[mmaimcal] BIWEEKLY CALENDAR OF THE ALMA PROJECT at NRAO
Al Wootten
awootten at nrao.edu
Wed Nov 17 17:31:53 EST 2004
BIWEEKLY CALENDAR OF THE ALMA PROJECT at NRAO
November 8 -- November 22, 2004
******************************** THIS FORTNIGHT*************************
The Committees of both Houses of Congress have reported to the floor a
FY05 funding bill for independent agencies (including NSF) which contain
full construction funding for ALMA. Action on an omnibus spending bill
including this funding is expected before Thanksgiving. FY05 will be the
7th consecutive year of ALMA funding.
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ALMA currently operates on a budget defined in 2002 October. Updating
this budget and the ALMA schedule to reflect current reality has begun;
this process is known as rebaselining. Individual IPTs are currently
updating their budgets to reflect what can be built on the available
budget and schedule. These individual budgets will be combined into the
rebaselined ALMA early next year, which will be presented to the ALMA
Board for discussion and approval. In the Spring, NSF will conduct an
invasive review of the by-then rebaselined ALMA.
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Antenna bids have been extended to 2004 Dec 15, after the ESO Finance
Council and ESO Council meetings. The goal stated by the ALMA Board is
"...64 antennas... in equal numbers from Europe and North America, and
the goal of identical products"
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Eduardo Donoso will become the new NA ALMA IPT lead, to replace Simon
Radford who has now joined Caltech to work on the Cornell-Caltech 25-m
telescope project. The JAO has also endorsed this appointment.
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Past issues of this Calendar may be viewed at
http://www.cv.nrao.edu/~awootten/mmaimcal/ALMACalendars.html
*******************************************************************************
General Happenings
Santiago: The JAO began functional operations in the interim quarters on
the 18th floor of No. 3650 Apoquindo.
See http://www.alma.nrao.edu/almanews/santiagoopens.html
SPdA: The bidding procedure for the construction of the Technical
Facilities at the OSF has been started. Currently there continue to be
approximately 70 persons and 24 pieces of heavy equipment (bulldozers,
graders, loaders, trucks etc.) working at the site.
Road construction for the permanent access road continues. Work is
progressing between km 22 and km 28. The formation level between km 15
and 26 is almost complete. Some blasting is being executed at km 21.3.
Mass excavation at the OSF and road construction from km 0.00 to km 7
continues. Approximately 4 km of road formation level have been
established at that area.
Tucson: Work continued on test of the laser synthesizer, support of SI
phase noise tests, rack mounting of assemblies for the SI central LO
rack, design and procurement for the line length corrector, and external
ICDs.
AOC: Two more Vega 1 digitizers from UB have arrived at U. S. Customs.
A review of the new BE requirements document pointed out the need to
complete the LO system analysis initiated but not completed by the
departed System Architect, and to move frequency switching to the 1st LO
synthesizer. Offline (AIPS++) user test started (NRAO)
NTC: Cryostat #1 was cryo-cycled for the second time at the integration
center. The results were consistent with the previous cool down.
A Provisional Acceptance on Site meeting for production cryostat #1 was
held in Charlottesville on November 2. It was agreed that the cryostat
is provisionally accepted. Beam tests for the Band 6 (1.3mm) cartridge
continue. Tests of the prototype bias supply are also being conducted.
Two batches of Band 6 triplers have been cryogenically qualified and
two more are scheduled for testing this week. One complete correlator
station rack and one complete correlator rack have been populated and
brought to life.
The PDR for the Tunable Filter Bank was held Oct 18-20 in Bordeaux. The
third day was a software working meeting. The PDR was chaired by Robert
Laing and it was considered successful; a final report has been issued.
NAASC:
Please see the October NRAO Newsletter for a report.
DAILY CALENDAR (Times EDT )
Monday, 8 November
9:30 AM-10:30 AM: NA Project Office Staff Meeting
10:30 AM-11:30 PM: JAO/IPT Teleconference
Tue 09 Nov
4:00 PM-5:00 PM: NAScienceIPT teleconference (open to all interested
parties) (434)296-7082
Agenda: http://www.cv.nrao.edu/~awootten/mmaimcal/
Wed 10
11:00 AM-12:00 PM: Software Science Req. Group Teleconference
Thu 11
All day event: NRAO Holiday
8:30 AM-10:00 AM: JAO Teleconference
Fri 12
Sat 13
Sun 14
Mon 15
10:30 AM: JAO/IPT Teleconference
11:30 AM: NA IPT Lead Teleconference
Tue 16
10:30 AM-11:00 AM: Science IPT Telecon
Wed 17 Jansky Symposium Charlottesville
Thu 18
8:30 AM-10:00 AM: JAO Teleconference
Fri 19
Sat 20
Sun 21
****************************** UPCOMING EVENTS *************************
ALMA Calendar
* 9 November -- ASAC Telecon
* 16 November -- Science IPT Telecon
* 2 December -- ALMA Board Telecon
* 5-7 Jan 2005 -- UNSC URSI Boulder meeting Commission J
* 6 Jan 2005 -- ANASAC Telecon
* 11 Jan 2005 - ALMA Town Meeting, AAS San Diego
* 27 Jan 2005 -- ALMA Board Telecon
******************************* TECHNICAL NEWS *************************
ALMA Memo # 506 PMD Effects on the Analogue Signal Transmission
P. Shen, N. J. Gomes, P. A. Davies (UKent), W. P. Shillue (NRAO), P. G.
Huggard (RAL)
Keywords: PMD, Polarisation, phase drift, Photonic LO
We address the effects and problems of the polarisation mode dispersion
(PMD) in the fibre transmission system for the Photonic LO. PMD is a
random phenomenon, and varies from fibre to fibre, time to time and
wavelength to wavelength. First, its value directly affects the
efficiency of the LO generation. Then, the long term and short term
stability of the PMD affect the long and short term phase stability
of the delivered LO signal. It is suggested that ultra low PMD fibre
should be used to preserve LO generation efficiency, to minimize system
outage, and also maintain better phase stability (less phase drift).
Measures to minimize the PMD effects are suggested. The polarisation
mode noise at the receiver is also discussed. Any components in the
receiver with large PMD, such as optical isolator, amplifier and
photodetector will result in observable polarisation mode noise in the
presence of large input polarisation fluctuation. A major contributor to
this fluctuation is the antenna wrap, which has to be designed with care.
View a pdf version of ALMA Memo #506.
http://www.alma.nrao.edu/memos/html-memos/alma506/memo506.pdf
*******************************ALSO OF INTEREST************************
Level One Science for ALMA was presented at the DUSTY04 conference by
Carlos DeBreuck http://aramis.obspm.fr/DUSTY04/talks/debreuck.ppt
and John Richer http://aramis.obspm.fr/DUSTY04/talks/richer.ppt
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Please send information for upcoming calendars by Friday evening of the
preceding biweekly period to Jennifer Neighbours or Al Wootten via
e-mail (jneighbo at nrao.edu or awootten at nrao.edu).
The calendar will be issued between late Friday and sometime on Monday
by e-mail to all NRAO scientific staff members and anyone else
interested. A specific mailing list, alma-info, has been created for
anyone wishing to receive it. Past issues are now available at
http://www.cv.nrao.edu/~awootten/mmaimcal/ALMACalendars.html
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