From muehle at astro.uni-bonn.de Mon Jan 21 16:20:36 2013 From: muehle at astro.uni-bonn.de (Stefanie Muehle) Date: Mon, 21 Jan 2013 16:20:36 +0100 (CET) Subject: [DARC] ALMA news January 2012 Message-ID: Dear Colleagues, a happy and successful New Year to you and your loved ones! In this edition of the German ARC node newsletter, you will find news on the following topics: * ALMA Update: End of Cycle 0 and start of Cycle 1 * First ALMA science data have become public * CASA 4.0.0 released * First announcement: ERIS 2013 * First announcement: Science with ALMA Band 11 * Calendar of Events If you have any questions, please do not hesitate to contact the German ARC node at arc[at]astro.uni-bonn.de. Best wishes, Stefanie Muehle (for the German ARC node) ------------------------------------------------------------------------- ALMA Update: End of Cycle 0 and start of Cycle 1 ================================================ The inaugural ?Cycle 0 Early Science? observing season for ALMA was completed with a 40-hr session over the New Year (Dec. 31 ? Jan. 1). In Cycle 0, data were observed and processed on a ?best efforts? basis; 96% of the 113 ?Highest Priority? projects were fully or partially observed. So far quality-assessed data have been delivered to the PIs for project components (?Scheduling Blocks? or SBs) that reached the requested sensitivity. Over the next two months, the remaining SBs will be reviewed and delivered to PIs. The science program for the next observing season, ?Cycle 1 Early Science?, was announced in November 2012. Observations for the first batch of high priority projects are being currently prepared. PIs of these projects will be contacted by staff from one of the ALMA Regional Centers (ARCs) or their affiliated nodes when the ?Phase 2? materials for their projects are ready for review and approval. Proposers of Target of Opportunity (ToO) projects that were awarded ?highest priority? status will be able to submit triggers for observations that fulfill the selection criteria specified in their proposal as of March 1, 2013. Also as of March 1, the Joint ALMA Observatory will accept proposals for Director Discretionary Time (DDT). Please see http://almascience.eso.org/news/completion-of-cycle-0-observing-and-distribution-of-data-sets-2 for all the details (source: ESO Science Portal) ------------------------------------------------------------------------- First ALMA science data have become public ========================================== It is ALMA policy to make all science data public after a proprietary period of (usually) one year. As the first ALMA Cycle 0 data have been released to the PIs one year ago, these data have become public on Friday, December 7, 2012. The data as well as further Cycle 0 data in the future can be obtained from http://almascience.org/alma-data (source: ESO ARC node) ------------------------------------------------------------------------- CASA 4.0.0 released =================== Linux and Mac distributions of CASA 4.0.0 have been released and can now be downloaded from the CASA webpage http://casa.nrao.edu (follow the link "Obtaining CASA") CASA, the Common Astronomy Software Applications (CASA) package is being developed by NRAO, ESO, and NAOJ and is used for the offline reduction and analysis of both ALMA and EVLA data. CASA is fully scriptable. Full support is provided for ALMA, VLA, and JVLA formats, but almost any data that can be written in uvfits format can be imported and reduced in CASA (for example, CARMA, SMA, ATCA). The release notes and a list of known issues can be found at http://casa.nrao.edu/current_casa.shtml ------------------------------------------------------------------------- First announcement: ERIS 2013 ============================= The Fifth European Radio Interferometry School will take place in Dwingeloo (The Netherlands) during the week of 9-13 September 2013. ERIS will provide a week of lectures and tutorials on how to achieve scientific results from radio interferometry. The topics covered by the lectures/tutorials will include: * Calibration and imaging of continuum, spectral line, and polarization data * Low frequency (LOFAR domain), high frequency (ALMA domain), and VLBI interferometry * Extracting the information from the data and interpreting the results * Choosing the most suited array and observing plan for your project Participants are