This agenda is available at https://safe.nrao.edu/wiki/bin/view/ALMA/NaascMinutes2008Sep03

NAASC Organizational Meeting: Wednesday Sep 03, 1-2:30pm ET (1700-1830UT), CV-ER209/TUC-N525/Soc280(SO-conf2)

Meeting Information

  • Call date: 2008-09-03 (Wednesday)
  • Call time 13:00 ET or 17:00 UT
  • Duration: 1.5 hr
  • Non toll-free number: 434-244-6834
  • USA toll-free Number: 866-675-5385
  • Outside USA Number: +1 517-444-6916
  • Passcode: 8445333#
  • Leader: Hibbard

Attendees

  • CV: JStoke, AWootten, JMangum, ARemijan, THunter, CBrogan, BKent, RIndebetouw, MAdams, FLo, JHibbard
  • Soc: BGlendenning, SMyers, CCarilli
  • GB:
  • ATF:
  • Canada: JdF, BMatthews, GShieven
  • Tuc: DEmerson

Action Items from past meetings (RED=OPEN)

  • ACTION: provide revised ALMA EPO plan/staff ramp-up for NAASC EPO effort consistent with planned funding level
    • WHO: M.Adams/J. Stoke
    • DUE: Dec 15 -> Sep 15
    • DONE:
    • NOTES: reassigned to J. Stoke
  • ACTION: Write revised NAASC proposal: budget methodology; changes from Washington review
    • WHO: Hibbard
    • DUE: Jan-30
    • DONE: New budget done 11/13. Need text.
  • ACTION: meet with James diF during Massive08 meeting to discuss CA contribution to NA ARC activities in FY09
    • WHO: Lonsdale, Hibbard
    • DUE: Sept 27
    • DONE:
    • NOTES: Gerald will join
  • ACTION: get ANASAC written material on NA ARC prior to f2f meeting
    • WHO: Hibbard
    • DUE: 9/5/2008
    • DONE:
    • NOTES: FY08 program report, FY09 program plan, FY09-FY13 LRS
  • ACTION: make sure Jennifer has all arrangements made for ANASAC f2f
    • WHO: Crystal
    • DUE: 9/5/2008
    • DONE:
    • NOTES:
  • ACTION: Review NAASC webpage you are responsible for (see assignments) prior to monthly NAASC Org. Meeting
    • WHO: Everyone
    • DUE: prior to meeting
    • DONE:

Action Items from this meeting:

  • ACTION: Have Splatalogue "Users focus group" to decide priorities for splatalogue between now and March
    • WHO: Remijan, Wootten, Brogan, Hunter, Hibbard
    • DUE: 9/9/2008
    • DONE:
    • NOTES:

Agenda

  • NAASC News (Hibbard)
    • Our 2nd CSV offer was declined. Must re-advertise. Have a number of positions to fill. Carol is working on this closely with OSAA. JAO will advertise 6 positions
    • Planning: 2008Q3 quarterly report done, FY08 Progress Report submitted, FY09 Program Plan in draft. Can read these in material submitted to ANASAC (see below)
    • The Canadian MOU should be signed. CL/JH will meet with James diF during Massive08 meeting to discuss CA contribution to NA ARC activities in FY09
    • Canadians have several new players in the Millimeter Astronomy Group (MAG) at HIA (note: the MAG is responsible for the Canadian in-kind contribution to NA ARC core support). These include Gerald Schieven, who will become the MAG leader on November 1, and Brenda Matthews. James will remain a Canadian ARC representative. All three will likely attend these monthly telecons.
    • JH goes to Mitaka Sep 16-21 for SciOps IPT f2f meeting. Needs helpdesk document draft by then

