[ASA] Joint Research Centre on Antarctic astronomy and instrumentation

[Michael Ashley]

Dear colleagues,

I would like to draw your attention to the Federal Government's recently announced Australia-China Science and Research Fund (ACSRF) initiative:

https://protect-au.mimecast.com/s/AG1ZBkTlqxMoh9?domain=business.gov.au
-Joint-Research-Centres

"Astronomy related technology including big data" is the first-listed priority area.

I am submitting an Expression of Interest to UNSW for a centre based on the following themes:

- astronomy from Antarctica
- wide-field optical/IR instrumentation
- international schools on astronomy and instrumentation held in China
- CubeSat Ka-band satellites for bringing back ~250GB/day from Antarctica

On the Chinese side I expect to have a half-dozen institutes/universities involved, as well as the Polar Research Institute of China, which as of this month has a AUD$450 million proposal being considered by the Chinese government for an expansion of astronomy at Dome A.

The centre would provide up to $1 million from each of Australia and China over three years for collaboration. The funds can be used for travel, salaries, equipment.

Each Australian university can submit one proposal, and it will be challenging to be selected from UNSW since we have strong collaborations in many areas with China. I would therefore encourage other universities to also explore leading a proposal. To maximise our chances it would help to have as many universities as possible willing to sign up as partners, and an impressive list of Co-Investigators. The effort required could be as little as writing a letter of support, or as much as contributing cash/in-kind and helping to shape the proposal.

Please contact me ASAP if you are interested. The UNSW EoI deadline is 4 October. The final proposal is due on 15 November.

Best regards,
Michael
-- 
Professor Michael Ashley                   Department of Astrophysics
University of New South Wales       http://www.phys.unsw.edu.au/~mcba