior)

t0iterable

list or array containing the starting parameters. Its length must match lpost.model.npar.

max_post: bool, optional, default False

If True, do MAP fits on the power spectrum to find the highest data/model outlier Otherwise, do a Maximum Likelihood fit. If True, the simulated power spectra will be generated from an MCMC run, otherwise the method will employ the approximated covariance matrix for the parameters derived from the likelihood surface to generate samples from that likelihood function.

seedint, optional, default None

An optional number to seed the random number generator with, for reproducibility of the results obtained with this method.

Returns
max_y_allnumpy.ndarray

An array of maximum outliers for each simulated power spectrum

simulate_lrts(s_all, lpost1, t1, lpost2, t2, seed=None)[source]

Simulate likelihood ratios for two given models based on MCMC samples for the simpler model (i.e. the null hypothesis).

Parameters
s_allnumpy.ndarray of shape (nsamples, lpost1.npar)

An array with MCMC samples derived from the null hypothesis model in lpost1. Its second dimension must match the number of free parameters in lpost1.model.

lpost1LogLikelihood or Posterior subclass object

Object containing the null hypothesis model

t1iterable of length lpost1.npar

A starting guess for fitting the model in lpost1

lpost2LogLikelihood or Posterior subclass object

Object containing the alternative hypothesis model

t2iterable of length lpost2.npar

A starting guess for fitting the model in lpost2

max_postbool, optional, default True

If True, then lpost1 and lpost2 should be Posterior subclass objects; if False, then lpost1 and lpost2 should be LogLikelihood subclass objects

seedint, optional default None

A seed to initialize the numpy.random.RandomState object to be passed on to _generate_data. Useful for producing exactly reproducible results

Returns
lrt_simnumpy.ndarray

An array with the simulated likelihood ratios for the simulated data

### Auxiliary Classes¶

These are helper classes instantiated by stingray.modeling.ParameterEstimation and its subclasses to organize the results of model fitting and sampling in a more meaningful, easily accessible way.

class stingray.modeling.OptimizationResults(lpost, res, neg=True, log=None)[source]

Helper class that will contain the results of the regression. Less fiddly than a dictionary.

Parameters
lpost: instance of :class:Posterior or one of its subclasses

The object containing the function that is being optimized in the regression

res: instance of scipy.OptimizeResult

The object containing the results from a optimization run

negbool, optional, default True

A flag that sets whether the log-likelihood or negative log-likelihood is being used

loga logging.getLogger() object, default None

You can pass a pre-defined object for logging, else a new logger will be instantiated

References

7

8

https://projecteuclid.org/euclid.aos/1176344136

Attributes
resultfloat

The result of the optimization, i.e. the function value at the minimum that the optimizer found

p_optiterable

The list of parameters at the minimum found by the optimizer

modelastropy.models.Model instance

The parametric model fit to the data

covnumpy.ndarray

The covariance matrix for the parameters, has shape (len(p_opt), len(p_opt))

errnumpy.ndarray

The standard deviation of the parameters, derived from the diagonal of cov. Has the same shape as p_opt

mfitnumpy.ndarray

The values of the model for all x

deviancefloat

The deviance, calculated as -2*log(likelihood)

aicfloat

The Akaike Information Criterion, derived from the log(likelihood) and often used in model comparison between non-nested models; For more details, see 7

bicfloat

The Bayesian Information Criterion, derived from the log(likelihood) and often used in model comparison between non-nested models; For more details, see 8

meritfloat

sum of squared differences between data and model, normalized by the model values

dofint

The number of degrees of freedom in the problem, defined as the number of data points - the number of parameters

sexpint

2*(number of parameters)*(number of data points)

ssdfloat

sqrt(2*(sexp)), expected sum of data-model residuals

sobsfloat

sum of data-model residuals

_compute_covariance(lpost, res)[source]

Compute the covariance of the parameters using inverse of the Hessian, i.e. the second-order derivative of the log-likelihood. Also calculates an estimate of the standard deviation in the parameters, using the square root of the diagonal of the covariance matrix.

The Hessian is either estimated directly by the chosen method of fitting, or approximated using the statsmodel approx_hess function.

Parameters
lpost: instance of :class:Posterior or one of its subclasses

The object containing the function that is being optimized in the regression

res: instance of scipy’s OptimizeResult class

The object containing the results from a optimization run

_compute_criteria(lpost)[source]

Compute various information criteria useful for model comparison in non-nested models.

Currently implemented are the Akaike Information Criterion 9 and the Bayesian Information Criterion 10.

Parameters
lpost: instance of :class:Posterior or one of its subclasses

The object containing the function that is being optimized in the regression

References

9

10

https://projecteuclid.org/euclid.aos/1176344136

_compute_model(lpost)[source]

Compute the values of the best-fit model for all x.

Parameters
lpost: instance of :class:Posterior or one of its subclasses

The object containing the function that is being optimized in the regression

_compute_statistics(lpost)[source]

Compute some useful fit statistics, like the degrees of freedom and the figure of merit.

Parameters
lpost: instance of :class:Posterior or one of its subclasses

The object containing the function that is being optimized in the regression

print_summary(lpost)[source]

Print a useful summary of the fitting procedure to screen or a log file.

Parameters
lpostinstance of Posterior or one of its subclasses

The object containing the function that is being optimized in the regression

class stingray.modeling.SamplingResults(sampler, ci_min=5, ci_max=95, log=None)[source]

Helper class that will contain the results of the sampling in a handy format.

Less fiddly than a dictionary.

