Teleconference, 14 June 2001

Draft Minutes

Participants: R. Bachiller, A. Benz, G. Blake, R. Booth, L. Bronfman, R. Crutcher, N. Evans, S. Guilloteau, T. Hasegawa, M. Ishiguru, R. Kurz, H. Matsuo, N. Nakai, J. Richer, S. Sakamoto, P. Shaver, K. Tatematsu, M. Tsubio, E. van Dishoeck, W. Welch, C. Wilson, A. Wootten

The proposed agenda was adopted

The minutes of the last teleconference will be checked finally over the next few days, and any revisions sent to A. Wootten. They will then be posted on the WWW. E. van Dishoeck mentioned two remaining action items: (1) the DSB-SSB-2SB recommendation will be completed within the next month. (2) finalizing the receiver science cases – this has been completed and is going onto the WWW.

1. AMAC, ACC meetings in Munich

R. Kurz reviewed the AMAC meeting, which took place at ESO (Garching) on 8-9 June. The committee’s composition is presently as follows:

From the US: Gordon Chin, John Mather, Gerry Saunders, Dominic Tenorelli, Bob Wilson

From Europe:

Arnold van Ardenne, ASTRON Chief of engineering

Herwig Schopper, Dir-Gen CERN (ret)

John Credland, ESA executive scientific programs

Robert Aymar, Head of ITER Project (fusion)

Sergio Bertini, executive (ret) in Italian electronics firm, formerly radio astronomer at Arcetri

Five Japanese members are expected to join in the near future.

The written report of the committee will be completed by 6 July. In brief, the AMAC was very positive about the project and its progress, and made the following main recommendations:

a) the project should hold to the original strategy with the antennas: competition through prototypes and testing

b) there should be a strong central project office, established as soon as possible for Phase 2 (but also for Phase 1)

c) the engineering effort (especially system engineering) should be strengthened

d) The Chile issue has become the important item in the critical path, and should be resolved as soon as possible

e) the scope of the 3-way project should be clearly defined and fixed, and "creeping escalation" in the project definition must be avoided. This applies to the funded scope, but R. Kurz added that it is also good to make clear what is ultimately needed for a complete ALMA.

The date of the next AMAC meeting has not yet been fixed; it will be sometime in the last quarter of the year, probably before the ACC meeting of 30-31 October.

The Extended ALMA Coordinating Committee (EACC) met at ESO

(Garching) on June 11. The EACC now includes Japanese representatives in recognition of Japan's potential partnership in ALMA. The principal

topic of the meeting was Japanese participation in ALMA. It was

concluded that a tri-lateral partnership for ALMA could be formed for a

project that both enhanced the capability of the current bi-lateral

baseline project and at the same time reduced the costs to the present

ALMA partners, North America and Europe.

R. Kurz reviewed the highlights. The most important result was that all three partners agreed to submit budget requests according to the "-10% option", rather than the "-20% option". If this level of funding indeed comes through, it would be possible to implement all of the high priority enhancements, i.e., the ACA, 4 additional receiver bands (1, 4 , 8 and 10), and the enhanced/future correlator. The definition of the 3-way project must now be completed accordingly, and the proposals appropriately revised. A "trial" division of effort has been drafted, and shows that a solution can be found. Japan’s proposal must be completed shortly; Europe will prepare a revised proposal for October, and the US for fiscal year 2003.

The Chile WG reported good progress. A. Wootten recalled I. Corbett’s comment to the EACC: The American document submitted to the EACC the previous week allowed the others to understand the US thinking, including the points of principle. Subsequent discussion makes it appear that a new model synthesized from the old ones is possible. The working group should prepare and evaluate a new model, circulate it, and discuss it by mid July, in time for a meeting in Chile on 26 July. In this maintaining independent stateholder identity should be possible but the framework on which ALMA operates needs further study.

N. Evans and E. van Dishoeck congratulated the EACC on behalf of the

ASAC for the successful outcome of this meeting.

