BIWEEKY CALENDAR OF THE ALMA PROJECT at NRAO 19 May - 2 June 2009 ******************************** THIS FORTNIGHT************************* Apologies for not getting this out in a timely manner. New one soon. --------------------------------------------------------------------- The Herschel telesope (with its longtime companion Planck) launched successfully from Kourour, Guiana on 14 May. Initial tests showed that the HIFI instrument, whose frequency coverage is common with some ALMA bands, is working properly. Congratulations to the ESA and NASA teams on this event. --------------------------------------------------------------------- A new standard ALMA Description has been adopted: “The Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA), an international astronomy facility, is a partnership of Europe, North America and East Asia in cooperation with the Republic of Chile. ALMA is funded in Europe by the European Organization for Astronomical Research in the Southern Hemisphere (ESO), in North America by the U.S. National Science Foundation (NSF) in cooperation with the National Research Council of Canada (NRC) and the National Science Council of Taiwan (NSC) and in East Asia by the National Institutes of Natural Sciences (NINS) of Japan in cooperation with the Academia Sinica (AS) in Taiwan. ALMA construction and operations are led on behalf of Europe by ESO, on behalf of North America by the National Radio Astronomy Observatory (NRAO), which is managed by Associated Universities, Inc. (AUI) and on behalf of East Asia by the National Astronomical Observatory of Japan (NAOJ). The Joint ALMA Observatory (JAO) provides the unified leadership and management of the construction, commissioning and operation of ALMA.” The Board also approved Version III of the Project Plan. --------------------------------------------------------------------- Past issues of this Calendar may be viewed at http://www.cv.nrao.edu/~awootten/mmaimcal/ALMACalendars.html *************************************************************************** General Happenings Photos of activity may be found at NRAO eNews: http://www.nrao.edu/news/newsletters/ Sky: Venus and Mars rise before dawn; Saturn rules the night from Leo's belly. SCO (Santiago Central Office): A Management IPT face-to-face meeting was held. The construction phase of the Santiago Central Office building, on the grounds of the ESO complex at Vitacura, has begun. AOS (Array Ops Site, 16570ft altitude): 132 foundations have had lean concrete poured. To date, 66 foundations have been provisionally accepted. 22 foundations for Atacama Compact Array (ACA) antennas have been provisionally accepted. Access to the first antenna pad to receive an antenna at A106 near the Technical Building is complete. Trenching for utilities is complete with power and fiber installation imminent. Physical installation of the second correlator quadrant is expected to be August 17-25 OSF (Ops Support Facility, 9600ft altitude): The recently accepted third ALMA antenna has had its surface adjusted to well below 12 microns by a team led by D. Emerson. Radio pointing models, focus curves and beam maps have been obtained for PM03 and DV01.Three Vertex antennas stand on foundations outside the Site Erection Facility awaiting acceptance tests; No 3 is undergoing formal pointing tests. The third WVR, second at the OSF, passed provisional acceptance on-site (PAS) on 29 May. Amplitude Calibration Devices (ACD) 5 and 6 went through provisional acceptance in-house (PAI); ACD5 was shipped to the OSF. Modifications of the OSF technical facility electrical design are ongoing. AOC: A new CASA Manager has been hired, Nick Elias, who will arrive in about three months. Elias has been managing a Very Large Telescope Interferometer (VLTI) pipeline. The CASA 2.4 release will be used at an ALMA Workshop in Hamilton Ontario. Antenna Article (AA) 5, including analog and digital racks, left the crating vendor in Albuquerque. Antenna Articles nos 6, 7 and 8 will be shipped to the OSF in mid-June. Keller Ford and Estella Candelaria join Saxon Sturgis as the newest members of the Back End IPT- The Next Generation! NTC: The panel report for the operational readiness review for the NA-FEIC was released (ALMA-40.00.00.00-186-A10-REP). Installation of signal cables in Quadrant 3 of the 64 antenna correlator began. NAASC: Registration continues for the Sept 21-24 Workshop, fourth in a series on transformational science with ALMA. Do it at http://www.nrao.edu/meetings/galaxies09/ NRC hosts a "Observing with ALMA" workshop, which included an ALMA primer. See