Parameters
sampler: emcee.EnsembleSampler object

The object containing the sampler that’s done all the work.

ci_min: float out of [0,100]

The lower bound percentile for printing credible intervals on the parameters

ci_max: float out of [0,100]

The upper bound percentile for printing credible intervals on the parameters

loga logging.getLogger() object, default None

You can pass a pre-defined object for logging, else a new logger will be instantiated

References

11

https://projecteuclid.org/euclid.ss/1177011136

Attributes
samplesnumpy.ndarray

An array of samples from the MCMC run, including all chains flattened into one long (nwalkers*niter, ndim) array

nwalkersint

The number of chains used in the MCMC procedure

niterint

The number of MCMC iterations in each chain

ndimint

The dimensionality of the problem, i.e. the number of parameters in the model

acceptancefloat

The mean acceptance ratio, calculated over all chains

Lfloat

The product of acceptance ratio and number of samples

acorfloat

The autocorrelation length for the chains; should be shorter than the chains themselves for independent sampling

rhatfloat

weighted average of between-sequence variance and within-sequence variance; Gelman-Rubin convergence statistic 11

meannumpy.ndarray

An array of size ndim, with the posterior means of the parameters derived from the MCMC chains

stdnumpy.ndarray

An array of size ndim with the posterior standard deviations of the parameters derived from the MCMC chains

cinumpy.ndarray

An array of shape (ndim, 2) containing the lower and upper bounds of the credible interval (the Bayesian equivalent of the confidence interval) for each parameter using the bounds set by ci_min and ci_max

_check_convergence(sampler)[source]

Compute common statistics for convergence of the MCMC chains. While you can never be completely sure that your chains converged, these present reasonable heuristics to give an indication whether convergence is very far off or reasonably close.

Currently implemented are the autocorrelation time 12 and the Gelman-Rubin convergence criterion 13.

Parameters
sampleran emcee.EnsembleSampler object

References

12

https://arxiv.org/abs/1202.3665

13

https://projecteuclid.org/euclid.ss/1177011136

_compute_rhat(sampler)[source]

Compute Gelman-Rubin convergence criterion 14.

Parameters
sampleran emcee.EnsembleSampler object

References

14

https://projecteuclid.org/euclid.ss/1177011136

_infer(ci_min=5, ci_max=95)[source]

Infer the Posterior means, standard deviations and credible intervals (i.e. the Bayesian equivalent to confidence intervals) from the Posterior samples for each parameter.

Parameters
ci_minfloat

Lower bound to the credible interval, given as percentage between 0 and 100

ci_maxfloat

Upper bound to the credible interval, given as percentage between 0 and 100

plot_results(nsamples=1000, fig=None, save_plot=False, filename='test.pdf')[source]

Plot some results in a triangle plot. If installed, will use [corner] for the plotting, if not, uses its own code to make a triangle plot.

By default, this method returns a matplotlib.Figure object, but if save_plot=True the plot can be saved to file automatically,

Parameters
nsamplesint, default 1000

The maximum number of samples used for plotting.

figmatplotlib.Figure instance, default None

If created externally, you can pass a Figure instance to this method. If none is passed, the method will create one internally.

save_plotbool, default False

If True save the plot to file with a file name specified by the keyword filename. If False just return the Figure object

filenamestr

Name of the output file with the figure

References

corner

https://github.com/dfm/corner.py

print_results()[source]

Print results of the MCMC run on screen or to a log-file.

### Convenience Functions¶

These functions are designed to help the user perform common tasks related to modelling and parameter estimation. In particular, the function stingray.modeling.set_logprior() is designed to help users set priors in their stingray.modeling.Posterior subclass objects.

stingray.modeling.set_logprior(lpost, priors)[source]

This function constructs the logprior method required to successfully use a Posterior object.

All instances of class Posterior and its subclasses require to implement a logprior methods. However, priors are strongly problem-dependent and therefore usually user-defined.

This function allows for setting the logprior method on any instance of class Posterior efficiently by allowing the user to pass a dictionary of priors and an instance of class Posterior.

Parameters
lpostPosterior object

An instance of class Posterior or any of its subclasses

priorsdict

A dictionary containing the prior definitions. Keys are parameter names as defined by the astropy.models.FittableModel instance supplied to the model parameter in Posterior. Items are functions that take a parameter as input and return the log-prior probability of that parameter.

Returns
logpriorfunction

The function definition for the prior

Examples

Make a light curve and power spectrum

>>> photon_arrivals = np.sort(np.random.uniform(0,1000, size=10000))
>>> lc = Lightcurve.make_lightcurve(photon_arrivals, dt=1.0)
>>> ps = Powerspectrum(lc, norm="frac")


Define the model

>>> pl = models.PowerLaw1D()
>>> pl.x_0.fixed = True


Instantiate the posterior:

>>> lpost = PSDPosterior(ps.freq, ps.power, pl, m=ps.m)


Define the priors:

>>> p_alpha = lambda alpha: ((-1. <= alpha) & (alpha <= 5.))
>>> p_amplitude = lambda amplitude: ((-10 <= np.log(amplitude)) &
...                                 ((np.log(amplitude) <= 10.0)))
>>> priors = {"alpha":p_alpha, "amplitude":p_amplitude}


Set the logprior method in the lpost object:

>>> lpost.logprior = set_logprior(lpost, priors)

stingray.modeling.scripts.fit_crossspectrum(cs, model, starting_pars=None, max_post=False, priors=None, fitmethod='L-BFGS-B')[source]

Fit a number of Lorentzians to a cross spectrum, possibly including white noise. Each Lorentzian has three parameters (amplitude, centroid position, full-width at half maximum), plus one extra parameter if the white noise level should be fit as well. Priors for each parameter can be included in case max_post = True, in which case the function will attempt a Maximum-A-Posteriori fit. Priors must be specified as a dictionary with one entry for each parameter. The parameter names are (amplitude_i, x_0_i, fwhm_i) for each i out of a total of N Lorentzians. The white noise level has a parameter amplitude_(N+1). For example, a model with two Lorentzians and a white noise level would have parameters: [amplitude_0, x_0_0, fwhm_0, amplitude_1, x_0_1, fwhm_1, amplitude_2].

