TESSCut lists Sector 82 for 79 catalog host positions more than five pixels outside the science image at three checked exposures

We tested whether a TESSCut sector listing and QUALITY = 0 establish science image coverage for a planet search. We used 4,847 host positions from a frozen NASA Exoplanet Archive table. We projected these fixed positions through all 16 detector coordinate models in one TESS Sector 82 exposure. Of 1,799 positions inside a raw detector image, 101 were outside the science pixels. TESSCut listed Sector 82, camera, and CCD for 97 of these positions. Of these 97, 79 were more than five pixels beyond a science boundary. All 97 remained outside at two extra exposure checks. All 79 remained more than five pixels outside. Eight downloaded cutouts tested zero, partial, and full science coverage. Five had no science pixels. The KELT-16 cutout had 81 virtual pixels and 10,872 of 10,898 cadences with QUALITY = 0. All 232 pixel values checked across the eight cutouts exactly matched their source images. A sector listing and a zero quality value thus do not establish science pixel coverage. The detector layout is established prior work. This contribution gives a measured host audit, source checks, and a tool that reports the science fraction of a cutout. The result assumes the supplied catalog coordinates and detector models. It covers three checked exposures, not every exposure in the sector. The package preserves the exact input files and byte ranges, lookup replies, hashes, source code, tables, figures, and offline reproduction steps.

TESS · TESSCut · detector geometry · science pixels · exoplanet data · archive coverage · reproducible audit