  • Project News (Wootten)
  • ANASAC (Carilli)
    • Last telecon: 25 July 2008 Agenda
    • Working on charge on "Community Support" & ALMA preparatory work, use of NA ALMA prototype antenna (see also email from Mirabel), next NAASC workshop, plus ASAC charges
    • Plans being made for next f2f meeting (Sept 12 in CV). Agenda?
      • Will point them to the following material by weeks end: NAASC.ANASACf2f08.doc (includes FY08 program report, draft of FY09 program plan, FY09-FY13 LRS). Also CASA summary from Crystal

  • Main Event:
    • NRAO eNews: article on Carol. Should have something on larger NAASC when we are all here.
    • Preparing for ALMA spectral line capabilities. From Fred Lo:
Another issue should be placed on the agenda on the ANASAC meeting if
possible.   It is the planning and coordination of developing the
necessary tools to analyze the overwhelming spectroscopic data
especially in Galactic observations.   One can divide up the needs in 3
broad categories:  1. Line catalog; 2. the analysis and viewing tools
for the data cube (containing hundreds or thousands of line); 3.
modeling of radiative transfer through clouds for extracting the physics
and chemistry from the data cube.  How do we organize the US and other
communities to form a comprehensive and yet non-overlapping
international effort to make sure these tools are available by 2012?
For example, this important task can form a significant part of the
pre-ALMA research and development activities to be funded by the NSF.
    • Note: we do plan to hire NAASC postdoc to help support splatologue next year, as Tony will be owned by CSV
    • What do we do? What do we get others to do? How coordinate?
    • NAASC Priorities:
      • No. 1 has to be that what is in Splatalogue is bulletproof
      • No. 2 is for Splatalogue to be one-stop-shopping for all your line list needs
      • After that? Tool to predict spectra for LTE of optical thin lines? Templates? Visualization? Automatic fitting? Workshop?
      • JH suggests "splatalogue user focus group" next week to evaluate state of Splatalgue and suggest near-term development priorities
  • ACTION: Have Splatalogue "Users focus group" to decide priorities for splatalogue between now and March
    • WHO: Remijan, Wootten, Brogan, Hunter, Hibbard, anyone else
    • DUE: 9/9/2008
    • DONE:
    • NOTES:
  • Reports from Working Groups
    • Software Testing
      • Pipeline testing:
      • CASA
        • Beta patch-2 is out. NOT restricted to external testers. Freely available at http://my.nrao.edu. See release notes for whats new.
        • Preparations for patch 3 on Oct 15: soft freeze Sept 1. Hard freeze Sept 15. Need everyone to spend SOME time (~3 days) testing Sept 15-Oct 15.
      • ObsTool. User Test 5.0 ended in June.
      • Casapy simulator: Workshop Sept8+ in Grenoble. Remy, Rob, Antonio & Al are going
      • ALMA Archive:
    • Calibration Group (JeffMangum): Calibration
    • Imaging Group (AlWootten):
    • Splatalogue
    • Webpages (Aaron Evans):
      • Fred wants NAASC to pioneer science user outreach.
    • EPO (Adams)
      • We still need revised ALMA EPO plan/staff ramp-up
      • Newsletter is now electric, goes out 1/mo. Either contribute NAASC article quarterly (when we do quarterly report), or each month have a different functional assignment area generate an article.
    • NAASC Workshops
    • Upcoming Science Meetings: (Wootten)
      • Cosmic Dust Near and Far 8-12 Sept, Heidelberg
      • Simulation workshop, Grenoble, partially overlaps this. Several to attend.
      • Band1 workshop in Victoria Oct 8-10 - technology & science behind band1
      • One of the special sessions for the 5-7 Jan 2009 URSI commission J meeting in Boulder, Colorado will be on "ALMA Technology, Science and Status".
      • Other Meetings of interest listed at http://www.cv.nrao.edu/naasc/alma_meetings.php

-- JohnHibbard - 30 Sep 2008
Topic revision: r2 - 2008-10-01, JohnHibbard
This site is powered by FoswikiCopyright © by the contributing authors. All material on this collaboration platform is the property of the contributing authors.
Ideas, requests, problems regarding NRAO Public Wiki? Send feedback