Parameters
csCrossspectrum

A Crossspectrum object with the data to be fit

model: astropy.modeling.models class instance

The parametric model supposed to represent the data. For details see the astropy.modeling documentation

starting_parsiterable, optional, default None

The list of starting guesses for the optimizer. If it is not provided, then default parameters are taken from model. See explanation above for ordering of parameters in this list.

max_postbool, optional, default False

If True, perform a Maximum-A-Posteriori fit of the data rather than a Maximum Likelihood fit. Note that this requires priors to be specified, otherwise this will cause an exception!

priors{dict | None}, optional, default None

Dictionary with priors for the MAP fit. This should be of the form {“parameter name”: probability distribution, …}

fitmethodstring, optional, default “L-BFGS-B”

Specifies an optimization algorithm to use. Supply any valid option for scipy.optimize.minimize.

Returns
parestPSDParEst object

A PSDParEst object for further analysis

resOptimizationResults object

The OptimizationResults object storing useful results and quantities relating to the fit

stingray.modeling.scripts.fit_lorentzians(ps, nlor, starting_pars, fit_whitenoise=True, max_post=False, priors=None, fitmethod='L-BFGS-B')[source]

Fit a number of Lorentzians to a power spectrum, possibly including white noise. Each Lorentzian has three parameters (amplitude, centroid position, full-width at half maximum), plus one extra parameter if the white noise level should be fit as well. Priors for each parameter can be included in case max_post = True, in which case the function will attempt a Maximum-A-Posteriori fit. Priors must be specified as a dictionary with one entry for each parameter. The parameter names are (amplitude_i, x_0_i, fwhm_i) for each i out of a total of N Lorentzians. The white noise level has a parameter amplitude_(N+1). For example, a model with two Lorentzians and a white noise level would have parameters: [amplitude_0, x_0_0, fwhm_0, amplitude_1, x_0_1, fwhm_1, amplitude_2].

Parameters
psPowerspectrum

A Powerspectrum object with the data to be fit

nlorint

The number of Lorentzians to fit

starting_parsiterable

The list of starting guesses for the optimizer. If it is not provided, then default parameters are taken from model. See explanation above for ordering of parameters in this list.

fit_whitenoisebool, optional, default True

If True, the code will attempt to fit a white noise level along with the Lorentzians. Be sure to include a starting parameter for the optimizer in starting_pars!

max_postbool, optional, default False

If True, perform a Maximum-A-Posteriori fit of the data rather than a Maximum Likelihood fit. Note that this requires priors to be specified, otherwise this will cause an exception!

priors{dict | None}, optional, default None

Dictionary with priors for the MAP fit. This should be of the form {“parameter name”: probability distribution, …}

fitmethodstring, optional, default “L-BFGS-B”

Specifies an optimization algorithm to use. Supply any valid option for scipy.optimize.minimize.

Returns
parestPSDParEst object

A PSDParEst object for further analysis

resOptimizationResults object

The OptimizationResults object storing useful results and quantities relating to the fit

Examples

We start by making an example power spectrum with three Lorentzians >>> np.random.seed(400) >>> nlor = 3

>>> x_0_0 = 0.5
>>> x_0_1 = 2.0
>>> x_0_2 = 7.5

>>> amplitude_0 = 150.0
>>> amplitude_1 = 50.0
>>> amplitude_2 = 15.0

>>> fwhm_0 = 0.1
>>> fwhm_1 = 1.0
>>> fwhm_2 = 0.5


We will also include a white noise level: >>> whitenoise = 2.0

>>> model = (models.Lorentz1D(amplitude_0, x_0_0, fwhm_0) +
...          models.Lorentz1D(amplitude_1, x_0_1, fwhm_1) +
...          models.Lorentz1D(amplitude_2, x_0_2, fwhm_2) +
...          models.Const1D(whitenoise))

>>> freq = np.linspace(0.01, 10.0, 1000)
>>> p = model(freq)
>>> noise = np.random.exponential(size=len(freq))

>>> power = p*noise
>>> ps = Powerspectrum()
>>> ps.freq = freq
>>> ps.power = power
>>> ps.df = ps.freq[1] - ps.freq[0]
>>> ps.m = 1


Now we have to guess starting parameters. For each Lorentzian, we have amplitude, centroid position and fwhm, and this pattern repeats for each Lorentzian in the fit. The white noise level is the last parameter. >>> t0 = [150, 0.4, 0.2, 50, 2.3, 0.6, 20, 8.0, 0.4, 2.1]

We’re ready for doing the fit: >>> parest, res = fit_lorentzians(ps, nlor, t0)

res contains a whole array of useful information about the fit, for example the parameters at the optimum: >>> p_opt = res.p_opt

stingray.modeling.scripts.fit_powerspectrum(ps, model, starting_pars=None, max_post=False, priors=None, fitmethod='L-BFGS-B')[source]

Fit a number of Lorentzians to a power spectrum, possibly including white noise. Each Lorentzian has three parameters (amplitude, centroid position, full-width at half maximum), plus one extra parameter if the white noise level should be fit as well. Priors for each parameter can be included in case max_post = True, in which case the function will attempt a Maximum-A-Posteriori fit. Priors must be specified as a dictionary with one entry for each parameter. The parameter names are (amplitude_i, x_0_i, fwhm_i) for each i out of a total of N Lorentzians. The white noise level has a parameter amplitude_(N+1). For example, a model with two Lorentzians and a white noise level would have parameters: [amplitude_0, x_0_0, fwhm_0, amplitude_1, x_0_1, fwhm_1, amplitude_2].