http://www.almatelescope.ca/Workshop/Home.html The Operations Software Requirements Review occurs in Santiago June 1-2, followed by the f2f meeting of the SciOpsIPT. Elsewhere: Assembly of the Band 10 (.35mm) prototype cartridge has begun in Mitaka, near Tokyo. Cryostat #9 arrived at the EA FEIC. Cryostat #10 is undergoing PAI and will be shipped to the EU FEIC afterwards. Cartridges: Testing of B4 (3mm) cartridge SN14 complete; B6 (1.3mm) SN15 beting tested; B7 (.85mm) Cartridge 10 being shipped to EU FEIC; B9: cartridge #15 shipped to EA FEIC. Water Vapour Radiometer WVR SN104 passed PAI on 6 May 2009 and is currently being shipped to the OSF. A calendar of NAASC events may be found at: http://www.cv.nrao.edu/naasc/alma_calendar.shtml *************************************************************************** DAILY CALENDAR (Times EDT/EST ) see https://wikio.nrao.edu/bin/view/ALMA/AlmaCalendar ****************************** UPCOMING EVENTS ************************* May 18-19 EU-Front End Integration Center meeting, RAL May 26-29 Advancing Chemical Understanding thru Astronomical Observations Jun 1-2 Ops software requirements review, Santiago Jun 8-12 mm and submm Astronomy at High Angular Resolution, ASIAA Jun 11-12 Front End Service Vehicle PDR, Taichung, Taiwan Jun 17 Correlator Quadrant 2 Provisional Acceptance In-house (PAI) Jun 22-25 Band 4 and 8 FE CDR & PAI Tokyo Sep 2-3 CSV Review, Santiago Sep 21-25 Assembly, Gas Content and Star Formation History of Galaxies Sep 28-30 IRAM 30th Oct 4 Spectral Line workshop, Koln Nov 11-12 ALMA Board face-to-face meeting, Santiago Nov 16- Annual ALMA External Review, Santiago ******************************* TECHNICAL NEWS ************************* *****************************ALSO OF INTEREST*************************** CALL FOR OBSERVING PROPOSALS FOR NRAO TELESCOPES Deadline: 1 June 2009, 5:00 P.M., EST (21:00 UTC) Proposal preparation and submission are via the Proposal Submission Tool at http://my.nrao.edu. Several modifications to the PST have been made and will be in place starting 12:00 EDT (noon) Friday, 15 May 2009. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- CALL FOR OBSERVING PROPOSALS FOR THE CALTECH SUBMILLIMETER OBSERVATORY The Caltech Submillimeter Observatory (CSO) encourages observing participation by astronomers from both U.S. and non-U.S. institutions. The observatory consists of a 10.4 m diameter telescope on Mauna Kea, Hawaii. Receivers are available from 200 to 400 GHz with noise temperatures of about 100 K (DSB) and, from 400 to 730 GHz at about 200 K (DSB). A receiver is available from 780 – 920 GHz with a noise temperature of about 250 K. AOS back-ends of about 1000 channels are available with 1 GHz and 50 MHz bandwidths. A new FFTS spectrometer with 8192 channels and a selectable bandwidth of 1 GHz or 500 MHz is also available. For further information please refer to the CSO web site at http://www.submm.caltech.edu/cso. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- This is a special ATNF call for proposals for the Australia Telescope Compact Array (ATCA) for the 2009 JULS. This semester is for ATCA proposals ***ONLY***. The CLOSING DATE for ATCA applications for 2009 JULS is 15 May 2009. Applications must arrive no later than midnight, Australian Eastern Standard Time (equivalent to 14:00 UT). All applications must be submitted using OPAL. See http://opal.atnf.csiro.au. The 2009 JULS will run for a 10-week period from 15 July until 30 September 2009. We expect that three CABB observing modes will be available by September 2009, including a high resolution zoom mode that is available for the first time. For the latest information it is essential to read the CABB documentation on the ATNF web pages. http://www.atnf.csiro.au/observers/apply/avail.html ATCA proposals not completely scheduled in the 2009 APRS semester that require further observing time should be resubmitted for consideration in the 2009 JULS semester. Please note that because of the need for local knowledge in using the new CABB systems, remote observing is expected to be restricted. A further announcement will be made in mid-May 2009 for the 2009 OCTS. This will be a standard six-month semester and applications will be invited for all ATNF facilities. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- *************************************************************************** Please send information for upcoming calendars by Friday evening of the preceding biweekly period to Jennifer Neighbours or Al Wootten via e-mail (jneighbo at nrao.edu or awootten at 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