APO 3.5-m Users Committee Phonecon, 11/17/14 Attending: Suzanne Hawley, Mark Klaene, Bill Ketzeback, Joe Huehnerhoff, Scott Anderson, Rachel Kuzio de Naray, Joanne Hughes Clark, John Wisniewski, Jon Holtzman, David Brown (for Michael Strauss), Mark Hammergren, Jeff Bary, John Bally, Rene Walterbos, and Bruce Gillespie ********************************** User feedback and comments from institutional representatives: o Washington - Scott had no issues or concerns. o Georgia State - Rachel had no issues or concerns. o Seattle - Joanne reported that there was a pointing/software issue on one night that was later resolved. SPIcam worked well, and the seeing was great. o Oklahoma - John had no issues or concerns. o Princeton - David said that the PU users have no reported issues. o NMSU - Jon had no issues or concerns. o Chicago/Adler - Mark mentioned problems with the new Chebyshev tracking routines; these are being worked on with Russell Owen. o NAPG - Jeff said the users are happy. o Virginia - No report. o Colorado - John had no user concerns. o Johns Hopkins - No report. ********************************** Discussion of telescope/instruments report: Mark highlighted the report below. There were two occurrences of issues with the azimuthal motion of the telescope, which are now understood. Also, TripleSpec twice produced corrupted images, and then corrected itself in later image files. Staff at Virginia are looking into it. Joe reported that the new imager, ARCTIC, is currently pumped down, powered on, and he is starting the characterization of the CCD. Bill reported that ARCSAT has been behaving well, although there have been a couple of instances of software glitches. It seems that most ARCSAT users have been happy with the shared-risk observing program. ************************* 3.5-m Telescope and Instruments Highlights 10/22/14 through 11/14/14 0) Overview Weather for the end of October and the first half of November has started to cool off with several nights with high humidity. We have yet to see our first snow fall of the year. 1) Telescope We had two instances of telescope runaways. We believe we understand each instance and have taken corrective measures in software. Otherwise the telescope has been behaving well with the new TCC software. 2) Instruments DIS has been operating normally. Agile is operational. TripleSpec has had two instances of corrupted images. The first instance the problem corrected itself before further troubleshooting could be done. The second is being investigated. Mike Skrutskie is on site and we are consulting with him. SPIcam was operational during this period. Echelle inter-order light is holding with no additional issues. NIC-FPS continues to operate in shared-risk observing mode due to occasional image corruption issue. NFS less than 9 is operational. GIFS is operational. 3) ARCTIC The instrument development is proceeding on schedule. The dewar has a loaner CCD from STA and has been integrated with the readout electronics by Bob Leach. It is at UW for further testing and development. The optics order will be placed within the next few weeks. We hope to start fabricating the remainder of the instrument after the first of the year. ********************************** Report on Board meeting: Suzanne said that the ARC Board of Governors meeting went well, and thanks for all the slides that showed scientific results from the past year. Notable in the past year was the unusually bad weather in September. The overall downtime rate of 0.6% is similar to the last few years and is again an impressive achievement and tribute to the 3.5m staff. The new TCC and ARCTIC development were also highlighted. It was pointed out that with the new GSU partnership and existing leases, we are now financially solvent through 2016, and the plan is that extra income will be invested in infrastructure and instrumentation upgrades. Rene added that the Board was pleased with the stability of the telescope partnership and its operations, as well as the new developments either underway or being planned. Mark led a discussion at the Board meeting on the pending situation at Sunspot with the National Solar Observatory. Although the date may slip, it is currently believed that the NSF will relieve NSO of responsibility for the Sunspot site in 2017. The biggest impact to APO will be access to water. Other concerns entail use of the aluminizing chamber, housing for staff and visitors, and the occasional use of heavy equipment. All these are at risk, and we are discussing with NMSU a proposal to take over limited operations at Sunspot of the critical facilities and services we need. This said, it is apparently not completely clear to us what are the intentions of the NSF when NSO leaves. ********************************** GIFS update: Mark announced that GIFS is up and running, and is being kept cold. The instrument is available for remote use on the telescope, and there is on-line documentation. Engineers at GSFC are planning to bring a photon-counting detector for engineering in 2015. If interested, contact John Wisniewski at Oklahoma or Michael McElwain at GSFC. It is hoped that the new detector will be at APO in the second quarter. Suzanne added that she hopes that ARC users will start to use GIFS as a real facility instrument, and potential users should try it out to learn its capabilities. ********************************** APOGEE fiber link to 3.5m (action item): Suzanne said she is still polling the community to see how much interest there is for a fiber run from the 3.5-m telescope to the H-band APOGEE spectrograph at the Sloan telescope. Based on discussions at the Board meeting, it appears that SDSS is OK with the concept of the instrument being scheduled for use with the 3.5-m telescope perhaps 2-3 nights/month. The Users Committee members relayed the levels of interest for this capability at their respective institutions: o Scott (UW) - mild interest o Joanne (Seattle) - mild interest o Rachel (GSU) - none to lukewarm o JohnW (Okla) - mild o David (Princeton) - no update from last month o Jon (NMSU) - Strong interest, especially potential for Gaia follow-up o Jeff (NAPG) - young stars, mild interest o John (Colorado) - Strong interest, two specific science cases o Don York (Chicago) - Strong interest Suzanne added that we could consider laying fibers between all the APO telescopes, which would provide additional opportunities. Suzanne asked for two people to work with Nick MacDonald at UW to develop a technical and scientific case for the fiber project, either as internally funded or with new funding from external sources. John Bally and Jon Holtzman agreed to be on the panel. Bruce also volunteered, and Don York has expressed interest. Any other interested users are welcome to join, please send email to Jon H. and Suzanne. ********************************** New optical spectrograph design study: Suzanne said that she talked with the ARC Board about the need to replace DIS in the next few years. Before developing a concrete plan for a new spectrograph, we first need to have a group to study what characteristics and science a new spectrograph would address, which would lead to instrumental design requirements. We need to find a Principal Investigator willing to lead the design and construction of the new spectrograph which will likely be a $2M project. This led to an action item: =====> ACTION: Users Committee members to poll their constituents to engage and enlist people who are willing to be involved with the specification and development of a new optical spectrograph. ********************************** Miscellaneous: Suzanne informed the Board at the recent meeting that she intends to step down as Director of the ARC 3.5-m telescope, likely when her current (4th) term ends in December, 2016. A Director search will probably be initiated sometime next year, so there will be some overlap in 2016. If anyone is potentially interested, Suzanne would be happy to discuss the job with them even before the formal search process begins. ********************************** ACTION ITEMS: [open from previous meeting]: =====> Action: users committee to gather information from users about scientific interest in a fiber feed to APOGEE (2.5m) and smaller telescopes on site. Status: Commmittee appointed, other users welcome to join, action item closed. [new from this meeting]: =====> ACTION: Users Committee members to poll their constituents to find people who are willing to be involved with the specification and development of a new optical spectrograph. ********************************** Next meeting: The next Users Committee phonecon will be on Monday 15 December. The agenda and other materials will be sent to the committee members during the preceding week. APO APO APO APO APO Apache Point Observatory 3.5m APO APO APO APO APO This is message 1348 in the apo35-general archive. You can find APO the archive on http://www.astro.princeton.edu/APO/apo35-general/INDEX.html APO To join/leave the list, send mail to apo35-request@astro.princeton.edu APO To post a message, mail it to apo35-general@astro.princeton.edu APO APO APO APO APO APO APO APO APO APO APO APO APO APO APO APO APO