Parameters
psPowerspectrum

A Powerspectrum object with the data to be fit

model: astropy.modeling.models class instance

The parametric model supposed to represent the data. For details see the astropy.modeling documentation

starting_parsiterable, optional, default None

The list of starting guesses for the optimizer. If it is not provided, then default parameters are taken from model. See explanation above for ordering of parameters in this list.

fit_whitenoisebool, optional, default True

If True, the code will attempt to fit a white noise level along with the Lorentzians. Be sure to include a starting parameter for the optimizer in starting_pars!

max_postbool, optional, default False

If True, perform a Maximum-A-Posteriori fit of the data rather than a Maximum Likelihood fit. Note that this requires priors to be specified, otherwise this will cause an exception!

priors{dict | None}, optional, default None

Dictionary with priors for the MAP fit. This should be of the form {“parameter name”: probability distribution, …}

fitmethodstring, optional, default “L-BFGS-B”

Specifies an optimization algorithm to use. Supply any valid option for scipy.optimize.minimize.

Returns
parestPSDParEst object

A PSDParEst object for further analysis

resOptimizationResults object

The OptimizationResults object storing useful results and quantities relating to the fit

Examples

We start by making an example power spectrum with three Lorentzians >>> m = 1 >>> nfreq = 100000 >>> freq = np.linspace(1, 1000, nfreq)

>>> np.random.seed(100)  # set the seed for the random number generator
>>> noise = np.random.exponential(size=nfreq)

>>> model = models.PowerLaw1D() + models.Const1D()
>>> model.x_0_0.fixed = True

>>> alpha_0 = 2.0
>>> amplitude_0 = 100.0
>>> amplitude_1 = 2.0

>>> model.alpha_0 = alpha_0
>>> model.amplitude_0 = amplitude_0
>>> model.amplitude_1 = amplitude_1

>>> p = model(freq)
>>> power = noise * p

>>> ps = Powerspectrum()
>>> ps.freq = freq
>>> ps.power = power
>>> ps.m = m
>>> ps.df = freq[1] - freq[0]
>>> ps.norm = "leahy"


Now we have to guess starting parameters. For each Lorentzian, we have amplitude, centroid position and fwhm, and this pattern repeats for each Lorentzian in the fit. The white noise level is the last parameter. >>> t0 = [80, 1.5, 2.5]

Let’s also make a model to test: >>> model_to_test = models.PowerLaw1D() + models.Const1D() >>> model_to_test.amplitude_1.fixed = True

We’re ready for doing the fit: >>> parest, res = fit_powerspectrum(ps, model_to_test, t0)

res contains a whole array of useful information about the fit, for example the parameters at the optimum: >>> p_opt = res.p_opt

## Pulsar¶

This submodule broadly defines functionality related to (X-ray) pulsar data analysis, especially periodicity searches.

class stingray.pulse.SincSquareModel(amplitude=1.0, mean=0.0, width=1.0, **kwargs)[source]

Performs epoch folding at trial frequencies in photon data.

If no exposure correction is needed and numba is installed, it uses a fast algorithm to perform the folding. Otherwise, it runs a much slower algorithm, which however yields a more precise result. The search can be done in segments and the results averaged. Use segment_size to control this

Parameters
timesarray-like

the event arrival times

frequenciesarray-like

the trial values for the frequencies

Returns
(fgrid, stats) or (fgrid, fdgrid, stats), as follows:
fgridarray-like

frequency grid of the epoch folding periodogram

fdgridarray-like

frequency derivative grid. Only returned if fdots is an array.

statsarray-like

the epoch folding statistics corresponding to each frequency bin.

Other Parameters
nbinint

the number of bins of the folded profiles

segment_sizefloat

the length of the segments to be averaged in the periodogram

fdotsarray-like

trial values of the first frequency derivative (optional)

expocorrbool

correct for the exposure (Use it if the period is comparable to the length of the good time intervals). If True, GTIs have to be specified via the gti keyword

gti[[gti0_0, gti0_1], [gti1_0, gti1_1], …]

Good time intervals

weightsarray-like

weight for each time. This might be, for example, the number of counts if the times array contains the time bins of a light curve

stingray.pulse.fftfit(prof, template=None, quick=False, sigma=None, use_bootstrap=False, **fftfit_kwargs)[source]

Align a template to a pulse profile.

Parameters
profarray

The pulse profile

templatearray, default None

The template of the pulse used to perform the TOA calculation. If None, a simple sinusoid is used

Returns
mean_amp, std_ampfloats

Mean and standard deviation of the amplitude

mean_phase, std_phasefloats

Mean and standard deviation of the phase

Other Parameters
sigmaarray

error on profile bins (currently has no effect)

use_bootstrapbool

Calculate errors using a bootstrap method, with fftfit_error

**fftfit_kwargsadditional arguments for fftfit_error
stingray.pulse.fit_gaussian(x, y, amplitude=1.5, mean=0.0, stddev=2.0, tied={}, fixed={}, bounds={})[source]

Fit a gaussian function to x,y values.