expected to bring their own laptops, equipped with the most widely-used packages such as AIPS, CASA, and ParselTongue. Examples will be drawn from m, cm, and mm-wave instruments such as LOFAR, VLA, EVN, e-MERLIN and ALMA. The school will be hosted by ASTRON & JIVE (Dwingeloo). The participants and lecturers will be accommodated in local hotels. Participants will be sharing double rooms. The registration fee is 150 euro. It will cover the accommodation and half board for the 5 days of the school, from the arrival on Sunday 8 September 2013 to the departure on Friday 13 September 2013. Please reply to eris2013 at astron.nl, indicating your interest to be notified of future announcements. Forms for registration and further instructions will soon be made available. Note that due to logistical limitations we will be able to accommodate about 80 participants, so we encourage you to express your interest as soon as possible. LOC: L. Elpenhof, S. Mellema , Z. Paragi, R. Pizzo, G. Surcis, C. Toribio SOC: R. Pizzo (ASTRON) & Z. Paragi (JIVE), M. Bremer (IRAM), M. Brentjens (ASTRON), R.M. Campbell (JIVE), R. Laing (ESO-ALMA), J. McKean (ASTRON), A. Richards (JBCA), T. Venturi (INAF, IRA), O. Wucknitz (MPIfR) ------------------------------------------------------------------------- First announcement: Science with ALMA band 11 ============================================= Open workshop: SCIENCE WITH ALMA BAND 11 Queen's College, University of Oxford, UK, March 19th-20th, 2013 There are three atmospheric windows in the 1.0-1.6 THz frequency range. Ultra-high-resolution interferometry in the supra-terahertz windows cannot be achieved using any other ground-based facility, and it would exploit ALMA's capability to the limit. ESO has initiated a study that will result in a report on the scientific case for supra-terahertz operation. The aims of the Workshop are to (i) assess the scope of the scientific opportunities available, (ii) develop the programmes within each of the main themes; (iii) identify synergies with other space-borne and ground- based facilities; and (iv) identify a number of top-level science cases. Topics include, but not exclusively, continuum emission from cold molecular clouds, far-infrared spectroscopy of galactic and extragalactic ISM cooling lines such as [CII],[NII],[OI], and [CI] and CO, light-hydride observations of prestellar cores, and solar-planet and extra-solar-planet observations. There will be no registration fee. If you would like to take part in this meeting, and additionally if you would like to give a 15 min presentation on some aspect of a possible science case, please email almab11 at physics.ox.ac.uk Scientific Organizing Committee: Stafford Withington (Cambridge, Chair) Brian Ellison (RAL) Robert Laing (ESO) John Richer (Cambridge) Dimitra Rigopoulou (Oxford) Leonardo Testi (ESO) Ghassan Yassin (Oxford) The full text of the announcement can be found at http://www.alma.ac.uk/events/science-with-alma-band-11 ------------------------------------------------------------------------- Calendar of Events: =================== 28-31 Jan. 2013 Astrochemistry in the ALMA era, Univ. Copenhagen, Denmark http://youngstars.nbi.dk/alma2013 04-08 Feb. 2013 Magnetic Fields in the Universe IV, Playa del Carmen, MX http://www.nucleares.unam.mx/mfu4/ 19-20 Mar. 2013 Science with ALMA band 11, Oxford, UK http://www.alma.ac.uk/events/science-with-alma-band-11 08-12 Apr. 2013 Transformational Science with ALMA: 2013 Rocks! http://www.cv.nrao.edu/rocks/index.html 22-26 Apr. 2013 The Modern Radio Universe, Bonn, Germany https://indico.mpifr-bonn.mpg.de/indico/conferenceDisplay.py?confId=21 08-12 July 2013 European Week of Astronomy and Space Science, Turky, F http://www.astro.utu.fi/EWASS2013/ 09-13 Sep. 2013 European Radio Interferometry School, Dwingeloo, NL register your interest at eris2013 at astron.nl 24-27 Sep. 2013 Annual Meeting of the Astronomische Gesellschaft, Tuebingen, D http://astro.uni-tuebingen.de/~AG2013/ ------------------------------------------------------------------------- For more information on the German ARC node, please visit http://www.astro.uni-bonn.de/ARC/ ------------------------------------------------------------------------- For more information on this mailing list, please visit http://www.astro.uni-bonn.de/mailman/listinfo/darc -------------------------------------------------------------------------