BIWEEKLY CALENDAR OF THE ALMA PROJECT at NRAO 19 June 2006 - 3 July 2006 ******************************** THIS FORTNIGHT**************************** ALMA Special Session at Calgary AAS Meeting: "Imaging Star Formation in the Cosmos with ALMA" Members of the NAASC, including our Canadian colleagues, organized a special session at the June meeting of the American Astronomical Society (AAS). The June 5th afternoon session was filled to capacity, with nearly 200 AAS and Canadian Astronomical Society (CASCA) members in attendance to hear presentations on "Using ALMA to Disentangle the Physics of Star Formation in Our Galaxy by Douglas Johnstone (NRC-HIA, U. Victoria), "Imaging Star-Forming Gas in Nearby Galaxies with ALMA by Jean Turner (UCLA), and "ALMA and Distant Galaxies by Andrew Blain (Caltech). The special session included an accompanying poster session (#51), with nine posters and one in session #56 on the 3mm cartridge. These posters also traveled to the JAO in Santiago the following week. Invited session 30.01 featured Christine Wilson speaking on "Luminous Infrared Galaxies with the Submillimeter Array: Probing the Extremes of Star Formation.". Powerpoint and pdf versions of the talks from the special session and several of the posters are collected at http://www.cv.nrao.edu/naasc/AAS/ -- J. Hibbard & Crystal Brogan ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Jonathan Williams of Hawaii was appointed as the new ANASAC Chair. Jonathan has been enlisted to organize ANASAC input into key US community issues, such as a potential grants-with-observing time program, as well as to perform a general review of the North American ALMA operations plan. A listing of the current ANASAC membership and dates of scheduled meetings are given at www.cv.nrao.edu/naasc/admin.shtml. The community is encouraged to contact their ANASAC representatives with any ideas or questions on NA ALMA operations or the Science Center. -C. Carilli ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Madrid meeting registration is now closed, having reached the limit. The number of participants in the conference is over 300; the limit is 280. There are many requests for contributing talks. In order to have a reasonable scheduling of the meeting and to give the participants half a day for visiting Madrid, the LOC and the SOC, have decided to add one day to the meeting, i.e., the new dates are Nov 13-17. Participants should be sure to make their hotel reservations soon. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- The ALMA Board held its eleventh face-to-face meeting on 13-14 June 2006 in Santiago Chile. Afterward, there was a trip to the ALMA site to examine the considerable progress made so far in ALMA construction there. F. Lo and R. Booth, respectively, served as alternate members for A. Sargent and E. van Dishoeck, who were unable to attend. P. Ho attended as an Observer from the Japanese delegation. Among its major actions, the Board * approved the ALMA Science Requirements Document pending some wording adjustments, * discussed the duties of the Project Scientist; a search for a suitable candidate is expected to commence soon, * concurred with the Director's recommendation that ESO proceed with the placement of the OSF construction contract, * discussed progress made on developing the Operations plan, * recommended that the NSF/ESO/NINS amendment Version #2 recommended by the Board's Working Group be executed by the parties by June 30, 2006, * Agreed to a revision to the draft ALMA Agreement amendment # 2, * Requested that the Director base the operations plan on a single time allocation committee while the Executives further examine this modality for ALMA in coordination with the Directors' Council and the Chilean Board Member, * Concurred in NSF's proposal to appoint John Bally to the ASAC. Noting that I. Corbett's long association with the Board is drawing to a close, the Board expressed its profound thanks to him for his many years of service to the ALMA Project and noted his substantial contributions in enabling the success of the partnership. To that appreciation, we add our own! ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Prof. Frank Low is 41st annual Karl G. Jansky Lecturer Associated Universities, Inc., and the National Radio Astronomy Observatory are pleased to announce that the 41st annual Karl G. Jansky Lectureship has been awarded to Professor Frank J. Low, a pioneer in the development of millimeter and infrared astronomy. While he was at the NRAO (1962 - 1965), Low undertook a series of important millimeter wavelength experiments. Conducted in Green Bank, West Virginia, this work exploited his innovative low temperature bolometer detector mounted on a relatively small dish. The success of this early research resulted in Low's proposal to continue with a larger instrument at a drier site, and eventually led to the NRAO millimeter wavelength 36 Foot Telescope at Kitt Peak, Arizona. This was millimeter astronomy's pioneer instrument, eventually being upgraded to 12m, the diameter of ALMA's core telescopes. See the NRAO website for more details, please. