| great circle coordinates | One of the two main coordinate systems
utilized by the SDSS. In this system, mu and nu are spherical coordinates (corresponding to ra and dec) in a system whose equator is along the center of the stripe in question. The stripes of the survey are great circles which all cross at (RA, Dec) = (95, 0). The stripes are defined by their inclination with respect to the equator, and are indexed by integers n such that the inclination of a stripe is -25 + 2.5n. Thus, stripe n=10 corresponds to the Equator. Astrotools provides utilities to convert to and from these, such as GSCToSurvey. The design is that the area covered by the imaging on a given stripe (the so-called OK_SCANLINE area in the north) is a 2.5 degree wide rectangle centered on nu=0 in Great Circle coordinates.
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