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Contact Information

  • 2005-5-17 14:30 UT
  • Duration: 1 hr
  • USA Toll Free Number: 877-874-1919
  • Toll Number: +1-203-320-9891
  • Passcode: 185064
  • Leader: Al Wootten

Topics

  1. Old Business The enhanced Agenda from last month's meeting is available. Science IPT notes from last month's telecon are available.

DUSTY04 collection of papers relevant to ALMA.

  1. New Business--Project news/updates (Wootten, Wilson, Kawabe)
  2. Milestones--09.2.17.2 Complete draft ICD between Science and Site Planned
  3. Subarrays--by frequency, four for ALMA, two for ACA independently tuned
  4. Frequency Switching -- The commentary on the wiki page and in other places have been consolidated into a document: Frequency Switching on ALMA SCID-90.00.00.00-012-A-SPE which is open for discussion at almaedm.
  5. New personnel: NA Postdoc hired--Tony Remijan. Shigehisa Takakuwa (SMA/CfA) will join ALMA-J project office from July to work with us. Juan Bravo will replace Diaz as Roberto Rivera's assistant at the site.
  6. Early Science Modes: Originally the plan was to implement only modes which were available on the single baseline correlator at the ATF on the ALMA correlator in Chile. However, the tunable filter bank will almost certainly be implemented on the Chilean correlator, though not at the ATF. Therefore we need to define modes which we would like to have available both for testing and for observing in the early phases of Chilean operations. Please see the document Baseline Correlator + TFB Specs for details. One possibility is a wideband mode for e.g. continuum simultaneous with a narrowband mode for e.g. a spectral line. Please comment; we don't have to be limited to one but without a specific group there could be nearly an infinite number. See ALMA Early Science Modes SCID-90.00.00.00-011-A-LIS.
  7. Total Power Receiver: In The Beginning, there will be normal ALMA receivers on the total power antennas. Eventually we will want receivers with improved stability. There are several possibilities; comment please.
    1. Normal ALMA receiver modified slightly (e.g. detuned).
    2. Correlation Receiver. This would be a special receiver. It should operate in a predefined 'Continuum Band' which we should define in a spectral place as linefree as possible. The design would probably be somewhat similar to that of the WVR correlation receiver design from Cambridge.
    3. Windowed Correlation Reciever. If in a band there is no suitable window, the masking against contaminant line emission could be achieved in the correlator. Correlation done this far down the chain could be advantageous in that it could remove other sources of instability. The price would be complexity. I would imagine that one would only puruse this option should suitably linefree windows not be available.
  8. ACA correlator PDR -- ALMA-J will hold the ACA correlator PDR on 30-31 May. Robert Laing will represent the Science IPT. In the ACA Correlator PDR folder, you will find the CIDL and a format for the Compliance Matrix as well. I hope you have a chance to look at them. Baseline Correlator + TFB Specs
  9. Nutator Requirements discussion has begun. Comments to wiki page please.
  10. Group Activities (all)
  11. Next meeting is on June 14th (14:30 UT)

Science IPT Group Activity Reports

Please include your Group Activity Report here (How to Enter Your Report), or email it to AlWootten

1 Science IPT - IPT meetings, CVR Review, Rebaselining Options, ASAC Report, Operations Plan Vers A, New Band 5 Receivers/OTF Interferometry and the Board Meetings 4-9 April 2005.

2 ASAC news ASAC Report

3 Antennas

4 Astronomer Outreach: NRAO Newsletter ESO Newsletter. NRAO ALMA Calendar

Emerson/Laing -- Instrument Scientists

  • WVR Review (Laing)
  • ACA Corrleator Review (Laing)
  • Nutator design (Emerson)

John Conway -- Configuration

  • Notes from configuration redesign telecon.

Jeff Mangum -- Calibration

Alison Stirling -- Phase calibration

  • Turbulence simulations of dry and wet phase fluctuations during the daytime at Chajnantor

Robert Lucas -- SSR

  • Meeting on 2005-5-11: Minutes
  • CDR3 is planned for early June. Release R3 plans: testing interferometry software in simulation mode.

Michiel Hogerheijde -- DRSP

Robert Laing -- Commissioning and Science Verification

Mark Holdaway/Steve Myers -- Imaging

  • See NRAO Algorithms Working Group Minutes "Pointing corrections in interferometer calibration and imaging" discussed 13 April.