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- June 20th, 2006 - - The House Appropriations Committee has sent all of its FY 2007 funding bills to the floor. The National Science Foundation receives $6 billion, the full amount requested as part of the American Competitive Initiative and an increase of $439 million above FY06. Includes $4.6 billion for research, $334.5 million above FY06; and $832.4 million for science education, $16.2 million above the request. National Aeronautics and Space Administration receives $16.7 billion, $462 million above the FY06 base level. Funds the President's vision for space exploration at $3.8 billion; provides full request for the Space Shuttle; and restores $100 million above the request to aeronautics research, and $75 million above the request for space science. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- The world's largest airborne astronomical observatory has passed a technical and programmatic review that could potentially lead to the continuation of the mission. NASA's Program Management Council concluded that there were no insurmountable technical or programmatic challenges to the continued development of the Stratospheric Observatory for Infrared Astronomy (SOFIA). The agency has developed a technically viable plan to proceed with the development of the SOFIA aircraft, subject to the identification of appropriate funding offsets. http://www.nasa.gov/home/hqnews/2006/jun/HQ_06240_SOFIA_update.html ---------------------------------------------------------------------- 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 Sky: The Evening sky hosts Mercury, Mars, Jupiter and Saturn. Venus is the morning star. OSF (Ops Support Facility, 9600ft altitude): Approximately 90 people are working on the ALMA site; the largest contingent is the Con-Pax contingent building the nine antenna foundations at the Melco and Vertex laydown areas. Work has begun on the utilities for these areas. The Vertex building should arrive very soon. Signing of the contract for the construction of the OSF has been approved by all parties and is imminent. The ALMA Camp Recreation Room, adjacent to the dining facility, should be complete by the end of this fortnight. AOS (Array Ops Site, 16570ft altitude): From 15-21 June, the APEX facility has seldom registered more than 1mm of PWV; much of the time it has been below 0.5 mm. S. Radford (Caltech) reports data from near the summit of Chajnantor (5612 m) has generally shown lower values than from a station near the CBI. Santiago: A meeting on Assembly, Integration, Verification and Commissioning (AIVC) was held in Santiago at the JAO offices. Study continues of siting and needs for the permanent Santiago Central Office in Vitacura. AOC: Bidders conference for the nutator was held 31 May. Master Laser specification and SoW review was held. An updated ALMA System Block diagram was distributed. Move of hardware from the Socorro lab to the ATF is scheduled to begin 2006-Aug-28. *************************************************************************** DAILY CALENDAR (Times EDT ) see https://wikio.nrao.edu/bin/view/ALMA/AlmaCalendar Mon 19 Jun All day: Assembly, Integration, Verification and Commissioning (AIVC) meeting, Santiago Tue 20 Jun Mercury is at greatest elongation, 25° east of the Sun in the evening sky. All day: Assembly, Integration, Verification and Commissioning (AIVC) meeting, Santiago 10:30 AM-11:30 AM: JAO IPT Telecon Wed 21 Jun First Day of Winter (Southern Hemisphere) Thu 22 Jun Venus, Moon and Pleiades nearby before sunrise. Fri 23 Jun Sat 24 Jun Sun 25 Jun New Moon Mon 26 Jun St. Peter & St. Paul Holiday, Chile Tue 27 Jun 10:30 AM-11:30 AM: JAO IPT Telecon 4:00 PM-5:00 PM: NAScienceIPT teleconference (open to all interested parties) (434)296-7082 Wed 28 Jun 10:30 AM EDT: Science IPT Telecon Thu 29 Jun Fri 30 Jun Sat 1 Jul Sun 2 Jul Mon 3 Jul NRAO Holiday Tue 4 Jul Independence Day Holiday, US. ****************************** UPCOMING EVENTS **************************** Jun 19-20 all day AIVCSV Meeting Santiago Jun 30 1800 UT ANASAC Meeting Telecon Jul 25-26 FE face-to-face CV Jul 27-28 all day FE LO CDR CV Aug 8-9 B7 cartridge CDR Grenoble Aug 28 Move of PSI to ATF Sept 16-17 all dat ASAC face-to-face Arcetri 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 # 549: Reference values of arterial oxygen saturation and heart rate at the ALMA site Author: Seiichi Sakamoto Abstract: Arterial oxygen saturation (SpO2) and heart rate at the ALMA site were monitored with portable pulse oximeters for an astronomer over five years. A set of data is presented to provide a reference range of these values at the ALMA site. View a pdf version of ALMA Memo #549 at: http://www.alma.nrao.edu/memos/html-memos/alma549/memo549.pdf ******************************ALSO OF INTEREST***************************** ALMA has openings for Head of Science Operations, Head of Technical Services, and Head of Administration. Please see: http://www.nrao.edu/administration/personnel_office/careers.shtml ------------------------------------------------------------------------- *************************************************************************** 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