[mmaimcal] FYI: 7 May 2007 BIWEEKLY CALENDAR OF THE ALMA PROJECT at NRAO

Wed May 23 17:20:27 EDT 2007

Comments, corrections, contributions?

Al

                    BIWEEKLY CALENDAR OF THE ALMA PROJECT at NRAO
                        7 May 2007 - 21 May 2007

******************************** THIS FORTNIGHT***************************
ALMA will be featured in the NRAO exhibit at the AAS meeting in
Honolulu, Hawaii, 27 - 31 May 2007. The ALMA brochure has been updated 
and will be distributed at the meeting.  A video will also be shown.
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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
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General Happenings
Photos of activity may be found at:
http://www.alma.nrao.edu/almanews/almagallery/index.html
Sky: Venus shines brightly as the evening star in the west this month.
Arcturus is shining very high in the southeast--a late-type giant star, it 
will be among the brightest stars ALMA can see. Saturn rides high in the 
evening sky, and Jupiter and Mars highlight the morning sky. 

SCO (Santiago Central Office): Architectural design documents for the 
permanent office are being evaluated by the technical evaluation committee.  
The AMAC meeting previously scheduled for late June has been postponed.
Space at Cerro Calan for AIV personnel has been approved.  The ESO - 
NAOJ Master Agreement for ALMA Goods and Service has been accepted at ESO.

AOS (Array Ops Site, 16570ft altitude):Sky transparency has improved over 
the fortnight, with a long period of low opacity (<0.5 PWV) as this is 
written.

OSF (Ops Support Facility, 9600ft altitude):  There are 446 people working
at the ALMA site.  The backup structure for the VertexRSI production
antenna has been assembled by the pedestal assembly which was erected at 
the OSF site on 27 April. Work is finished in the Vertex Site Erection 
Facility (SEF) area; in this great hall antennas 2 through 32 will be 
assembled.

ATF:  Holography tests have continued on the AEC antenna, producing useful 
images of the surface.  Holography acceptance is anticipated very soon.  
Optical Pointing Telescope (OPT) acceptance should also occur
soon (tests continue on the Vertex antenna).  It has been proposed to 
prolong ATF operation until June 2008.

AOC: Pipeline test report released.

NTC (NRAO Technology Center): Provisional Acceptance In-House for the 
fifth B7 (.85mm) cartridge was held in Grenoble on May 8 and is ready 
for shipment to the EU Front End Integration Center (FEIC).  Acceptance 
tests on the 6th B9 (.45 mm) cartridge have been completed in the 
Netherlands.  Funding for the EU FEIC was approved by the ESO Finance 
Committee.  Tests of the first complete ALMA Front End continue at the 
NA FEIC with measurement of beam patterns.  Main feed patterns were 
measured for holography system #2 at Green Bank.
The 2-antenna correlator is 90% assembled and awaits only some mechanical 
work.

HIA: The third B3 (3mm) cartridge to be delivered has been shipped to the 
NA FEIC.

NAASC: The Computing IPT Design Review 5 was held at the NTC and at the NAASC.  
A calendar of NAASC events may be found at:
http://www.cv.nrao.edu/naasc/calendar/calendar.php
A number of ALMA-related science discussions will occur during the
next fortnight at the NAASC; see the listings below.
Registration for the workshop 'Transformational Science with ALMA:
Through Disks to Stars and Planets' to be held 22-24 June 2007
is under way:  See http://www.cv.nrao.edu/naasc/disk07/ for schedule.
***************************************************************************
DAILY CALENDAR (Times EDT/EST ) see
https://wikio.nrao.edu/bin/view/ALMA/AlmaCalendar
 Sun   6 May - ALMA EPO Working Group meeting in Tokyo. D. Iono and K-I 
Morita have joined the ALMA EPO Working Group as S. Sakamoto and R. Kawabe 
have moved to new positions outside ALMA.
 Mon   7 May - ASAC face-to-face meeting, Tokyo
3:30PM: PSI/ATF telecon
 Tue   8 May - 
10:30 AM-11:30 AM: JAO IPT Telecon
 Wed   9 May - Europe's Day
11:00 - Science Software Requirements (SSR) group telecon
 Thu  10 May - 
Calibration Group
 Fri  11 May - 
 Sat  12 May -
 Sun  13 May -
 Mon  14 May - FE Optics CDR. IRAM
 Tue  15 May - FE Optics CDR. IRAM
 Wed  16 May -
10:30AM: Science IPT Telecon
 Thu  17 May - 
 5:30pm: ALMA Board telecon
 Fri  18 May -
 Sat  19 May -
 Sun  20 May - 
 Mon  21 May - Navy Day Holiday (Chile)
****************************** UPCOMING EVENTS ****************************
 Apr 27          18:00 UT        ANASAC Telecon
 May 2           16:00 UT        NAASC telecon
 May 7-8         all day         ASAC f2f meeting       Tokyo
 May 14-16       all day         FE optics CDR          IRAM
 May 16          14:30 UT        Science IPT telecon
 May 17          21:30 UT        ALMA Board Telecon
 May 23                          Software CDR5          Cville
 Jun 13-14                       Nutator PDR            Taipei
 Jun 18-21                       NRAO 50th Bday         Cville
 Jun 21-24                       Thru Disks 2 Stars     Cville
 Jun 27-28                       ALMA Board Meeting     Santiago
 Sep 12-13                       B6 CDR                 Cville
******************************* TECHNICAL NEWS ***************************
*****************************ALSO OF INTEREST*****************************
Proposals for Caltech Submillimeter Observatory (CSO) observing time will 
be reviewed by an external peer group committee and should be sent by 31 
May for the observing period 1 September through 31 January.
http://www.submm.caltech.edu/cso/cso-call.html
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The deadline for proposals to use NRAO telescopes (GBT, VLA, VLBA) is
1700 EDT Friday, 1 June 2006.  
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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 available at
http://www.cv.nrao.edu/~awootten/mmaimcal/ALMACalendars.html