[mmaimcal] FYI: 18 December 2006 BIWEEKLY CALENDAR OF THE ALMA PROJECT at NRAO
Chris Carilli
ccarilli at nrao.edu
Mon Dec 18 17:11:03 EST 2006
You left out the big one from ops perspective -- submission
of ops plan for review to Board, NSF, ESO... End October.
for the general happenings -- NAASC staff are involved with
extensive CASA user interface testing this month.
cc
Al Wootten wrote:
> Folks,
>
> Comments or contributions?
>
> BIWEEKLY CALENDAR OF THE ALMA PROJECT at NRAO
> 18 December 2006 - 1 January 2007
>
> ******************************** THIS FORTNIGHT***************************
> ALMA's Year in Review 2006 This observer's candidates for the top ALMA events
> of 2006:
> January - Chilean Local Labor hiring agreement between ESO and AUI.
> March - The Board approves selection of the ESO's Vitacura site as the location
> for the ALMA Headquarters building in Santiago.
> May - the National Science Board approved NSF's request for additional funding
> for ALMA. This action provides the NSF Director with spending authority that
> covers the revised baseline as approved by the ALMA Board.
> June - Operations phase ramps up. Chris Carilli has been appointed Head of
> the North American ALMA Science Center, Paola Andreani has been appointed
> ARC Manager for ESO and John Hibbard and Ryohei Kawabe continue as acting
> ARC Managers for NRAO and Japan. Later in year New Operations Plan nears
> completion. Head of Administration for Joint ALMA Observatory hired Dec 06.
> June - first ALMA antenna pad constructed, at the Vertex Site Erection
> Facility at the OSF.
> June - Array Operations Site Technical Building construction contract signed
> by AUI and ConPax.
> July - Amendment #2 to the Agreement Concerning the Construction of the
> Enhanced Atacama Large Millimeter/Submillimeter Array (ALMA) Between ESO,
> NSF and the National Institutes of Natural Sciences of Japan was executed by
> all of the parties, marking the beginning of the trilateral ALMA project.
> August - Operations Support Facility Construction Contract signed between
> ESO and VVMO.
> November - More than 300 astronomers meet in Madrid for the second ALMA
> conference, Science with ALMA: a new era for Astrophysics, held 13-17 Nov.
> December - Signal connectivity through the ALMA prototype system from
> transmitter to correlator achieved at ALMA Test Facility.
> ----------------------------------------------------------------------
> Past issues of this Calendar may be viewed at
> http://www.cv.nrao.edu/~awootten/mmaimcal/ALMACalendars.html
> See also the JAO ALMA Calendar overview at:
> http://www.alma.cl/alma_project
> ***************************************************************************
> General Happenings
> Sky: Saturn rises around 9 pm, Venus emerging from the very early sunsets
> this week. Other bright planets are low in the morning sky.
> The sunspot group causing last week's coronal mass ejections and aurorae
> (http://www.spaceweather.com/aurora/images2006/14dec06f/dmsp1_dec1415.gif)
> has passed behind the solar limb.
>
> AOS (Array Ops Site, 16570ft altitude): Work continues toward the immediate
> goal of enclosing and powering the technical building by late January,
> including an internet connection to the OSF and beyond.
>
> OSF (Ops Support Facility, 9600ft altitude): Work has started in the Vertex
> Site Erection Facility (SEF) area. Excavation for foundations, earth grounding
> and utilities is ongoing. Building erection will begin in January 2007.
> Currently there are 357 persons working on the site of which 187 use the
> ALMA and Contractor's lodging facilities, and 147 live in the VVMO camp.
> Extension of the contractor's camp continues with 80 of 160 new beds in use.
> Delivery date was Feb 2007.
> Images at http://www.alma.nrao.edu/almanews/almagallery/index.html
>
> TUC: D. Emerson traveled to the ATF to assist in PSI tests. Holdaway is
> working on a final design for the extended configuration.
