BIWEEKLY CALENDAR OF THE ALMA PROJECT at NRAO May 23 2005 -- June 6, 2005 ******************************** THIS FORTNIGHT********************************* AUI has proposed a draft of ALMA antenna contract package to the National Science Foundation. The AUI recommendation is currently under consideration at NSF, with a decision expected by erly June. AUI has proposed the same choice of antenna contractor as that proposed by ESO to its Finance Committee. The ESO Finance Committee (FC) met on 10 & 11 May in Garching. The largest agenda item was the ALMA antenna contract. The FC asks to have all of the information concerning ALMA affordability before approving the antenna negotiations. That is, the FC requests that ESO Council be satisfied about the finances, that is the total cost of the ALMA project. This should occur at the next ESO Council meeting on June 6/7. If Council approves of the ALMA budget plan, then ESO Council will communicate this to FC, and FC in turn will allow the antenna procurement to go ahead at an extraordinary meeting to be held 20 June. The FC has approved the choice of antenna contractor proposed by ESO. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Hans Rykaczewski has accepted the ESO offer as ALMA European Project Manager and ALMA Division Head and will start on 1st July. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Mrs. Maria van der Hoeven, the Dutch Minister of Education, Culture and Science, arrived at the the Operation Support Facility of the future ALMA Observatory on Saturday May 14, 2005. On Sunday, May 15, the delegation went to the 5000m Llano de Chajnantor, the future site of the large array of ALMA 12m antennas that is being built there to be completed by 2013. The Minister visited the 12m APEX (Atacama Pathfinder Experiment; very similar to the Vertex prototype) telescope and see the technical infrastructure. "I am fully confident that the worldwide cooperation in ALMA will be equally successful as the VLT, and I am convinced that the discoveries to be made here are meaningful for the Earth we live in", said Mrs. van der Hoeven. "History and future are coming together in the north of Chile, in a very special way," she added. "In the region of the ancient Atacamenos, scientists from all over the world are discovering more and more about the universe and the birth and death of stars. They even find new planets. They do that on Paranal with the VLT and soon will be doing that on the ALMA site." ---------------------------------------------------------------------- The Water Vapor Radiometer PDR took place 2005 May 4-5 at Onsala. A report is being readied by the review committee, chaired by Robert Laing. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Past issues of this Calendar may be viewed at http://www.cv.nrao.edu/~awootten/mmaimcal/ALMACalendars.html See also the ALMA Calendar overview at: https://wikio.nrao.edu/bin/view/ALMA/AlmaCalendar ******************************************************************************* General Happenings Santiago: OSF: The extension of the ALMA Camp to 30 beds is underway, to be completed by 3 June. There are 35 persons currently working on the site. AOS: Budget estimates from contractors for ALMA antenna foundation designs are being analyzed. Tucson: Construction of one of two prototype line length correctors for the Prototype System Integration (PSI) complete. AOC: Takahiro Hayakawa has joined the computing team, from ALMA-Japan. NTC: Sidelobes measured from the B6 (1.3mm) cartridge may require study in Grenoble. The first prototype tunable filter bank card has been shipped. All slots, all bins of the first quadrant correlator have had a final functional verification. NAASC: A plan for the ALMA Town meeting proposed for the Washington AAS meeting in January 2006 was submitted to the AAS council. A continuously running powerpoint presentation for the Minneapolis ALMA display was prepared and submitted. ******************************************************************************* DAILY CALENDAR (Times EDT ) see https://wikio.nrao.edu/bin/view/ALMA/AlmaCalendar Mon 23 May 9:30 AM-10:30 AM: North American Project Office Meeting 10:30 AM-11:30 AM: JAO IPT Telecon 12:00 pm- 1:00 PM: North American ALMA Caucus Telecon Tue 24 4:00 PM-5:00PM: NAScienceIPT teleconference (open to all interested parties) (434)296-7082 Agenda: https://wikio.nrao.edu/bin/view/ALMA/10May05A Archive: http://www.cv.nrao.edu/~awootten/mmaimcal/ Wed 26 10:30AM-11:30AM: Nutator discussion 11:30AM-12:30PM: Change Control Board telecon Thu 27 Fri 28 Sat 29 Sun 30 Mon 31 Memorial Day Holiday (US) Tue June 1 4:00 PM-5:00PM: NAScienceIPT teleconference (open to all interested parties) (434)296-7082 Agenda: https://wikio.nrao.edu/bin/view/ALMA/10May05A Archive: http://www.cv.nrao.edu/~awootten/mmaimcal/ Wed 2 Thu 3 9:30 AM-11:00 AM: Management IPT Teleconference Fri 4 Sat 5 Sun 6 ****************************** UPCOMING EVENTS ****************************** ALMA Calendar--see also https://wiki.nrao.edu/bin/view/ALMA/NAASC * May 26 -- 1500UT ALMA Board telecon * May 29-Jun 2 -- AAS Minneapolis * May 30-31 ACA Correlator PDR, Tokyo * June 5-6 -- ESO Council * June 12 -- 1-5pm ANASAC Face-to-Face CfA, Cambridge * JUN 13 - 16 Workshop on submillimeter wavelength astronomy in Cambridge. Registration deadline is APR 30. For more information, log onto the event website: http://cfa-www.harvard.edu/smast05. * June 20 -- Extraordinary Meeting, ESO Finance Committee * June 21-22 -- ALMA Board Meeting, The Hague, Netherlands * June 21-24 Bands 4 & 8 PDRs, Tokyo * Jul 3-4 -- Deep Impact probe impact of comet Temple 1. * 6-7 Jul - Front End IPT delta PDR, Garching * 6 Oct -- Rolling Stones come to Scott Stadium, Charlottesville ******************************* TECHNICAL NEWS ******************************* *ALMA Memo # 520: A Refined Method for Estimating Calibrator Counts Above 90~GHz Authors: M.A. Holdaway and Frazer Owen Abstract: We reanalyze the 90~GHz detections of Holdaway, Owen, and Rupen (1994)) and present a physically plausible model which can be more sensibly extrapolated to higher frequencies. This model predicts fewer calibrator sources at frequencies above 90~GHz than the simple model of Holdaway and D'Addario (2004). Fast switching efficiency will be minimally impacted, though these new source count estimates will often make calibrator observations at 90~GHz more attractive than calibrating at the target freqency. View a pdf version of ALMA Memo #520: http://www.alma.nrao.edu/memos/html-memos/alma520/memo520.pdf ******************************ALSO OF INTEREST******************************* SMA reports: 3C454.3 continues to brighten. It is now a wopping 25 Jy at 342 GHz ___________________________________________________________ CSO CALL FOR PROPOSALS Deadline: 31 May 2005 The Caltech Submillimeter Observatory (CSO) encourages observing participation by astronomers from both U.S. and non-U.S. institutions. For instructions on applying and for information about available instruments, including new bolometer cameras, see http://www.submm.caltech.edu/cso/cso-call.html. Applications for observing time between 1 September 2005 through 31 January 2006 are due by mail 31 May 2005. Applications will be reviewed by an outside peer group. ****************************************************************************** Please send information for upcoming calendars by Friday evening of the preceding biweekly period to Jennifer Neighbours or Al Wootten via e-mail (jneighbo@nrao.edu or awootten@nrao.edu). The calendar will be issued between late Friday and sometime on Monday by e-mail to all NRAO scientific staff members and anyone else interested. A specific mailing list, alma-info, has been created for anyone wishing to receive it. Past issues are available at http://www.cv.nrao.edu/~awootten/mmaimcal/ALMACalendars.html