| Adaptive MomentsAdaptive moments are the second moments of the object intensity, measured using
a particular scheme designed to have near-optimal signal-to-noise ratio.
Moments are measured using a radial weight function interactively adapted to the
shape (ellipticity) and size of the object.  This ellipticial weight function
has a signal-to-noise advantage over axially symmetric weight functions.  In
principle there is an optimal (in terms of signal-to-noise) radial shape for
the weight function, which is related to the light profile of the object
itself.  In practice a gaussian with size matched to that of the object is
used, and is nearly optimal. Details can be found in Bernstein & Jarvis (2002).
 
The outputs included in the SDSS data release are the following:
 
The sum of the second moments in the CCD row and column direction:
 mrr_cc = <col2> + <row2>and its error
 mrr_cc_err.The second moments are defined in the following way:
 
  <col2>= sum[I(col,row) w(col,row) col2]/sum[I*w]where
 Iis the intensity of the object andwis the weight function.The ellipticity (polarization) components:
 me1 = <col2> - <row2>)/mrr_ccme2 = 2.*<col*row>/mrr_cc
and square root of the components of the covariance matrix:
 
 
me1e1err = sqrt( Var(e1) )me1e2err = sign(Covar(e1,e2))*sqrt( abs( Covar(e1,e2) ) )
 me2e2err = sqrt( Var(e2) )
A fourth-order moment
 mcr4 = <r4>/sigma4where
r2 = col2 + row2, and sigma is the size of the gaussian weight. No error is quoted on this quantity.These quantities are also measured for the PSF, reconstructed at the position
   of the object.  The names are the same with an appended _psf.  No errors are
   quoted for PSF quantities.  These PSF moments can be used to correct the
   object shapes for smearing due to seeing and PSF anisotropy. See Bernstein &
   Jarvis (2002) and Hirata & Seljak (2003) for details. Last modified: Wed Feb 12 13:14:39 CST 2003
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