BIWEEKLY CALENDAR OF THE ALMA PROJECT at NRAO August 30 - September 13, 2004 ******************************** THIS BIWEEK *********************************** SUBTEL, the Chilean government telecommunications entity has issued a Resolution on 12 August that concludes the process of establishing a Radio Quiet Zone around ALMA, the second such zone in the world after the Green Bank RQZ. The Resolution protects ALMA by establishing stringent limits to emissions within ALMA's observing and intermediate frequency bands currently attributed to Radio Astronomy. The Resolution creates a zone of coordination 120 km in radius of which the first 30 km are of exclusion. --------------------------------------------------------------------------- Past issues of this Calendar may be viewed at http://www.cv.nrao.edu/~awootten/mmaimcal/ALMACalendars.html ******************************************************************************* General Happenings Chile: An ALMA RQZ was established; see above. At the OSF, the ALMA Camp is completed pending installation of some kitchen equipment. TUC: Photonics LO system tests continue. An LO Review will be held 8 September with video participation of sites in CV, ESO and elsewhere. The objective is to review of the state of the 1st Local Oscillator design maturity, as well as work plans and work organization as this effort is picked up by BE and FE IPTs. NAASC: Presentations were made to the current CV staff on the structure of the NAASC. A TWiki page for the NAASC may be found at: https://wiki.nrao.edu/bin/view/ALMA/NAASC NTC: Both mixer-preamps for the Band 6 (1.3mm) first production cartridge that essentially meet ALMA specs. A beam measurement system has been built. First integrated testing for the first quadrant, production correlator was done 17 August. AOC: A retrofitted digitizer assembly was shipped back to the AOC from Bordeaux. The Computing IPT received the report from the CDR2 panel. R. Hills and A. Stirling (Cambridge) visited to prepare for WVR installation and tests at the ATF. DAILY CALENDAR (Times EDT ) Mon 30 Aug 9:30 AM-10:30 AM: NA Project Office Staff Meeting 10:30 AM-12:00 PM: JAO/IPT Teleconference Tue 31 Aug 12:15 PM: CV Tuna (http://www.cv.nrao.edu/tuna/): Paul Vanden Bout, NRAO "The North America ALMA Science Center" 4:00 PM-5:00 PM: NAScienceIPT teleconference (open to all interested parties) (434)296-7082 Agenda: http://www.cv.nrao.edu/~awootten/mmaimcal/ Wed 01 Sept Thu 02 8:30 AM-10:00 AM: JAO Teleconference Fri 03 1:00 PM: AOC Colloquium Ylva Pihlstrom, NRAO: Probing the Nuclei of Merging Galaxies with OH Megamasers Sat 04 Sun 05 Mon 06 All day event: NRAO Holiday 9:30 AM-10:30 AM: NA Project Office Staff Meeting Tue 07 1:00 PM-2:30 PM: NA DH Teleconference 4:00 PM-5:00 PM: NAScienceIPT teleconference (open to all interested parties) (434)296-7082 Agenda: http://www.cv.nrao.edu/~awootten/mmaimcal/ Wed 08 11:00 AM-12:00 PM: Software Science Req. Group Teleconference Thu 09 8:30 AM-10:00 AM: JAO Teleconference 10:30 AM: ASAC Teleconference Fri 10 3:00 PM: ANASAC Teleconference Sat 11 Sun 12 ****************************** UPCOMING EVENTS ****************************** ALMA Calendar * 10 September -- ANASAC Telecon * 23 September -- ALMA Board Telecon * 24 September -- ALMA/EU Meeting, Garching * 27-28 September -- ASAC face-to-face meeting, Charlottesville * 29 Sept - 1 October -- face-to-face IPT Leads Meeting, Charlottesville * 4-8 October -- The Cool Universe: Observing Cosmic Beginnings Universidad Tecnica Federico Santa Maria, Valparaiso, Chile * 11-12 Oct -- AMAC Meeting, Florence, Italy * 11-13 Oct -- New Windows on Star Formation in the Cosmos University of Maryland, College Park, Maryland * 27-29 Oct -- Dusty and Molecular Universe Paris * 29 Oct -- ANASAC Telecon * 2-3 Nov -- ALMA Board Face-to-face Meeting, OSF, near San Pedro de Atacama * 2 December -- ALMA Board Telecon * 5-7 Jan 2005 -- UNSC URSI Boulder meeting Commission J * 6 Jan 2005 -- ANASAC Telecon * 11 Jan 2005 - ALMA Town Meeting, AAS San Diego * 27 Jan 2005 -- ALMA Board Telecon ******************************* TECHNICAL NEWS ******************************* ALMA Memo # 504 The CloudSat Radar and Implications for ALMA ALMA North American Technical Advisory Committee (ANATAC) submitted by Darrel Emerson (NRAO) 2004-08-23 CloudSat is a downward-looking 94 GHz satellite-borne radar, due for launch in April 2005. The peak EIRP of the radar beam is some 4.109 watts, which is sufficient to damage ALMA receivers on the ground if ALMA antennas and the orbiting radar ever look directly at each other. Although the likelihood of this happening is very small, ALMA does need to take some operational precautions to avoid receiver damage, and to flag data that will be contaminated by radar interference. View a pdf version of ALMA Memo #504 at: http://www.alma.nrao.edu/memos/html-memos/alma504/memo504.pdf *******************************ALSO OF INTEREST******************************* ******************************************************************************* Please send information for upcoming calendars by Friday evening of the preceding biweekly period to Janet Bauer or Al Wootten via e-mail (jbauer@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 now available at http://www.cv.nrao.edu/~awootten/mmaimcal/ALMACalendars.html