BIWEEKLY CALENDAR OF THE ALMA PROJECT at NRAO 4 December 2006 - 18 December 2006 ******************************** THIS FORTNIGHT*************************** New stills and animations of ALMA artist concepts are available at http://www.alma.info ---------------------------------------------------------------------- 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: Saturn rises around 10 pm, Venus lost in the very early sunsets this week. Other bright planets are low in the morning sky. Santiago: The Head of Science Operations (HSO) and Head of Administration have been recruited. The Head of Administration, Mr. Russell Smeback, will start to work at the ALMA Offices on December 12th, and will be moving to Santiago with his family. The final plans for HSO arrival in the ALMA offices are under development but HSO is actively engaged in Operations Plan development already. Local hiring of AIV staff continues. Some staff are now arriving at North American sites. AOS (Array Ops Site, 16570ft altitude): The building will be enclosed and powered by a temporary generator by late January. A temporary link to the OSF should be operational by January. HVAC (heating, ventilating and air conditioning) systems were installed recently. OSF (Ops Support Facility, 9600ft altitude): The Holography tower is under construction. The Vertex Site Erection Facility (SEF) is under construction. The Vertex antennas will be received and assembled in this building. The 27 containers holding the building elements have arrived in Chile from Texas. There are 333 contractor and 22 ALMA personnel working on the site, of which 187 sleep at the site. NTC (NRAO Technology Center, Charlottesville): The North American Front End Integration Center (NA-FEIC) has installed bands 3,6 and 7 in the first FE; all bands are healthy and integration of the FE subsystem continues. NAASC: Daily ALMA Operations Group telecons have dominated the weeks. The end product will be a final version which the ALMA Board will distribute to review. ATF: BEND racks are installed in Alcatel antenna, the central LO has been relocated to VLA building, the Master Laser has been powered up in new location at nominal power levels. Most of the above have M&C software responding nominally. The Prototype Correlator is being moved. A second chain of electronics should be installed in Vertex prototype antenna the week of 4 Dec. Photogrammetric measurement of both antennas will occur to validate the accuracy of the holography results, with more holography tests currently scheduled for the week before Christmas. ESO: The ESO Council meets on 7-8 December. *************************************************************************** DAILY CALENDAR (Times EDT/EST ) see https://wikio.nrao.edu/bin/view/ALMA/AlmaCalendar Mon 4 Dec - Fourth Chilean School of Astrophysics--Interferometry in the Epoch of ALMA and VLTI http://www.astro.puc.cl/school/ 7:25 PM: Full Moon. This moon reaches very high elevations in the Northern Hemisphere, now suffering late Fall. Today is the earliest nightfall of the year. It is the time of earliest sunrise in Santiago. Tue 5 Dec - Fourth Chilean School of Astrophysics--Interferometry in the Epoch of ALMA and VLTI http://www.astro.puc.cl/school/ 10:30 AM-11:30 AM: JAO IPT Telecon 2:30 PM Chile (PUC) 16:30 hrs. ALMA Postdoc Itziar De Gregorio Monsalvo, ESO/APEX. "Radio Astronomical Study of the Environment surrounding Low-Mass young stellar Objects" Wed 6 Dec Fourth Chilean School of Astrophysics--Interferometry in the Epoch of ALMA and VLTI http://www.astro.puc.cl/school/ ACA Correlator CDR will be taking place 6,7 December in Tokyo. 9:30 - ASAC Telecon 1:00 - NAASC Telecon 2:00 - NA Telecaucus Thu 7 Dec Fourth Chilean School of Astrophysics--Interferometry in the Epoch of ALMA and VLTI http://www.astro.puc.cl/school/ ACA Correlator CDR will be taking place 6,7 December in Tokyo. 9:30 - ALMA Board telecon Fri 8 Dec - Holiday (Chile) Immaculate Conception Fourth Chilean School of Astrophysics--Interferometry in the Epoch of ALMA and VLTI http://www.astro.puc.cl/school/ 2:00 PM - ANASAC Telecon Sat 9 Dec Sun 10 Dec Mon 11 Dec Tue 12 Dec 10:30 AM-11:30 AM: JAO IPT Telecon 4:00 PM: ALMA Science IPT Telecon Wed 13 Dec 10:00 AM Science Software Requirements Group Telecon Thu 14 Dec 11:00 AM - Calibration Group Telecon Fri 15 Dec NRAO/CV Christmas Party, Colonnade Club Sat 16 Dec Beethoven's Birthday Sun 17 Dec Mon 18 Dec ****************************** UPCOMING EVENTS **************************** Dec 6 ASAC Telecon Dec 6-7 all day ACA correlator CDR Japan Dec 6-8 all day Molecular database meeting Leiden Dec 7 ALMA Board telecon Dec 14 all day LLC and LO Photonic Rx DR Cville Dec 29 1900UT ANASAC telecon Jan 16-17 '07 all day Transporter FDR Jan 18 '07 ALMA Board telecon Jan 29-30 '07 all day B9 Cartridge CDR Jan 30-1 Feb all day AEM antenna PPDR Mestre Feb 6-7 B9 cartridge CDR Groningen Feb 15 ALMA Board Telecon Telecon Mar 9-12 all day IPT F2F MEETING Chile ******************************* TECHNICAL NEWS *************************** *****************************ALSO OF INTEREST***************************** *************************************************************************** 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