Parameters
xarray-like
yarray-like
Returns
gfunction

The best-fit function, accepting x as input and returning the best-fit model as output

Other Parameters
amplitudefloat

The initial value for the amplitude

meanfloat

The initial value for the mean of the gaussian function

stddevfloat

The initial value for the standard deviation of the gaussian function

tieddict
fixeddict
boundsdict

Parameters to be passed to the [astropy models]_

stingray.pulse.fit_sinc(x, y, amp=1.5, mean=0.0, width=1.0, tied={}, fixed={}, bounds={}, obs_length=None)[source]

Fit a sinc function to x,y values.

Parameters
xarray-like
yarray-like
Returns
sincfitfunction

The best-fit function, accepting x as input and returning the best-fit model as output

Other Parameters
ampfloat

The initial value for the amplitude

meanfloat

The initial value for the mean of the sinc

obs_lengthfloat

The length of the observation. Default None. If it’s defined, it fixes width to 1/(pi*obs_length), as expected from epoch folding periodograms

widthfloat

The initial value for the width of the sinc. Only valid if obs_length is 0

tieddict
fixeddict
boundsdict

Parameters to be passed to the [astropy models]_

References

stingray.pulse.fold_events(times, *frequency_derivatives, **opts)[source]

Epoch folding with exposure correction.

Parameters
timesarray of floats
f, fdot, fddot…float

The frequency and any number of derivatives.

Returns
phase_binsarray of floats
The phases corresponding to the pulse profile
profilearray of floats
The pulse profile
profile_errarray of floats
The uncertainties on the pulse profile
Other Parameters
nbinint, optional, default 16

The number of bins in the pulse profile

weightsfloat or array of floats, optional

The weights of the data. It can either be specified as a single value for all points, or an array with the same length as time

gtis[[gti0_0, gti0_1], [gti1_0, gti1_1], …], optional

Good time intervals

ref_timefloat, optional, default 0

Reference time for the timing solution

expocorrbool, default False

Correct each bin for exposure (use when the period of the pulsar is comparable to that of GTIs)

stingray.pulse.get_TOA(prof, period, tstart, template=None, additional_phase=0, quick=False, debug=False, use_bootstrap=False, **fftfit_kwargs)[source]

Calculate the Time-Of-Arrival of a pulse.

Parameters
profarray

The pulse profile

templatearray, default None

The template of the pulse used to perform the TOA calculation, if any. Otherwise use the default of fftfit

tstartfloat

The time at the start of the pulse profile

Returns
toa, toastdfloats

Mean and standard deviation of the TOA

Other Parameters
nstepint, optional, default 100

Number of steps for the bootstrap method

stingray.pulse.get_orbital_correction_from_ephemeris_file(mjdstart, mjdstop, parfile, ntimes=1000, ephem='DE405', return_pint_model=False)[source]

Get a correction for orbital motion from pulsar parameter file.

Parameters
mjdstart, mjdstopfloat

Start and end of the time interval where we want the orbital solution

parfilestr

Any parameter file understood by PINT (Tempo or Tempo2 format)

Returns
correction_secfunction

Function that accepts in input an array of times in seconds and a floating-point MJDref value, and returns the deorbited times

correction_mjdfunction

Function that accepts times in MJDs and returns the deorbited times.

Other Parameters
ntimesint

Number of time intervals to use for interpolation. Default 1000

stingray.pulse.htest(data, nmax=20, datatype='binned', err=None)[source]

htest-test statistic, a la De Jager+89, A&A, 221, 180D, eq. 2.

If datatype is “binned” or “gauss”, uses the formulation from Bachetti+2021, ApJ, arxiv:2012.11397

Parameters
dataarray of floats

Phase values or binned flux values

nmaxint, default 20

Maximum of harmonics for Z^2_n

Returns
Mint

The best number of harmonics that describe the signal.

htestfloat

The htest statistics of the events.

Other Parameters
datatypestr

The datatype of data: “events” if phase values between 0 and 1, “binned” if folded pulse profile from photons, “gauss” if folded pulse profile with normally-distributed fluxes

errfloat

The uncertainty on the pulse profile fluxes (required for datatype=”gauss”, ignored otherwise)

stingray.pulse.phase_exposure(start_time, stop_time, period, nbin=16, gtis=None)[source]

Calculate the exposure on each phase of a pulse profile.

Parameters
start_time, stop_timefloat

Starting and stopping time (or phase if period==1)

periodfloat

The pulse period (if 1, equivalent to phases)

Returns
expoarray of floats

The normalized exposure of each bin in the pulse profile (1 is the highest exposure, 0 the lowest)

Other Parameters
nbinint, optional, default 16

The number of bins in the profile

gtis[[gti00, gti01], [gti10, gti11], …], optional, default None

Good Time Intervals

stingray.pulse.phaseogram(times, f, nph=128, nt=32, ph0=0, mjdref=None, fdot=0, fddot=0, pepoch=None, plot=False, phaseogram_ax=None, weights=None, **plot_kwargs)[source]

Calculate and plot the phaseogram of a pulsar observation.