E. van Dishoeck said that it is now up to the ASAC to confirm the feasibility and scientific importance of the enhancements, especially of the ACA. This must be done by the date of the next E-ACC meeting, October 30-31 in Washington, which means in practice that the recommendation must be formulated at the face-to-face meeting in Chile in September. In addition to the ASAC report, a document should be produced with the scientific arguments for the enhancements. Most of this has been done for bands 1, 4 and 8 and the enhanced/future correlator, but the ACA and Band 10 cases must still be added.

2. ACA simulations

E. van Dishoeck reported that a "tiger team" was being established to study the ACA feasibility. The ACA case is particularly critical: it is the largest budget item, of order $80M including receivers, and its feasibility and scientific importance must be proven. Previous simulations by various

groups have shown significant improvements in image fidelity, but those simulations did not yet include realistic atmospheric conditions, i.e.,

phase and amplitude errors. It had been stated by S. Guilloteau last month that about 6 months of work would be needed to do the proper simulations. This will now have to be shortened to about 2 months to get ready before the ASAC meeting. Accordingly, a "tiger team" has been formed to deal with the ACA simulations, to be coordinated by S. Guilloteau and A. Wootten, with participation by Hasegawa, Gueth, Pety, Holdaway, Butler, Morita, Kawabe, Monger and ASAC members Welch, Crutcher, Yun, Cox and others. The ACA tiger team will meet at/following the Cambridge calibration PDR where it will formulate a detailed plan. It will post weekly updates on the WWW and report at the monthly ASAC telecons. The role of the ASAC members of the tiger team is to keep a critical eye on the methods, progress and results, so that there are no surprises at the face-to-face meeting.

In addition, the ASAC is requested to provide science examples for the ACA. These should be sent to E. van Dishoeck by 29 June.

E. van Dishoeck also pointed out that the Band 10 science case must be elaborated along the lines of the Band 1, 4 and 8 cases. Van Dishoeck, Yamamoto, Matsuo and Hasegawa will assist in this effort.

3. Towards a discussion on operations

ASAC input is required on the operations from the pure scientific point of view: for example, how would the astronomers like to use ALMA, both experts and non-experts? What should be the tasks of the regional data centers and that in Chile? How should the archives be operated? Material on this subject, including the recent ESO operations document, is being sent to ASAC members.

An ASAC Operations working group is being set up for this purpose. Volunteers so far include N. Evans (coordinator), C. Wilson, P. Shaver, J. Richer, R. Booth, Y. Fukui, S. Sakamoto, M. Gurwell and L. Bronfman.

The output of the working group should be a short document to be used as a

starting point for the ASAC discussion in Chile. N. Evans will draft a statement of work.

4. Next face-to-face meeting

L. Bronfman went over plans for the ASAC meeting in Chile. ASAC members should contact him as soon as possible about their participation.

An ASAC scientific organizing committee for the science day on September 13 has been formed consisting of R. Bachiller (coordinator), L. Bronfman, P. Cox, A. Wootten. T. Hasegawa, and E. van Dishoeck. Plans will be circulated by early July.

There was brief discussion of the possible programme. N. Evans suggested that one talk could cover the mm-optical/IR connections, in view of the other large facilities in Chile, although this could also be covered in the introductory talk. A general talk in Spanish was suggested, but L. Bronfman said that English would be suitable for all likely participants. The possibility of participation by the Chilean press was mentioned; P. Shaver said that new PR materials were being prepared in Europe, and could be made available in Chile. The PR aspects will be coordinated with L. Bronfman.

5. Other matters

The ASAC was informed that there will be a 1-week working group meeting on the enhanced/future correlator between Japan/EU/NA representatives in late July/early August. The ASAC should re-iterate its guidelines beforehand. R. Bachiller will summarize the ASAC recommendations to date and circulate them before the July telecon.

6. Next teleconference

The next ASAC teleconference will take place on Thursday 12 July at 14:15 UT.