ANASAC telecon 17 Oct 2010
https://safe.nrao.edu/wiki/bin/view/ALMA/26Oct10Agenda
Carol Lonsdale, Al Wootten, Debbie Padgett, Alycia Weinberger, Johnn
Carpenter, Darryl Emerson, Kelsey Johnson, Dick Crutcher, John Hibbard,
Neal Evans, Hsien Shang, Rachel Osten, Douglas Scott, Andrew Baker, Mark Lacy
Status
(A. Wootten, D. Emerson, C. Lonsdale, J. Hibbard)
8 antennas at the high site. Two Vertex atennas at the OSF linked for
interferometer testing (4 total at OSF). Overall 16 Vertex antennas in
various states. Nine NAOJ antennas also present. First European
antenna moving along, currently undergoing holography and
pointing. Delivered surface quality better than spec, surface
adjustment proceeding. Scheduled to be accepted in March (experience
suggests this could be optimistic). ES 16 antennas schedule for 1st
week of April is acheivable. Science ops and CSV reviews went
well. Need to improve archive functionality and internal
communications between engineering, testers, and software
developers. Recent fire-suppression related incident at OSF
uncovered some safety issues that are being addressed.
Reliability update: one to a few hours lost each night due to problems.
Reliability is much improved since July.
Antenna delivery rate: it continues to be lower than desirable.
Status of correlator: One quadrant working, 2 quadrants on
site being wired for 32 antennas, quadrant no. 4 in C'ville for
software testing.
Draft letter to NSF
(A. Bolatto)
Several suggestions which will be incorporated into the next draft
to be circulated soon.
Review of ASAC meeting
(A. Baker, A. Wootten)
Feb 1st date for ES supported by hardware review, operations review
suggests maybe a month later. Hardware will be in place by September
for observations, but software (and hardware) reliability may be a
concern.
Readiness for ES: Not a "gold plated ALMA". There will be no expertise
requirements, only a clear description of capabilities and
support. There will be no guarantee that an accepted project will be
observed. The priority is to finish the array. If that comes into conflict
with the execution of ES projects there will be no quality compromise
but a reduction in the no. of projects.
The current plan is for ES call in February or March with observations
starting in September. Capabilities: mosaic, polarization,
single-dish, and additional correlator modes with mixed
resolutions. First two are a high priority. SD is a lower
priority. Mixed correlator is not part of the baseline plan. ASAC
suggests that they be accelerated because of importance for Galactic
observations. ASAC highlighted the importance of the UV coverage
available for ES. To make it reasonable, likely ES will take 6 hours,
and the rest of time will be devoted to comissioning.
Proposal review, and handover from phase I to phase II need a number
of policy decisions not yet taken.
Main schedule risks identified: front ends (short term) and European
antennas (long term)
ALMA Development Proposals
(A. Wootten)
Call patterned after European call. European proposals are currently
being evaluated. Some examples are new bands, expanding band capabilities,
array receivers, etc. The US call plans September
2012 as the date for completion of studies, with a 50K$ limit per study.
How will it be publicized? Sent to newslettter email list, and likely
the AAS? Website will have all important documents, including previous
discussions of possible upgrades going back to ASAC report Nov 2008.
How would it be evaluated? Feedback from ANASAC would be
important. Current plan is for creating a committee of people outside
the project with a technical evaluation group from ALMA. There is a
suggestion of changing the language for the funding from "up to 50K$"
to giving it as a "typical" or "amount that can be expected" so as to
not disallow proposals that may be more expensive (but important).
--
AlWootten - 2010-12-01