The phaseogram is a 2-D histogram where the x axis is the pulse phase and the y axis is the time. It shows how the pulse phase changes with time, and it is very useful to see if the pulse solution is correct and/or if there are additional frequency derivatives appearing in the data (due to spin up or down, or even orbital motion)

Parameters
timesarray

Event arrival times

ffloat

Pulse frequency

Returns
phaseogr2-D matrix

The phaseogram

phasesarray-like

The x axis of the phaseogram (the x bins of the histogram), corresponding to the pulse phase in each column

timesarray-like

The y axis of the phaseogram (the y bins of the histogram), corresponding to the time at each row

Additional information, like the pulse profile and the axes to modify the plot (the latter, only if return_plot is True)

Other Parameters
nphint

Number of phase bins

ntint

Number of time bins

ph0float

The starting phase of the pulse

mjdreffloat

MJD reference time. If given, the y axis of the plot will be in MJDs, otherwise it will be in seconds.

fdotfloat

First frequency derivative

fddotfloat

Second frequency derivative

pepochfloat

If the input pulse solution is referred to a given time, give it here. It has no effect (just a phase shift of the pulse) if fdot is zero. if mjdref is specified, pepoch MUST be in MJD

weightsarray

Weight for each time

plotbool

Return the axes in the additional_info, and don’t close the plot, so that the user can add information to it.

stingray.pulse.plot_phaseogram(phaseogram, phase_bins, time_bins, unit_str='s', ax=None, **plot_kwargs)[source]

Plot a phaseogram.

Parameters
phaseogramNxM array

The phaseogram to be plotted

phase_binsarray of M + 1 elements

The bins on the x-axis

time_binsarray of N + 1 elements

The bins on the y-axis

Returns
axmatplotlib.pyplot.axis instance

Axis where the phaseogram was plotted.

Other Parameters
unit_strstr

String indicating the time unit (e.g. ‘s’, ‘MJD’, etc)

axmatplotlib.pyplot.axis instance

Axis to plot to. If None, create a new one.

plot_kwargsdict

Additional arguments to be passed to pcolormesh

stingray.pulse.plot_profile(phase, profile, err=None, ax=None)[source]

Plot a pulse profile showing some stats.

If err is None, the profile is assumed in counts and the Poisson confidence level is plotted. Otherwise, err is shown as error bars

Parameters
phasearray-like

The bins on the x-axis

profilearray-like

The pulsed profile

Returns
axmatplotlib.pyplot.axis instance

Axis where the profile was plotted.

Other Parameters
axmatplotlib.pyplot.axis instance

Axis to plot to. If None, create a new one.

stingray.pulse.profile_stat(profile, err=None)[source]

Calculate the epoch folding statistics ‘a la Leahy et al. (1983).

Parameters
profilearray

The pulse profile

Returns
statfloat

The epoch folding statistics

Other Parameters
errfloat or array

The uncertainties on the pulse profile

stingray.pulse.pulse_phase(times, *frequency_derivatives, **opts)[source]

Calculate pulse phase from the frequency and its derivatives.

Parameters
timesarray of floats

The times at which the phase is calculated

*frequency_derivatives: floats

List of derivatives in increasing order, starting from zero.

Returns
phasesarray of floats

The absolute pulse phase

Other Parameters
ph0float

The starting phase

to_1bool, default True

Only return the fractional part of the phase, normalized from 0 to 1

stingray.pulse.search_best_peaks(x, stat, threshold)[source]

Search peaks above threshold in an epoch folding periodogram.

If more values of stat are above threshold and are contiguous, only the largest one is returned (see Examples).

Parameters
xarray-like

The x axis of the periodogram (frequencies, periods, …)

statarray-like

The y axis. It must have the same shape as x

thresholdfloat

The threshold value over which we look for peaks in the stat array

Returns
best_xarray-like

the array containing the x position of the peaks above threshold. If no peaks are above threshold, an empty list is returned. The array is sorted by inverse value of stat

best_statarray-like

for each best_x, give the corresponding stat value. Empty if no peaks above threshold.

Examples

>>> # Test multiple peaks
>>> x = np.arange(10)
>>> stat = [0, 0, 0.5, 0, 0, 1, 1, 2, 1, 0]
>>> best_x, best_stat = search_best_peaks(x, stat, 0.5)
>>> len(best_x)
2
>>> best_x[0]
7.0
>>> best_x[1]
2.0
>>> stat = [0, 0, 2.5, 0, 0, 1, 1, 2, 1, 0]
>>> best_x, best_stat = search_best_peaks(x, stat, 0.5)
>>> best_x[0]
2.0
>>> # Test no peak above threshold
>>> x = np.arange(10)
>>> stat = [0, 0, 0.4, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0]
>>> best_x, best_stat = search_best_peaks(x, stat, 0.5)
>>> best_x
[]
>>> best_stat
[]

stingray.pulse.sinc_square_deriv(x, amplitude=1.0, mean=0.0, width=1.0)[source]

Calculate partial derivatives of sinc-squared.

Parameters
x: array-like
Other Parameters
———-
amplitudefloat

the value for x=mean

meanfloat

mean of the sinc function

widthfloat

width of the sinc function

Returns
d_amplitudearray-like

partial derivative of sinc-squared function with respect to the amplitude

d_meanarray-like

partial derivative of sinc-squared function with respect to the mean

d_widtharray-like

partial derivative of sinc-squared function with respect to the width

Examples

>>> np.allclose(sinc_square_deriv(0, amplitude=2.), [1., 0., 0.])
True

stingray.pulse.sinc_square_model(x, amplitude=1.0, mean=0.0, width=1.0)[source]

Calculate a sinc-squared function.

(sin(x)/x)**2

Parameters
x: array-like
Other Parameters
———-
amplitudefloat

the value for x=mean

meanfloat

mean of the sinc function

widthfloat

width of the sinc function

Returns
sqvaluesarray-like

Return square of sinc function

Examples

>>> sinc_square_model(0, amplitude=2.)
2.0

stingray.pulse.test(**kwargs)

Run the tests for the package.

