The First Data Release of the Catalina Surveys

The Catalina Surveys consists of the Catalina Sky Survey (CSS) and the Catalina Real-time Transient Survey (CRTS). These two surveys work synergistically to extract the maximum scientific return from the data gathered by Catalina telescopes. In order to further facility the wealth of time-domain science that is possible with this data, the Catalina Surveys are now releasing Catalina Schmidt telescope photometry for 200 million objects. Each source has been measured over a period of six years and comes from a 24,000 square degree region between declination -30 and +70 degrees (with 10 degree avoidance of the galactic plane). On average each location in the data release has been observed more than 200 times to a depth of V=19.5. We will provide the details of the open-access data services as well as future data releases and recent discoveries....