BIWEEKLY CALENDAR OF THE ALMA PROJECT at NRAO 10 April 2006 - 23 April 2006 ******************************** THIS FORTNIGHT**************************** ALMA NAASC Internal Review will be held in Charlottesville, 11 April. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- ALMA Quarterly Report material due 15 April. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Past issues of this Calendar may be viewed at http://www.cv.nrao.edu/~awootten/mmaimcal/ALMACalendars.html See also the JAO ALMA Calendar overview at: http://www.alma.cl/alma_project *************************************************************************** General Happenings OSF (Ops Support Facility, 9600ft altitude): Road to high site rough work completed. ACA working area earthwork is now complete. Santiago: Early discussions on Santiago ALMA Offices at Vitacura continue. System Requirements Review followup telecons and agenda resulted in plan for 24-25 April meeting in Garching (+ videocon). AOS (Array Ops Site, 16000ft altitude): The AOS Technical Building Foundation and Shell construction to be complete 2006-April-19. Picture: http://www.cv.nrao.edu/~awootten/mmaimcal/AOSTB4Apr06.jpg TUC: Nutator specifications released for comment. AOC: 1st LO phase drift tests show system is close to project specifications. Offline and Pipeline tests concluded. ATF (ALMA Test Facility, VLA site): Optical Pointing Test report available. Elevation axis amplifier repaired on AEC antenna. NTC: Acceptance testing of B6 (1.3mm) Cartridge No 1 under way. A x9 multiplier solution to providing B9 (.65 mm) power appears promising. Cryostats No. 1 and No. 2 are operational at the NTC. Intensive tests of the tunable filter bank (TFB) II card were completed with participation of Escoffier, Quertier and Comoretto. Production TFB review in Bordeaux 10-11 April. NAASC (North American ALMA Science Center: Preparations for Internal Review of NAASC Operations Plan scheduled for 11 April. Posters and Talks listed for Calgary AAS special ALMA Session. *************************************************************************** DAILY CALENDAR (Times EDT ) see https://wikio.nrao.edu/bin/view/ALMA/AlmaCalendar Mon 10 Apr Tue 11 Apr 10:30 AM-?: Internal Review of NAASC Operations Plan 12:15 PM: NGC6334: A cluster of massive protostars resolved by the SMA Todd Hunter, SMA Wed 12 Apr 11:00 AM: SSR Telecon http://almasw.hq.eso.org/almasw/bin/view/SSR/2006-04-12 Thu 13 Apr 10:30 AM-11:30 AM: Management IPT Telecon 11:00 AM: Calibration Group telecon https://wikio.nrao.edu/bin/view/ALMA/CalAgendaMinutes20060413 Fri 14 Apr Holiday Chile, Europe Sat 15 Apr Sun 16 Apr Easter Mon 17 Apr Holiday, Europe Tue 18 Apr 10:30 AM-11:30 AM: JAO IPT Telecon NA IPT Leads Telecon 4:00 PM-5:00 PM: NAScienceIPT teleconference (open to all interested parties) (434)296-7082 Wed 19 Apr Late Abstracts and Early Registration DEADLINE Calgary AAS Meeting 10:30 AM-11:30 AM ScienceIPT teleconference https://wikio.nrao.edu/bin/view/ALMA/19Apr06Agenda Thu 20 Apr Fri 21 Apr Complex Molecules in Space: Present status and prospects with ALMA 8th thru 11th May 2006, Fuglsøcentret, Denmark Registration Deadline Sat 22 Apr Sun 23 Apr ****************************** UPCOMING EVENTS **************************** April 24-25 All day SRR followup meeting Garching April 27 ALMA Board Telecon April 28 1900 UT ANASAC Telecon May 3 1500UT ASAC Telecon May 3 1700UT NAASC Telecon May 25 ALMA Board Telecon June 13-14 all day ALMA Board Meeting Santiago Aug 1 Move of PSI to ATF Sept 22-23 evening Dave Matthews Band CV JPJ Arena opening November 9-10 all day ALMA Board Meeting Madrid TBD Nov 13-16 all day Science with ALMA: a new era for Astrophysics Madrid ******************************* TECHNICAL NEWS **************************** ALMA Memo #547: Estimate of the ALMA Cryostat Hold Time Author: G. A. Ediss In this paper we attempt to calculate the operational hold time for the ALMA front-end cryostat, given the reported thermal loading, thermal capacity and leak rates. View a pdf version of ALMA Memo #547 at: http://www.alma.nrao.edu/memos/html-memos/alma547/memo547.pdf ------------------------------------------------------------------------- ALMA Memo #548: Performance budget estimation on the ACA system Authors: Hitoshi KIUCHI (NAOJ), and Satoru IGUCHI (NAOJ) This memo describes the performance budget estimation on the ACA system. The most significant thing of interferometer is to maintain the signal coherence. We will discuss the performance budget through the estimation of the signal-to-noise ratio and the signal coherence. View a pdf version of ALMA Memo #548 at: http://www.alma.nrao.edu/memos/html-memos/alma548/memo548.pdf ******************************ALSO OF INTEREST***************************** 2nd pan-ALMA Conference : 2nd Announcement Dear Colleague, The 2nd pan-ALMA conference on "Science with ALMA: a new era for Astrophysics" will be held 13-16 November 2006 in Madrid, Spain. The venue will be the campus of the CSIC (Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Cientificas), in the centre of town. Information on the 2nd pan-ALMA meeting is available via http://www.oan.es/alma2006/ (final slash is mandatory) --------------------------------------------------------------------------- ALMA presentations at the January Zmachine meeting are available on line through links at www.zmachines.net --------------------------------------------------------------------------- Post Doctoral Research Associate Studies of high-mass star formation Salary up to £26,401 per annum (Ref: EPS/108/06) THE UNIVERSITY OF MANCHESTER FACULTY OF ENGINEERING AND PHYSICAL SCIENCES SCHOOL OF PHYSICS AND ASTRONOMY JODRELL BANK OBSERVATORY A postdoctoral position is available to work on a new VLA high resolution radio continuum survey of the Galactic Plane. This Large VLA Project has been awarded ~400 hours of observing time and will begin in June 2006; it will cover the same area as the northern GLIMPSE survey made by the SPITZER satellite. The postdoctoral fellow will take charge of the observations, reduction and exploitation of the survey, aimed principally at the study of high-mass star formation. Collaboration with other members of the international team is envisaged. The position is available immediately for a period of two years in the first instance, with the possibility of extension beyond this date. The appointment will be as a Research Associate, with a starting salary in the range of £24,886 to £26,401 per annum. Application forms and further particulars are available at http://www.manchester.ac.uk/vacancies or from EPS HR Office, The University of Manchester, Sackville Street Building, Manchester M60 1QD, Tel: 0161 275 8837; Fax: 0161 306 5037 or email: eps-hr@manchester.ac.uk. Quote ref: EPS/108/06 Closing date: Monday 1 May 2006 Informal inquiries may be made to Philip Diamond, tel: 01477 571321, email pdiamond@jb.man.ac.uk --------------------------------------------------------------------------- Anne Dutrey informs us of a CNRS post-doctoral position at the Observatory of Bordeaux. The position is opened for two years and will start on september 2006 at the Observatory of Bordeaux. The application deadline is June 2006. The position is dedicated to the modelling of chemistry in proto-planetary disks in order to interpret observational data obtained with the IRAM array. Interested people can read the dedicated CNRS web page http://www.k-projects.com/cnrs_postdocs/public/departement_details.php?IdDpt=9&Dep=SDU&NumOffre=2&Langue=en --------------------------------------------------------------------------- *************************************************************************** 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