[mmaimcal] FYI: 16 July 07 BIWEEKLY CALENDAR OF THE ALMA PROJECT at NRAO

Mon Jul 30 10:53:07 EDT 2007

Folks

Wrong buffer...sent out the last copy by mistake; please pardon me!

Comments, changes, contributions?

Thanks,
Al
                 BIWEEKLY CALENDAR OF THE ALMA PROJECT at NRAO
                         16 July 2007 - 30 July 2007

******************************** THIS FORTNIGHT*************************
The manufacture of three 12-m antennas for ACA in Japan has been
completed. After disassembled and packed, these antennas were shipped to
the port of Mejillones in Chile from Tamashima port in Okayama on May 27.
On July 13 the antennas arrived at the port, went through customs
clearance and were safely transported to the Operations Support Facility
(OSF) at 2900m elevation in the ALMA construction site on July 22. The
huge antenna mounts  were loaded on large-sized trailers and traveled 400
km to the OSF over a period of about one week. Assembling and adjustment
of three antennas will be completed in September 2007. There are now four
12m antennas at the OSF.
----------------------------------------------------------------------
The House Appropriations Committee has sent to the floor H,R.3093 that
would increase the FY 2008 budget for the National Science Foundation by
10.0 percent or $591.8 million to $6,509.0 million.  Last week, the Senate
Appropriations Committee has sent to the floor S.1745, an FY 2008
appropriations bill that would increase the National Science Foundation's
budget by 10.8 percent (see Report 110-124 for details).  In Report
110-240
the House Appropriations Committee report stated:  "The Committee
recommendation includes requested funding of $244,740,000 for the
following continuing projects: $102,070,000 for Atacama Large Millimeter
Array (ALMA)..."  The Senate report also recommended provision of the
requested funding.  Upon passage by both legislative branches and
signature by the President, this would provide the sixth year of ALMA
construction funding.

The Senate Report further "recommends the requested amount of $52,740,000
for the operations of the National Radio Astronomy Observatories. The
operations, maintenance, and development of new instrumentation at the
Very Large Array, the Very Long Baseline Array, and the Green Bank
Telescope allow these world-class facilities to provide valuable research
into the origins of the universe."
----------------------------------------------------------------------

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
Photos of activity may be found at:
http://www.alma.nrao.edu/almanews/almagallery/index.html
Sky:  Comet LINEAR (C/2006 VZ13) will fade gradually until perihelion, its
closest approach to the Sun, on August 10th. The weak Southern Delta
Aquarid meteor shower should produce some meteors the week beginning 23
Jul.  Venus and Saturn are low in the sky at sunset, ceding dominance of
the late evening sky to Jupiter, south of which the Moon passes July
24-25.

SCO (Santiago Central Office):  Human resources managers meet in Santiago.
Rainy cold and even snowy weather.

AOS (Array Ops Site, 16570ft altitude):   Sky transparency has been
excellent over the past week--often below 1mm PWV with several nights
remaining below 0.5mm PWV.

OSF (Ops Support Facility, 9600ft altitude):  There are 463 people
working at the ALMA site. Three mounts for the NAOJ 12m antennas have
arrived at the OSF and have been erected. Other components of these
antennas have been delivered.  Work continues on the AEM antenna lay down
facilities.  Vertex and ALMA cabling is ongoing in the first antenna. 
Major components of the second antenna are expected to leave northern
hemisphere ports in early August.  PAS for the optical pointing telescope
will be held 25-27 July.

ATF:  The first steps towards dynamic interferometry were taken with the
successful use of the control software to set the delay of the
digitizer clock.  Preproduction backends were installed on the Vx antenna
and the evaluation receiver re-installed.  Preproduction backends will now
go on the AEC antenna.

AOC: The new 2-station correlator has arrived; installation at the ATF
will begin early August.  Dick Sramek will be departing Socorro on 01 Sept
to train on sub-mm observing techniques before taking up duties in early
’08
as a test scientist for AIV in Chile. Gene Duvall will assume
responsibility for management of the P-SI engineering group on 01 Sept,
coincident with Computing IPT taking over the scheduling of ATF
activities.  Fabio Marchet moved to NRAO AOC in Socorro, beginning his
stay on 2007-07-17.

NTC (NRAO Technology Center):  The 2-antenna correlator was shipped to the
ATF.  Testing and integration of the 2 antenna correlator at ATF is
foreseen for the first week of August.

NAASC: The transformational science ALMA will enable in the field of
protostellar and debris disks is detailed in presentations from the very
successful NAASC conference, available online at
http://www.cv.nrao.edu/naasc/disk07/.  The ANASAC will meet at the NAASC
on 17 August.
A calendar of NAASC events may be found at:
http://www.cv.nrao.edu/naasc/calendar/calendar.php
The workshop 'Transformational Science with ALMA: Through Disks to
Stars and Planets' was held 22-24 June 2007
is under way:  See http://www.cv.nrao.edu/naasc/disk07/ for presentations.
***************************************************************************
DAILY CALENDAR (Times EDT/EST ) see
https://wikio.nrao.edu/bin/view/ALMA/AlmaCalendar
  Sun  15 Jul -
  Mon  16 Jul - Holiday Chile--DÌa de la VÌrgen del Carmen
                Holiday Japan--Ocean Day (umi no hi)
3:30PM: PSI/ATF telecon
  Tue  17 Jul -
10:30 AM-11:30 AM: JAO IPT Telecon
  Wed  18 Jul - Holiday US
10:30AM: Science IPT telecon
  Thu  19 Jul -
  Fri  20 Jul -
 4:00pm: Molecular Astrophysics Group, NAASC with presentations from Frank
          Lovas, John Yates and Paul Ruffle (GB).
  Sat  21 Jul -
  Sun  22 Jul -
2:29AM - first quarter moon
  Mon  23 Jul -
  Tue  24 Jul -
10:30 AM-11:30 AM: JAO IPT Telecon
  Wed  25 Jul -
  Thu  26 Jul -
  Fri  27 Jul -
  Sat  28 Jul -
  Sun  29 Jul -
  Mon  30 Jul -
Full Moon
****************************** UPCOMING EVENTS *************************
  Jul 26                          ALMA Board Telecon
  Aug 1                           ASAC telecon
  Aug 17                          ANASAC f2f             Cville
  Sep 3                           ALMA/Eu Community Day  ESO
  Sep 10-12                       Ann. ALMA External Rev Santiago
  Sep 27-28                       B3 CDR                 Cville
  Oct 1-2                         B6 CDR                 Cville
  Oct 28-31                       ALMA Board Meeting  Santiago&San Pedro
******************************* TECHNICAL NEWS *************************
*****************************ALSO OF INTEREST***************************
Proposals for observations using CARMA during the period 1 January to 30
June 2008 are due on 13 September 2007. Detailed information, including
capabilities to be offered this semester, sensitivities, and proposal
submission instructions, may be found at the CARMA website,
http://www.mmarray.org.
***************************************************************************
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