ALMA;

Contact Information

  • 2009-Dec-10 14:30 UT
  • Note: Line noise may be muted by pressing *6 which works thru the call center.
  • Duration: 1 hr
  • Toll Number: NEW; Old number cancelled 1-203-480-8549
  • USA Toll Free Number: NEW; Old number cancelled 866-600-8836
  • Passcode: NEW; Old number cancelled 3283890
  • Leader: Richard Hills

Old Business

Three antennas at dawn at the AOS Thanksgiving morning.

Three antennas at dawn at the AOS on the morning of 26th November.

  1. Agenda, Minutes: Agenda and Report of October meeting. Agenda and supporting materials (edm). Notes and Minutes of older telecons may be viewed at the ALMA EDM site Sitescape.

New Business

  1. Membership (Hills) *Current listing (pdf)
    • Our thanks to Andrew Blain and Michiel Hogerheijde, who will rotate off the ASAC at the end of this year.
    • Please check the to see if contact details, etc., are correct.
  2. Project Report
    • Brief status report. See Nov Report for more details. (Please let REH know if you can't access this.) Previous reports can be found in ALMA Monthly Reports
    • As announced, Interferometry has begun at the AOS and this has now been extended to all the receiver bands available so far. On the night of November 21, first fringes at Band 9 were achieved with the DV01-PM03 interferometer at the AOS. Observations of the water vapour maser spectral line in the evolved star VY CMa at 658 GHz were made in good (0.8 mm PWV) conditions on a 160 metre baseline (fringe spacing 0.6 arc seconds). It was a 300 second observation, single polarization observation.
    • Three antennas are operating at the AOS after the 20 Nov ascent of DV02. Two antennas are at the OSF being outfitted for interferometry there by mid-January. R7.0 computing integration and testing is under way. Erection continues on antennas in all vendor camps; the first ACA 7m is a recent addition to those standing at attention.
    • Antennas are now being operated from the Control Room at the OSF Technical Facility.
  3. Schedule: Latest schedule
    • The management team has agreed a plan which would enable us to achieve the goal of having 66 antennas and associated systems completed by the end of 2012. The schedule to achieve this continues to be under great pressure. The most problematic item at present is still the acceptance testing of both the antennas and the front ends.
    • The current management focus is on controlling costs to this schedule. A revised estimate for the final cost to complete the project was presented to the Board in November which showed that very little contingency funds remain. A plan to make savings in order to replenish contingency is being developed. As yet there are no specific proposals to discuss but the ASAC should expect to be consulted about this early in 2010, especially if the savings may compromise the scientific performance or the operational efficiency of the facility.
  4. Reviews.
    • The Review of the Implementation Plan for Operations took place on September 29th and 30th in Santiago.
    • The ALMA Annual External Review took place 16-19 November.
    • The Critical Design Review of the Calibration System took place on 3-4 December.
    • Plans for updating and reviewing the Systems Requirements are being worked on.
  5. Items for discussion
    • ALMA Board and response to the ASAC report.
    • Here is Onishi_san's presentation ASAC_Report_Onishi and the rather thin reply from the Project Response_to_ASAC, as well as the slides on ALMA_Development_Next_Steps which were also presented to the Board.
    • Status Report: Proposal Review Process
    • Other Development Plan items, e.g. additional receiver bands.
  6. Change Requests
  7. Discussion of new Board Charges. These have yet to be determined. Clearly some of the previous topics will carry over from the last set (proposal review, specifications) and others are essentially continuing.
    • Other ASAC activities which are not formal charges from the Board.
    1. Community sounding on expectations for early science, and ALMA information resources for the general community.
    2. ASAC will continue to look for ways in which ALMA construction and operations might be more environmentally friendly, especially in terms of energy use (without compromising science).
  8. Reports from regional Project Scientists (Testi, Morita, Wootten)
  9. and from the advisory committees:
    • ESAC Report (Tacconi)
    • ANASAC Report (Johnson) Discussion ongoing concerning 2010 Workshop planning.
    • EASAC Report
  10. Astronomer Outreach: Main JAO website, ESO Newsletter, NAOJ News, NRAO Newsletter, NRAO ALMA Calendar.
  11. AOB
  12. Next Meeting

Science Corner:

Calendar

2010
 
 
 
 
 
Day Date Time Event location details
Su-Th
3-7 Jan
 
215th AAS Meeting
Washington
 

Events of Interest

(see also Al's ALMA Biweekly Calendar)

Upcoming Meetings

See ALMA related meetings.

-- AlWootten - 2009-12-04

Topic attachments
I Attachment Action Size Date Who Comment
1_page_Gantt_charts_Status_Update_09Oct16.pdfpdf 1_page_Gantt_charts_Status_Update_09Oct16.pdf manage 349 K 2009-12-04 - 13:51 AlWootten ALMA Schedule Gantt Charts
AEDM_2009-043-O_Calendar_of_ALMA_Board_Meetings_and_Telecons_for_2010-1.pdfpdf AEDM_2009-043-O_Calendar_of_ALMA_Board_Meetings_and_Telecons_for_2010-1.pdf manage 32 K 2009-12-04 - 13:52 AlWootten Calendar of ALMA Board Meetings and Telecons for 2010
ALMA_Development_Next_Steps.pdfpdf ALMA_Development_Next_Steps.pdf manage 11 K 2009-12-10 - 11:18 RichardHills  
ASAC_Report_Onishi.pdfpdf ASAC_Report_Onishi.pdf manage 324 K 2009-12-10 - 11:16 RichardHills  
List_of_ASAC_members_-_as_of_September_2009.pdfpdf List_of_ASAC_members_-_as_of_September_2009.pdf manage 27 K 2009-12-09 - 20:52 RichardHills  
Response_to_ASAC.pdfpdf Response_to_ASAC.pdf manage 13 K 2009-12-10 - 11:17 RichardHills  
Topic revision: r4 - 2009-12-12, RichardHills
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