MMA Imaging and Calibration Group

Agenda/Minutes for meeting Tuesday, 5 Nov 2002 at 4:00pm EDT.

Date: 5 Nov 2002

Time: 4:00 pm EDT (2:00 pm Socorro, 2:00 pm Tucson)

Phone: (434)296-7082 (CV SoundStation Premier Conference phone 3rd floor).

Past minutes, etc on MMA Imaging and Calibration Division Page
 


 The Science IPT Organization Chart (Image courtesy E. van Dishoeck)
 

Agenda


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Science IPT News - Wootten

News from my point of view.
 Draft Level 3 Milestones were enhanced and revised during the face to face meeting 21 October in Tucson.
 
 The VertexRSI antennais up! Photogrammetry is scheduled.
 
  • Project News -
      ACC Meeting Santiago was held. Cox reports that "I made an usually long presentation of the ASAC report upon request from Catherine Cesarsky and there were lots of discussions. I think that I made my points and that they came through. I think that the ASAC report was well received by the ACC and certainly stimulated a healthy discussion. Presentation and discussion took about one hour in total. " Next ASAC meeting 5 November, report to be circulated after some small changes. The next ALMA Board meeting will be hold in May 26/27 with another meeting planned in November 3/4.
     New Systems guy located at Ivy Road
     Next ACC or ALMA Board meetings May 26/27 2003 (Europe) with another meeting planned November 3/4 2003.
      ESO Workshop: Science Operations with ALMA, ESO, Garching 8 Nov 2002
     ALMA Frontend/LO Reviews 18-22 November Charlottesville.
     Carla Beaudet and Galen Watts of NRAO/GB conduct RFI tests at Chajnantor 3 - 20 December 2002
    &
      European ALMA workshop in Leiden 18-20 December
     May 26/27 ALMA Board face-to-face (Europe)
     November 3/4 ALMA Board face-to-face (N.A.?)
     
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    Calibration - All


      Front End Issues for FrontEnd Review in Charlottesville (from Charles):
     FE stability for the total power antennas?
     FE stability for the rest?
     How many TP antennas are there and who builds them?
     What's the FE stability spec and what's the goal?
     How do we divide up the stability budget antenna/FE/BE etc
      I guess polarization and calibration are other areas of doubt and uncertainty?
     


     --------
     The Total Power Stability specification arose from the March 2000 ASAC Report, with details in Appendix D of that Report which is also available as a postscript standalone document. Also relevant is ALMA Memo 289.1 (rev) by Mel Wright.
     You may recall the report of the FE PDR:
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     ALMA Front End -
     Preliminary Design Review
     
     Held at NRAO Tucson, 19 and 20 February 2001
     Recommendations of the Review Committee
     Following ALMA review guidelines, the review panel was asked to answer five questions and give additional comments and recommendations. The following recommendations are listed in the order in which the questions were asked. At the end, specific comments (which were received after the review) by individual reviewers are included.
     1. Are the top level requirements for the front end subsystem complete and adequate ? The science requirements have not been translated sufficiently into front end engineering specs. The review panel notes that the top level requirements do not reflect specifications that can realistically be achieved within the tight schedule to first light. In particular, the panel is extremely concerned about the stringent requirement of total power stability of 1 part in 10 4 in 1 sec and urges the front end and science groups to study the implications on complexity, cost, and reliability as well as the science implications if this stability cannot be reached. The panel identified missing top level requirements on availability, reliability and maintainability as well as an operational concept for the receivers. They need to be available in time for the delta-PDR.
     [remaining items excised].
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     One result of this was the ALMA Front End Specifications of 4 May 2001.
     You may also recall the report of the Calibration Strategy PDR:
     ----------------------------------------------
     Report of Calibration Strategy Review Committee
      on
     ALMA Calibration Strategy Preliminary Design Review
     Cambridge, England, 21-22 June 2001
     
     [material excised]
      In particular, the receiver group should supply a reaction to Memo No. 372. How stable will the receivers be and how often will these various calibration steps need to be performed? What level of saturation will be encountered? How stable will sideband gain ratios be in a tunerless receiver? Although this is critical for development of a working system, prototype receivers probably need to be built to push the calibration system toward final design. We suggest that when the third prototype antenna arrives at the VLA site, the evaluation receiver from one of the earlier antennas be transferred to it and the prototype receiver from which they were taken be outfitted with prototype receivers and calibration system. This is an urgent necessity.
     [material excised]
     ----------------------------------------------
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      Telecon minutes from last week.
      List of the status of the reviews/reviewers. The key is: "C" - already submitted a review; "U" = submitted an unsolicited review; "Y" = agreed to review the memo; "N" - declined to review the memo; "NR" - no response. Links are provided to reviews; please consult the archive for subsequent discussions.
      1 - Memo 423 - Steve Myers (Y), Matt Carter (N), Geoff Blake (Y)
      2 - Memo 422 - Douglas Bock (Y), Lee Mundy (NR), Jeff Mangum (C), Dave Woody (U) (Memo withdrawn)
      3 - Memo 427 - Robert Lucas (C), Ed Fomalont (NR), Craig Walker (C)
      4 - Memo 372 - Jeff Mangum (C), Larry D'Addario (C), Mark Gurwell (N), Bryan Butler (U)
      5 - Memo 415 - Jose Cernicharo (NR), Mark Holdaway (C), John Richer (Y)
      6 - Memo 404 & 403 - Mel Wright (N), Dave Woody (Y&C), John Richer (Y)
      8 - Memo 402 - Richard Hills (Y), Peter Napier (NR)
      9 - Memo 352 - Dave Woody (C), Chris Wilson (C), Dick Plambeck (N)
      10 - Memo 434 - Stephane Guilloteau (C)
      so, as yet no response from:
      Lee Mundy - 422
      Ed Fomalont - 427
      Jose Cernicharo - 415
      Peter Napier - 402
     