This method builds arguments for and then calls pytest.main.

Parameters
packagestr, optional

The name of a specific package to test, e.g. ‘io.fits’ or ‘utils’. Accepts comma separated string to specify multiple packages. If nothing is specified all default tests are run.

argsstr, optional

Additional arguments to be passed to pytest.main in the args keyword argument.

docs_pathstr, optional

The path to the documentation .rst files.

open_filesbool, optional

Fail when any tests leave files open. Off by default, because this adds extra run time to the test suite. Requires the psutil package.

parallelint or ‘auto’, optional

When provided, run the tests in parallel on the specified number of CPUs. If parallel is 'auto', it will use the all the cores on the machine. Requires the pytest-xdist plugin.

pastebin(‘failed’, ‘all’, None), optional

Convenience option for turning on pytest pastebin output. Set to ‘failed’ to upload info for failed tests, or ‘all’ to upload info for all tests.

pdbbool, optional

Turn on PDB post-mortem analysis for failing tests. Same as specifying --pdb in args.

pep8bool, optional

Turn on PEP8 checking via the pytest-pep8 plugin and disable normal tests. Same as specifying --pep8 -k pep8 in args.

pluginslist, optional

Plugins to be passed to pytest.main in the plugins keyword argument.

remote_data{‘none’, ‘astropy’, ‘any’}, optional

Controls whether to run tests marked with @pytest.mark.remote_data. This can be set to run no tests with remote data (none), only ones that use data from http://data.astropy.org (astropy), or all tests that use remote data (any). The default is none.

repeatint, optional

If set, specifies how many times each test should be run. This is useful for diagnosing sporadic failures.

skip_docsbool, optional

When True, skips running the doctests in the .rst files.

test_pathstr, optional

Specify location to test by path. May be a single file or directory. Must be specified absolutely or relative to the calling directory.

verbosebool, optional

Convenience option to turn on verbose output from pytest. Passing True is the same as specifying -v in args.

stingray.pulse.z_n(data, n, datatype='events', err=None, norm=None)[source]

Z^2_n statistics, a la Buccheri+83, A&A, 128, 245, eq. 2.

If datatype is “binned” or “gauss”, uses the formulation from Bachetti+2021, ApJ, arxiv:2012.11397

Parameters
dataarray of floats

Phase values or binned flux values

nint, default 2

Number of harmonics, including the fundamental

Returns
z2_nfloat

The Z^2_n statistics of the events.

Other Parameters
datatypestr

The data type: “events” if phase values between 0 and 1, “binned” if folded pulse profile from photons, “gauss” if folded pulse profile with normally-distributed fluxes

errfloat

The uncertainty on the pulse profile fluxes (required for datatype=”gauss”, ignored otherwise)

normfloat

For backwards compatibility; if norm is not None, it is substituted to data, and data is ignored. This raises a DeprecationWarning

stingray.pulse.z_n_binned_events(profile, n)[source]

Z^2_n statistic for pulse profiles from binned events

See Bachetti+2021, arXiv:2012.11397

Parameters
profilearray of floats

The folded pulse profile (containing the number of photons falling in each pulse bin)

nint

Number of harmonics, including the fundamental

Returns
z2_nfloat

The value of the statistic

stingray.pulse.z_n_binned_events_all(profile, nmax=20)[source]

Z^2_n statistic for multiple harmonics and binned events

See Bachetti+2021, arXiv:2012.11397

Parameters
profilearray of floats

The folded pulse profile (containing the number of photons falling in each pulse bin)

nint

Number of harmonics, including the fundamental

Returns
kslist of ints

Harmonic numbers, from 1 to nmax (included)

z2_nfloat

The value of the statistic for all ks

stingray.pulse.z_n_events(phase, n)[source]

Z^2_n statistics, a la Buccheri+83, A&A, 128, 245, eq. 2.

Parameters
phasearray of floats

The phases of the events

nint, default 2

Number of harmonics, including the fundamental

Returns
z2_nfloat

The Z^2_n statistic

stingray.pulse.z_n_gauss(profile, err, n)[source]

Z^2_n statistic for normally-distributed profiles

See Bachetti+2021, arXiv:2012.11397

Parameters
profilearray of floats

The folded pulse profile

errfloat

The (assumed constant) uncertainty on the flux in each bin.

nint

Number of harmonics, including the fundamental

Returns
z2_nfloat

The value of the statistic

stingray.pulse.z_n_gauss_all(profile, err, nmax=20)[source]

Z^2_n statistic for n harmonics and normally-distributed profiles

See Bachetti+2021, arXiv:2012.11397

Parameters
profilearray of floats

The folded pulse profile

errfloat

The (assumed constant) uncertainty on the flux in each bin.

nmaxint

Maximum number of harmonics, including the fundamental

Returns
kslist of ints

Harmonic numbers, from 1 to nmax (included)

z2_nlist of floats

The value of the statistic for all ks

Calculates the Z^2_n statistics at trial frequencies in photon data.

