From vkilborn at swin.edu.au Thu Nov 12 19:16:22 2015 From: vkilborn at swin.edu.au (Virginia Kilborn) Date: Thu, 12 Nov 2015 19:16:22 +1100 Subject: [ASA] Astronomy Governance Message-ID: Dear Australian Astronomy community, Please find information attached about an update to the astronomy governance discussions that were started around 12 months ago. In particular, the terms of reference, timelines and committee membership details are attached to this email, along with a short statement from the committee, and a press release that the Hon Christopher Pyne MP communicated late yesterday. As a representative on this committee, I welcome your feedback at any stage of the process. We will provide updates on the discussions through the ASA exploder. Kind Regards, Virginia Kilborn President, ASA -- Virginia Kilborn Centre for Astrophysics & Supercomputing Faculty of Science, Engineering and Technology Swinburne University of Technology Ph (w) +61 (0)3 9214 4380 http://www.astronomy.swin.edu.au/~vkilborn/ -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: Cover-message.pdf Type: application/pdf Size: 34551 bytes Desc: not available URL: -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: Astronomy Governance Working Group - Terms of reference-2.pdf Type: application/pdf Size: 129874 bytes Desc: not available URL: -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: Minister for Industry Innovation and Science - Media Release - Astronomy leaders advise on strategic stargazing.pdf Type: application/pdf Size: 72016 bytes Desc: not available URL: From john.obyrne at sydney.edu.au Sat Nov 14 01:03:03 2015 From: john.obyrne at sydney.edu.au (John O'Byrne) Date: Fri, 13 Nov 2015 14:03:03 +0000 Subject: [ASA] Invitation to participate in PILOT stratospheric balloon experiment Message-ID: Dear ASA members, PILOT is a stratospheric balloon astronomy experiment to map polarized emission at infrared wavelengths (240 to 500 microns). The main science themes of PILOT are to map the direction of the magnetic field in the Galaxy, and probe the magnetic properties of ISM dust. Deep observations of diffuse regions at high galactic latitude will be used to characterize the polarized foreground emission, and devise methods for removing this component from CMB experiments. After a successful first flight from Canada in September this year, PILOT is scheduled to be launched from Alice Springs in April 2017. We are seeking interested Australian scientists to join the PILOT science team, and participate in the Alice Springs launch. Science team members will contribute to the scientific flight plan, and will have significant autonomy to devise projects that exploit the PILOT data and lead them to completion. The PILOT collaboration especially welcomes the participation of PhD students in the analysis of PILOT science and calibration data. A PILOT information session will take place at 3pm on Friday December 18th at the CSIRO Astronomy and Space Science headquarters in Marsfield. If you are interested to join the PILOT science team or just want to know more, then please come to the information session, or contact the PILOT PI Jean-Philippe Bernard (jean-philippe.bernard at irap.omp.eu) who will be visiting Australia in December and January. More information about the project is also available from the PILOT Australian contact scientist Jill Rathborne (jill.rathborne at csiro.au). PILOT is an international project under the leadership of L?Institut de Recherche en Astrophysique et Plan?tologie (IRAP, Toulouse) and the French space agency (CNES), involving contributions from several European institutes. --------------------------------------------------- Dr. Annie Hughes 9, avenue du Colonel Roche BP 44346 - 31028 Toulouse cedex 4 e: Annie.Hughes at irap.omp.eu *please note that hughes at mpia.de has expired* t: +33 (0)5 61 55 87 53 f: +33 (0)5 61 55 86 92 --------------------------------------------------- -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From scott.croom at sydney.edu.au Sun Nov 15 21:40:09 2015 From: scott.croom at sydney.edu.au (Scott Croom) Date: Sun, 15 Nov 2015 10:40:09 +0000 Subject: [ASA] Early Announcement: "The Changing Face of Galaxies" conference, Tasmania, September 2016 Message-ID: Dear Colleagues, Below is an early announcement message that I hope you will find of interest concerning a meeting we are organising in Tasmania next year. I encourage you to pass this on to others who you think may be interested. Best Regards Scott Croom (for the SOC). ################################################################################### The Changing Face of Galaxies: Uncovering Transformational Physics 2016 CAASTRO Scientific Conference 18 September to 23 September 2016 Wrest Point Hotel, Hobart, Tasmania [Apologies if you receive this message multiple times.] This is an early announcement of the 2016 CAASTRO Conference which will take place in Hobart, on the banks of the Derwent river in Tasmania. Our aim is to consider the key physical processes which transform galaxies across cosmic time. Registration will open in January 2016. Brief Rationale Fundamental to our understanding of galaxy formation is the question of how the galaxies seen at high redshift were transformed into the galaxy population we see around us today. There have been profound changes to the galaxy population in terms of both structure and activity. Structurally, galaxies are known to grow in size and change in morphological mix over time and this morphological mix is also well known to be strongly dependent on environment, with a much higher fraction of elliptical and lenticular galaxies in high density regions. Concerning activity, the global rate of star formation is seen to peak at redshift, z~1-2, declining to the present day, and it is again strongly dependent on environment. Activity due to the accretion of gas onto super-massive black holes similarly declines to the present day. Central to tackling these problems is our ability to observe and simulate galaxies in new ways. Observationally, new projects using spatially resolved spectroscopy are able to shed light on a broad range of physical processes. At the same time observations at radio frequencies are opening up a new window on the gas content in galaxies, and large-scale multi-wavelength surveys are providing coverage of galaxies over their entire spectral energy distribution. Together with this, the last few years has seen a number of breakthroughs in galaxy simulation, including large-scale cosmological hydrodynamical simulations, new views on feedback and the construction of realistic disk galaxies. Our focus in the conference will be to bring together these different themes to discover which processes drive the transformations we see in the galaxy population. Scientific Organising Committee: * Scott Croom (Chair), USYD * Joss Bland-Hawthorn, USYD * Kevin Bundy, IPMU * Sara Ellison, UVIC * Natascha F?rster Schreiber, MPE * Rosa Gonz?lez Delgado, IAA * Martha Haynes, Cornell * Phil Hopkins, Caltech * Lisa Kewley, ANU * Thorsten Naab, MPA * Chris Power, UWA * Amelie Saintonge, UCL * Stas Shabala, UTAS * Rachel Somerville, Rutgers Local Organising Committee: * Scott Croom, Chair (USYD) * Francesco D?Eugenio (ANU) * Kate Gunn (USYD) * Anne Medling (ANU) * Nic Scott (USYD) * Stas Shabala (UTAS) * Jesse van de Sande (USYD) * Dan Taranu (UWA) * Kylie Williams (USYD) Key Dates * Registration/abstract open: 17 January 2016 * Oral Presentation Abstracts Close: 30 April 2016 * Early Bird Closes: 30 June 2016 * Conference dates: 18th-23rd September Best regards, Scott Croom (chair), on behalf of the SOC. ------------------------------------------------------------------------- ASSOCIATE PROFESSOR SCOTT CROOM Sydney Institute for Astronomy School of Physics | Faculty of Science THE UNIVERSITY OF SYDNEY Rm 211, 44-70 Rosehill St Redfern, H90 | The University of Sydney | NSW | 2006 T +61 2 9036 5311 | F +61 2 9351 7726 E scott.croom at sydney.edu.au | W sydney.edu.au/science/people/scott.croom CRICOS 00026A This email plus any attachments to it are confidential. 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