L.-A. Nyman -- Site Characterization

ALMA
  • The meteorological instruments group was to define the 'ancillary devices'; an old draft of that is in almaedm at: http://tinyurl.com/5ns7e which has been updated by JohnRicher (see Calibration item above).
  • The second task was to define the interface of the ancillary devices to the site. The current draft of that document is in almaedm at: http://tinyurl.com/43gvn

Science Corner:

ALMA Please see: El Mercurio article

An unusual eruption registered at dawn Cinco de Mayo at Láscar volcano, located about 430 kilometers to the west of Antofagasta and 35 km East of the town of San Pedro de Atacama near the ALMA site, to its south. Lascar expelled ashes and columns of smoke by a period of 30 minutes between the localities of Camar and Talabre. The eruption was detected at 03,03 hours by the satelite of the University of Hawaii located at a base established at Camar, a reason why it was not perceived by the community of those towns. According to the director of the Regional Office of Civil defense and Emergency (Oremi), Hernán Vargas Canivilo, the volcanic activity was superior to that which normally usually registers....The biggest eruption of the Láscar happened in April of 1993 and figures third greatest in the history of Chile. In that eruption, the volcanic activity lasted a day and means, where the ashes caused damage in the north of Argentina and arrived over Brazil, which caused interest in the international the scientific community.

SMA reports: 3C454.3 continues to brighten. It is now a wopping 25 Jy at 342 GHz

Calendar

ALMA Events of Interest

(see also Al's ALMA Biweekly Calendar)

2005
 
 
 
 
 
Day Date Time Event location details
Tuesday
April 19
14:00UT
Science IPT Videocon
USA: 877-874-1919 World: +1-203-320-9891
Tuesday
April 19
15:00UT
ASAC Telecon
USA: 877-874-1919 World: +1-203-320-9891
Tues
April 26
1500UT
ALMA Board telecon
Telephone
Change 3/9/05
Friday
April 29
1400EDT
ANASAC Telecon
877-874-1919 PC=185064
Tuesday
May 3
14:30UT
ASAC Telecon
USA: 877-874-1919 World: +1-203-320-9891
 
Wednesday
May 04-5
all day
WVR PDR
Gothenburg, Sweden
 
Wednesday
May 04
2-3pm EDT
NAASC Organizational Meeting
CV-ER311 (434 296-7082)
Tuesday
May 17
14:30UT
Science IPT Videocon
USA: 877-874-1919 World: +1-203-320-9891
 
Thurs
May 26
1500UT
ALMA Board telecon
Telephone
 
Mon
May 30-31
all day
ACA Correlator PDR
Tokyo
Mon-Thurs
May 29-Jun 2
all day
AAS Minneapolis
ALMA booth part of NRAO booth
 
Sunday
June 12
1-5pm EDT
ANASAC Face-to-Face
CfA
 
Tues-Fri
June 21-24
all day
Bands 4 & 8 PDRs
Tokyo
Tues-Weds
June 21-22
1500UT
ALMA Board Meeting
The Hague, Netherlands
 
Friday
June 24
2-3pm EDT
ANASAC Telecon
877-874-1919 PC=185064
 
Weds-Thurs
July 6-7
all day
Front End deltaPDR
Garching
 
Thurs
Aug 4
1500UT
ALMA Board telecon
Telephone
 
Friday
August 26
2-3pm EDT
ANASAC Telecon
877-874-1919 PC=185064
 
Thurs
Sep 22
1500UT
ALMA Board telecon
Telephone
 
Friday
October 28
2-3pm EDT
ANASAC Telecon
877-874-1919 PC=185064
 
Tues-Weds
Nov 1-2
1500UT
ALMA Board Meeting
Chile
 
Thurs
Dec 8
1500UT
ALMA Board telecon
Telephone
 

Upcoming Meetings

IAU Symposium 227 Massive Star Birth: A Crossroads of Astrophysics May 16-20 2005, Acireale, Italy

Astrobiology and the Origins of Life Hamilton, Ontario, Canada May 24-28.

Workshop on submillimeter wavelength astronomy in Cambridge (JUN 13-16).

Star Formation in the Era of Three Great Observatories July 13-15, 2005 in Cambridge, Massachusetts

Astrochemistry throughout the Universe: Recent Successes and Current Challenges 2005 August 29 - September 2; Asilomar, California

Protostars and Planets V 24 - 28 October 2005 Hilton Waikoloa Village, The Big Island, Hawaii

Mm/submm Techniques and Science session, at the URSI General Assembly 2005 October 23-29, New Delhi, India

"IR Diagnostics of Galaxy Evolution". 14-16 November 2005, Pasadena, CA

50th anniversary of the founding of NRAO October 15-19, 2006; Charlottesville, Virginia

ALMA November 13-16; Madrid, Spain

See also NAASC listing

-- AlWootten - 05 May 2005
Topic revision: r9 - 2010-08-03, ToddHunter
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