The “real” Z^2_n statistics is very slow. Therefore, in this function data are folded first, and then the statistics is calculated using the value of the profile as an additional normalization term. The two methods are mostly equivalent. However, the number of bins has to be chosen wisely: if the number of bins is too small, the search for high harmonics is ineffective. If no exposure correction is needed and numba is installed, it uses a fast algorithm to perform the folding. Otherwise, it runs a much slower algorithm, which however yields a more precise result. The search can be done in segments and the results averaged. Use segment_size to control this

Parameters
timesarray-like

the event arrival times

frequenciesarray-like

the trial values for the frequencies

Returns
(fgrid, stats) or (fgrid, fdgrid, stats), as follows:
fgridarray-like

frequency grid of the epoch folding periodogram

fdgridarray-like

frequency derivative grid. Only returned if fdots is an array.

statsarray-like

the Z^2_n statistics corresponding to each frequency bin.

Other Parameters
nbinint

the number of bins of the folded profiles

segment_sizefloat

the length of the segments to be averaged in the periodogram

fdotsarray-like

trial values of the first frequency derivative (optional)

expocorrbool

correct for the exposure (Use it if the period is comparable to the length of the good time intervals.)

gti[[gti0_0, gti0_1], [gti1_0, gti1_1], …]

Good time intervals

weightsarray-like

weight for each time. This might be, for example, the number of counts if the times array contains the time bins of a light curve

## Simulator¶

This submodule defines extensive functionality related to simulating spectral-timing data sets, including transfer and window functions, simulating light curves from power spectra for a range of stochastic processes.

class stingray.simulator.simulator.Simulator(dt, N, mean, rms, red_noise=1, random_state=None, tstart=0.0)[source]

Methods to simulate and visualize light curves.

TODO: Improve documentation

Parameters
dtint, default 1

time resolution of simulated light curve

Nint, default 1024

bins count of simulated light curve

meanfloat, default 0

mean value of the simulated light curve

rmsfloat, default 1

fractional rms of the simulated light curve, actual rms is calculated by mean*rms

red_noiseint, default 1

multiple of real length of light curve, by which to simulate, to avoid red noise leakage

random_stateint, default None

seed value for random processes

count_channels()[source]

delete_channel(channel)[source]

Delete an energy channel.

delete_channels(channels)[source]

Delete multiple energy channels.

get_all_channels()[source]

Get lightcurves belonging to all channels.

get_channel(channel)[source]

Get lightcurve belonging to the energy channel.

get_channels(channels)[source]

Get multiple light curves belonging to the energy channels.

powerspectrum(lc, seg_size=None)[source]

Make a powerspectrum of the simulated light curve.

Parameters
lclightcurve.Lightcurve object OR

iterable of lightcurve.Lightcurve objects The light curve data to be Fourier-transformed.

Returns
powernumpy.ndarray

The array of normalized squared absolute values of Fourier amplitudes

Imports Simulator object.

Parameters
filenamestr

Name of the Simulator object to be read.

format_str

Available option is ‘pickle.’

Returns
objectSimulator object
relativistic_ir(t1=3, t2=4, t3=10, p1=1, p2=1.4, rise=0.6, decay=0.1)[source]

Construct a realistic impulse response considering the relativistic effects.

Parameters
t1int

primary peak time

t2int

secondary peak time

t3int

end time

p1float

value of primary peak

p2float

value of secondary peak

risefloat

slope of rising exponential from primary peak to secondary peak

decayfloat

slope of decaying exponential from secondary peak to end time

Returns
hnumpy.ndarray

Constructed impulse response

simple_ir(start=0, width=1000, intensity=1)[source]

Construct a simple impulse response using start time, width and scaling intensity. To create a delta impulse response, set width to 1.

Parameters
startint

start time of impulse response

widthint

width of impulse response

intensityfloat

scaling parameter to set the intensity of delayed emission corresponding to direct emission.

Returns
hnumpy.ndarray

Constructed impulse response

simulate(*args)[source]

Simulate light curve generation using power spectrum or impulse response.

Parameters
args

See examples below.

Returns
lightCurveLightCurve object

Examples

• x = simulate(beta):

For generating a light curve using power law spectrum.

Parameters:
• beta : float Defines the shape of spectrum

• x = simulate(s):
For generating a light curve from user-provided spectrum.

Note: In this case, the red_noise parameter is provided. You can generate a longer light curve by providing a higher frequency resolution on the input power spectrum.

Parameters:
• s : array-like power spectrum

• x = simulate(model):

For generating a light curve from pre-defined model

Parameters:
• model : astropy.modeling.Model the pre-defined model

• x = simulate(‘model’, params):

For generating a light curve from pre-defined model

Parameters:
• model : string the pre-defined model

• params : list iterable or dict the parameters for the pre-defined model

• x = simulate(s, h):

For generating a light curve using impulse response.

Parameters:
• s : array-like Underlying variability signal

• h : array-like Impulse response

• x = simulate(s, h, ‘same’):

For generating a light curve of same length as input signal, using impulse response.

Parameters:
• s : array-like Underlying variability signal

• h : array-like Impulse response

• mode : str mode can be ‘same’, ‘filtered, or ‘full’. ‘same’ indicates that the length of output light curve is same as that of input signal. ‘filtered’ means that length of output light curve is len(s) - lag_delay ‘full’ indicates that the length of output light curve is len(s) + len(h) -1

simulate_channel(channel, *args)[source]

Simulate a lightcurve and add it to corresponding energy channel.

Parameters
channelstr

range of energy channel (e.g., 3.5-4.5)

*args

see description of simulate() for details

Returns
lightCurveLightCurve object
write(filename, format_='pickle')[source]

Exports Simulator object.

Parameters
filenamestr

Name of the Simulator object to be created.

format_str

Available options are ‘pickle’ and ‘hdf5’.

## Exceptions¶

Some basic Stingray-related errors and exceptions.

class stingray.exceptions.StingrayError[source]