ALMA North American Science Advisory Committee Telecon Phone Meeting 2006-June 30

This page available at https://safe.nrao.edu/wiki/bin/view/ALMA/30Jun06Agenda.

Contact Information

• Call date: 2006-6-30 18:00 UT (Friday)
• Call time 14:00 ET or 18:00 UT
• Duration: 1 hr
• USA Number: 877-874-1919
• Outside USA Number: +1 203-320-9891
• Passcode: 185064
• Leaders: Chris Carilli, Jon Williams

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Attendance

ANASAC Members (Attendees in RED):

• Andrew Baker (U. Md.) (2008)
• John Bally (U. Col.) (2008)
• Andrew Blain (Caltech) (2007)
• Crystal Brogan (U. Hawaii) (2008)
• Todd Clancy (SSI) (2009)
• Xiaohui Fan (U. Az.) (2007)
• Terry Herter (Cornell) (2009)
• Paul Ho (CfA, Harvard) (2008)
• Kelsey Johnson (UVa) (2009)
• Doug Johnstone (HIA/DAO, Victoria) (2007)
• Elizabeth Lada (UFla) (2009)
• Lee Mundy (U. Md) (2007)
• Jean Turner (UCLA) (2007)
• Alycia Weinberger (DTM) (2009)
• Jonathan Williams (U. Hawaii) (2008)
• Christine Wilson (McMaster U.) (2007)
• Mel Wright (UC Berkeley) (2008)

(Bold = Member of ASAC)

NRAO:

• J. Hibbard
• A. Wootten

Agenda

1) Old Business (Hibbard)

Agenda and Minutes of 28 April 2006 meeting. Approved?
Action items from last time:

• ACTION: Find replacement Chair for ANASAC
  • WHO: F.Lo
  • DUE: ASAP
  • DONE: 5/31/2006 - Jonathan Williams (IfA) is new Chair
• ACTION: Schedule AnasacF2f meeting.
  • WHO: Next Chair
  • Due: next meeting
  • Done:
• ACTION: Send UC report to ANASAC
  • WHO: Hibbard
  • Due: 5/30
  • Done: 6/6/2006 - sent in email from Jonathan Williams
• ACTION: Help further define NAASC workshop on Disks
  • WHO: C. Brogan
  • Due: next meeting (6/30)
  • Done:
• ACTION: email comments on Science Support program to A. Baker (ajb@astro.umd.edu)
  • WHO: all ANASAC members
  • Due: before next meeting (6/30)
  • Done: 6/2006 - A. Baker report to NAASC

2) ANASAC membership (Carilli)

• Jon Williams new head
• John Bally new ASAC member

3) ALMA Science IPT News (Wootten)

15 June view of the AOS TB Shell and the antennas of the site testing interferometer. The AOS TB Shell is in place. The interior work has commenced and continues through the current austral winter. At the OSF, antenna foundations are under construction at the Vertex and Melco laydown areas. The ALMA Board approved the OSF contract; construction should begin soon on the OSF building. The Board recommended that all parties sign the Agreement which brings Japan fully into the project. As of the Board meeting, NINS (Japan) and ESO had signed; NSF was expected to by 30 June.

• ALMA Biweekly Calendar
• ALMA Construction Photogallery
• IAU XXVI General Assembly Prague, 14-25 August 2006. There will be an ALMA booth near ESO and NRAO displays.
  • "The ALMA Era for Astrophysics Begins" Aug. 24, 2006 Start time (9:30) End time (12:00) Dressing Room 225
  • ALMA at the IAU Other sessions of special interest.
• ALMA Madrid meeting is filled, with a waiting list of > 45
• Other ALMA-related meetings.

4) New ANASAC role (Carilli)

The role of the ANASAC will become critical in the coming months. As operations ramps-up, we need to move to a mode where the ANASAC has concrete input into the project through formal charges and responses, in a manner parallel to the vital scientific role the ASAC has played in the international construction project.

These needed changes come now because we have a few absolutely critical charges for the ANASAC that need to be addressed by the end of the summer. These charges relate to the funding proposal for North American ALMA operations that has been requested from NRAO by the NSF for October, 2006. The ANASAC represents the community in this process. Please see the Supplemental Material at the end of this agenda for the charges.