>
> NTC (NRAO Technology Center, Charlottesville): First Band 9 (650 GHz)
> cartridge passed tests on 2006-Dec-12. It will be installed in the cryostat
> after Christmas, joining bands 3 (3mm), 6 (1.3mm), and 7 (.87mm) for the
> first complete bilateral cartridge set in a cryostat. Integrated testing
> for electromagnetic compatibility continues. At IRAM, B7
> Cartridge No. 2 is ready to be shipped to the NTC/FEIC.
> Informal reviews were held by the LO photonics group of the Line Length
> Corrector and LO Photonics Receiver.
>
> NAASC: Planning for the workshop 'Transformational Science with ALMA:
> Through Disks to Stars and Planets' to be held 22-24 June 2007 continues.
> Early registration is under way; registration will open with the new year.
> See http://www.cv.nrao.edu/naasc/disk07/
> A. Hales traveled to the ATF to assist in PSI tasks.
>
> ATF: Prototype Antenna racks have been installed in the VertexRSI antenna.
> The 2-antenna correlator was successfully updated and tested at the ATF.
> Evaluation frontends were used to detect the holography signal, followed
> through to the correlator. Holography testing continues with improving results.
> Software has been updated to post-ACS (ALMA Common Software) Version 6.
>
> ESO: "Today is a great day because the ESO Council has authorised us to go
> forward with the final design of the next flagship telescope of ESO,", says
> Catherine Cesarsky, ESO's Director General, speaking of the decision by the
> ESO Council to go ahead with the design study for an European Extremely
> Large Telescope.
> ***************************************************************************
> DAILY CALENDAR (Times EDT/EST ) see
> https://wikio.nrao.edu/bin/view/ALMA/AlmaCalendar
> Mon 18 Dec -
> Tue 19 Dec -
> 10:30 AM-11:30 AM: JAO IPT Telecon
> 5:59 PM - International Space Station 47 deg above NW horizon.
> Wed 20 Dec
> 9:01am - New Moon
> 9:30am - Science IPT telecon
> Thu 21 Dec
> 7:22pm - Summer solistice occurs in Chile.
> Fri 22 Dec - Half Day (Chile)
> A flurry of meteors may emerge from Ursa Minor (the Little Dipper) on
> Dec. 22nd between 18 and 23 hours UT when Earth runs into a filament of
> debris trailing comet 8P/Tuttle. Meteor forecaster Peter Jenniskens of the
> SETI Institute anticipates as many as 39 meteors per hour, best seen from
> Europe and Asia.
> Sat 23 Dec - Holiday (Japan) The Emperor's Birthday
> Sun 24 Dec
> Mon 25 Dec - Holiday (Chile, NA, Europe) Merry Christmas!
> Tue 26 Dec - Holiday (Chile, NA, Europe)
> Wed 27 Dec
> Thu 28 Dec
> Fri 29 Dec - Half Day (Chile)
> Sat 30 Dec
> Sun 31 Dec
> Mon 1 Jan - International Holiday. Happy New Year!
> ****************************** UPCOMING EVENTS ****************************
> Jan 3 ASAC Telecon
> Jan 16-17 '07 all day Transporter FDR
> Jan 18 '07 ALMA Board telecon
> Jan 29-30 '07 all day B9 Cartridge CDR
> Jan 30-1 Feb all day AEM antenna PPDR Mestre
> Feb 6-7 B9 cartridge CDR Groningen
> Feb 15 ALMA Board Telecon Telecon
> Mar 9-12 all day IPT F2F MEETING Chile
> ******************************* TECHNICAL NEWS ***************************
> *****************************ALSO OF INTEREST*****************************
> ***************************************************************************
> 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 available at
> http://www.cv.nrao.edu/~awootten/mmaimcal/ALMACalendars.html
>
> _______________________________________________
> mmaimcal mailing list
> mmaimcal at listmgr.cv.nrao.edu
> http://listmgr.cv.nrao.edu/mailman/listinfo/mmaimcal
More information about the mmaimcal
mailing list