[evlatests] EVLA Demo Science

[Steven T. Myers]

EVLA scientists and testers (pardon if you get this twice) -

Rather than discussing the possible science demo projects in the Transition and 
other meetings in big groups, we have decided to break into smaller topical 
groups.  Note that individuals can also pick their own targets outside of groups 
(presumably there will be some collective mechanism to "grant time").  Each 
group can propose multiple observations of course.  See the notes at the very 
bottom of the message for what capabilities we think we will have for WIDAR-0 
this fall.

Those of you who have ideas and/or are interested in participating please 
contact the topical leaders of the groups listed below. We plan to discuss any 
ideas that have come out of this so far at the EVLA Transitions meeting next 
week (Thursday 3 Sep).

GUIDELINES: The goal of the demo projects is not Fred's ultimate
"Hubble Deep Field" for PR purposes, but small demonstrations of EVLA
capabilities that can be shown in AAS talks.  It is important that we
try multiple things and not worry whether specific observations are
optimal or truly unique.  Lets just show that the EVLA is nearly
working!  We should also plan to continue these over the next year as
new capabilities are brought online but before they are made available
to OSRO (when RSRO people arrive we can fold them in to the effort).

Furthermore, targets should be well-known (e.g. Orion, Cygnus-A, M31,
M82) and all data will be made publically available immediately.

1. Galactic Star Formation

    Leader(s): Chandler
    Participants: Brogan, Indebetouw, Claussen

    Target(s): Orion, Perseus?

    Primary Demonstration: wide spectral bandwidth for line surveys,
    wide-band continuum of galactic plane region?


2. Evolved Stars and Supernova Remnants

    Leader(s): Mioduszewski
    Participants: Claussen, Rupen, Goss, Dhawan, Bhatnagar

    Target(s): some star or another, they're all the same to me :)
               a microquasar? a new EVLA frame in a movie?
               a big SNR?

    Primary Demonstration: TBD


3. Radio Galaxies

    Leader(s): Owen
    Participants: Fomalont, Bhatnagar, Golap, Moellenbrock, Condon, Perley

    Target(s): Cygnus A

    Primary Demonstration: Wide-bandwidth continuum imaging and polarimetry

    Notes: I think having wide-band polarimetry (e.g. for RM) is a nice
    showpiece if it works.


4. High-redshift Molecular Lines and Galaxies

    Leader(s): Carilli
    Participants: Kanekar, Ott, Myers, Johnston

    Target(s): TBD

    Primary Demonstration: Wide-band line surveys


5. Masers

    Leader(s): Claussen
    Participants: Goss, Moellenbrock, Sjouwerman, Condon

    Target(s): whatever

    Primary Demonstration: high-res spectra and wide bandwidth

    Notes: not sure if there is any interesting demos here, maybe something in
    Ka-band (SiO) or in the new part of C-band?.  Also, may be
    overlapped or combined with other topics like Star Formation,
    Stars, and Galaxies (near and far).


6. Pulsars and Transients

    Leader(s): Frail
    Participants: Brisken, Deller, Dhawan

    Target(s): Crab? GRBs?

    Primary Demonstration: wide-band continuum, high time-res
    transients


7. HI in Local Group and Nearby Galaxies

    Leader(s): Ott
    Participants: Chung, van Moorsel, Kent, Myers, Greisen

    Target(s): Local Group Galaxies, Virgo?, HVCs?

    Primary Demonstration: HI spectral line capability, prototyping
    for EVLA HI Deep Field?

    Notes: also could include molecular lines if appropriate


8. Planets

    Leader(s): Hesman

    Participants: Butler, Sjouwerman

    Target(s): there's 7 to pick from, unless you want to stoop to
               dwarf and minor ones

    Primary Demonstration: imaging and spectral capabilities


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NOTES:
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>From Michael -

The WIDAR-0 modes will likely be as following:

  - full pol'n data for 12 antennas, 5 subband pairs;
  - RR (or LL) only for 12 antennas, 10 subbands.

* All this uses 8-bit samplers (input quantization) and 4-bit correlation.

* Each subband can be up to 128 MHz wide.

  - Each subband's bandwidth and channelization can be selected
    independently.

  - You can trade subbands for channels: i.e., use only 1 subband pair
    but get 5x as many channels in that one subband pair.

* Each subband can be placed independently within the single fully-tunable
  1 GHz baseband.

The current thinking has all long (> few hour) observations taking
place during the open LST time (10-12 passes at ~05 LST) during DnC,
beginning 25sep09.  But there may be time at other LST ranges for
short observations in C (if things go well) and later in D.