      and awaiting agreed upon reviews from:
      Steve Myers - 423
      Geoff Blake - 423
      Douglas Bock - 422
      John Richer - 415, 404, 403
      Richard Hills - 402
     
     
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    AIPS++ -

     
    Tim Cornwell will assume interim responsibility for leading the ALMA pipeline and offline efforts (for which Chris Wilson is the SSR subsystem scientist).
     
     
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    Configuration - Holdaway

     
     According to my calendar, the first iteration of Y+ positions is available today.
     The JAO approved the configuration plan. The JAO document was entered into sitescape, though there are several problems which Jaap noted:
  • The document mentions 214 pads but gives positions for 172 and states 170 in the beginning.
  • The table has 36 occupancy columns, while the heading reads 35 configurations. Column one is repeated.
     
     
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    Meetings Past and Future - Wootten


     The ASAC held a telecon on 9 October. Its report was submitted to the ACC. It will become public after presentation to the ACC. Next meeting to be held on 6 November.
     The Site Infrastructure Review was held last week in Tucson. Al's notes are available.
     The Transporter Review was also held in Tucson. An image is available.
     No meeting next week owing to GBT Review. Scientific Staff Meeting supersedes us on 26 November.
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    Other


     A NA monthly report for October is due to the Science IPT. A monthly report for the October monthly report will be submitted to the JAO by the Science IPT. Please send materials to HAW for NA.
      A bimonthly report for Aug-Sept was submitted by the NA Science IPT to the Project Management for inclusion in its report to NSF. The next one will be for Oct-Nov. (Whew!).
      In four weeks, another report will be due the Science IPT and the JAO.
     
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     SMA News...
     MON, OCT 28 15:00(HST) Ground Breaking Ceremony for Hilo Facility
     The Ground breaking ceremony for the Hilo facility went off smoothly on OCT 28. The event received considerable local press coverage. The front page of the Hawaii Tribune-Herald (Hilo) on OCT 29 carried a front page story entitled "Breaking Ground for Astronomy" with pictures of Ant giving welcoming remarks, the artist drawing of the building, and the group digging their O'O sticks into the lava. (No lava tubes were discovered during this exercise.) Carrying the O'O sticks were: Ant Schinckel, Harry Kim (Mayor of County of Hawaii), Rolf Kudritzki (Director of IfA), Benett Bolek (Taisei Construction Company), Rose Tseng (Chancellor of UHH), Helene Hale (State Representative), and Nagayoshi Ohashi. The Honolulu Star Bulletin also carried a story on page 5 with a photo of six antennas of the SMA.
     Stability measurements on developmental continuum total power detector. (I wonder what they got??)
      Flux densities of 21 extragalactic sources were measured this week. The snr on some of them were as high as 70:1 (even though we may not be reaching the expected theoretical sensitivity (see note in Test Log Entry 4079). The repeatability is remarkably good and also consistent with measurements at other observatories. The SMA flux density scale may be accurate to about 10 percent at 230 GHz (see Test Log Entries 4084 and 4085).
     The reports of the committees of National Academy of Sciences and the National Academy of Public Administration that were appointed to study the scientific research programs at the Smithsonian and to investigate the possible effects of transferring the SI research support to the NSF were released this week and will be posted soon on the Intranet page of the CfA website. Irwin Shapiro gave details of the contents of the reports at an open meeting on NOV 2. In general, the reports were quite favorable to the SI research programs and no advantages were found in the proposed plan to shift funding to the NSF. The other committee reviewing the science programs at SI is expected to issue its report by the end of the year.
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    Upcoming Meetings - Wootten

    JAN 5/9, 2003 201st Meeting of the American Astronomical Society

    JUL 13-26, 2003 Twenty-Fifth General Assembly of the IAU

    JUL 22/25, 2003 IAU Symposium (221): Star Formation at High Angular Resolution, Sydney, Australia. Tyler Bourke is a co-chair of the scientific organizing committee. Good opportunity to show ALMA capabilities.

    SEP 22-26, 2003 4th Cologne-Bonn-Zermatt-Symposium on The Dense Interstellar Medium in Galaxies

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    Travel

     Oh, always

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