5)Charges May 2006, and subcommittee preliminary reports (Williams)

See supplementary material below.

6) ASAC Report (Wilson)

• Face to face meeting place and time (r1.44).
  • The Board has approved a meeting in Florence 16-17 September.

7) ALMA Workshops (Brogan)

• Planning of 2nd NAASC Science Workshop is in early stages. A meeting on disks, with a session including chemistry, was well recieved at last ANASAC meeting. C. Brogan will work on this. Update?
• A sample ALMA Meetings held in 2005-6:
  • The SZ Effect and ALMA (Meeting in Orsay Apr 2005)
  • Galactic and Extragalactic ISM Modelling in an ALMA Perspective (Meeting in Onsala Oct 2005)
  • Stellar Physics with ALMA (Meeting in Montpellier Oct 2005)
  • From z-Machines to ALMA (Meeting in Charlottesville Va, January 2006)
  • Complex Molecules in Space: present status and prospects with ALMA (Meeting in Aahrus, Denmark, May 2006)
  • The fate of gas in galaxies (Meeting in Dwingeloo, NL, July 2006)
  • Subaru-ALMA Science (Meeting in Hilo, March 2006)
  • ALMA Science (Ast. Soc. of Japan Meeting in Wakayama, March 2006)
  • Workshop on Measurement of Atmospheric Water Vapour: Theory, Techniques, Astronomical and Geodetic Applications October 9-11, 2006; Wettzell / Hoellenstein (Germany)

8) Next telecon and face-to-face

• Date of next phone meeting According to our current schedule the next one should be on: 2006-8-25 18:00 UT (Friday)
• Suggest meeting in Charlottesville in the Fall, perhaps 2nd week (11,12), to review input into NSF proposal?

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Supplemental Material

Charges May 2006, and subcommittee preliminary reports (Williams)

CHARGE 1. User Grants program: the grants program is a recommended priority by the decadal committee. NRAO can act as an advocate for the community in this regard, but the real impetus must come from the community. The Grants should not be considered funding for NRAO, but should be considered funding for support for the community use of ALMA. Does the community want a grants-with-observing time program associated with ALMA? What is a reasonable starting amount for such a program? The number we have penciled-in is $10 M/year, which is about $1 per second observing time (similar to space missions).

• Can the ANASAC provide an endorsement letter for a grants program (if that is what you decide), with a rough description of the kind of grants program the user community would like to see, and possibly a guideline as to the amount?

Addition to Charge II:

Concerning Charge II to the ANASAC about community involvement in ALMA ops, we should clarify that we are most interested in getting input on the general process for deciding how development funds are prioritized scientifically, and then the process for deciding how best to implement these priotities. The exact detailed programs are less of an issue, since these will evolve with time, although if they have some specific recommendations in the near term, those are welcome.

One operational model for the prioritization process would be to hold regular (annual?) open workshops to discuss the science priorities of the communities, and then the best means of implementation.

Subcommittee: Fan, Clancy, Weinberger, Bally

CHARGE 2. Community involvement in ALMA operations: The NSF has asked us to identify areas where ALMA operations funding could be spent outside of NRAO, ie. in the US University community. The obvious areas are (i) software development: this could include software to support new ALMA observing modes, or to take advantages of new computing hardware, or advanced analysis routines, such as complex, wide field spectral line analysis and visualization. (ii) hardware development: possibly new receiver bands or advanced WVRs (iii) educational activities: scientific meetings, students, and postdocs support

• Can the ANASAC make a set of recommendations as to where they think the Universities could best get involved with ALMA operations?

subcommittee: Baker, Blain, Johnson

CHARGE 3: A review of the North American ALMA operations funding proposal, prior to submission to the NSF. Community assessment of the proposal is an absolutely crucial task, and should make the proposal much stronger. Can the ANASAC review the draft NSF proposal, and provide a short assessment of the proposed North American ALMA operations funding plan?

subcommittee: ASAC members

-- ChrisCarilli - 28 June 2006