From aaron.robotham at uwa.edu.au Thu Jun 14 12:03:07 2018 From: aaron.robotham at uwa.edu.au (Aaron Robotham) Date: Thu, 14 Jun 2018 02:03:07 +0000 Subject: [ASA] PhD opportunities at ICRAR-UWA Message-ID: To Whom it May Concern, It would be greatly appreciated if the below could be forwarded on to keen astronomy (and even comp-sci) students who you think might be interested in doing a PhD. All the best, Aaron ?? PhD scholarships in astrophysics at the International Centre for Radio Astronomy Research, UWA The University of Western Australia (UWA) node of the International Centre for Radio Astronomy Research (ICRAR) invites applications for its PhD program. ICRAR is one of Australia?s top astronomical research institutes. Established in 2009 as a high profile equal joint venture between Curtin University and UWA, ICRAR is a leading organization in the international Square Kilometre Array project. ICRAR/UWA hosts a vibrant and friendly research environment where PhD students carry out cutting-edge projects in observational and theoretical astrophysics, often including work in "Big Data" methodologies and technologies. ICRAR/UWA researchers play leading roles in programs that exploit state-of-the-art radio telescopes (e.g. ASKAP), exquisite multi-wavelength datasets (e.g. GAMA, SAMI), and the latest galaxy formation models run on powerful HPC facilities, such as the Pawsey Supercomputing Centre. Situated on the Swan River, UWA is one of Australia?s most picturesque campuses. Its open courtyards lush and verdant, are a place to study and relax, taking advantage of Perth?s beautiful climate. A range of PhD scholarships are available, covering tuition fees, health insurance, living allowance support and research/travel expenses. For details about ICRAR/UWA's PhD program, including eligibility requirements and potential projects, follow the web links below. There are separate rounds for international and domestic applicants. International applicants are requested to submit an Expression of Interest, which must include a 1-page cover letter indicating PhD project(s) of interest, a detailed C.V. and academic transcripts following the instructions on the application website (https://protect-au.mimecast.com/s/8njXCANZvPiJK8JMIG99hq?domain=tinyurl.com) by July 15, 2018. Domestic and UWA international graduates should apply by July 13, 2018 following the instructions at this link: http://www.scholarships.uwa.edu.au/futurestudents/postgrad (there is no Expression of Interest process for domestic applicants). ICRAR/UWA is committed to equity and diversity and encourages applications from all qualified candidates. Related URLs: Description of PhD projects (select Project Node= ICRAR-UWA) UWA Future Postgraduate entry requirements International Centre for Radio Astronomy Research ?? ------------------------------------------ Dr Aaron S.G. Robotham Research Assistant Professor & Senior Research Fellow Room: G44, KJM Building, UWA, 7 Fairway, Crawley, Perth, WA 6009 Post: ICRAR M468, UWA, 35 Stirling Highway, Crawley, Perth, WA 6009 Tel: (+61) 08 6488 5564 Email: aaron.robotham at uwa.edu.au WWW: www.researchgate.net/profile/Aaron_Robotham ICRAR: Discovering the hidden Universe through radio astronomy [cid:79666969-E22F-4D7A-A6B9-695B7AEBBC3B at pawsey.org.au] www.icrar.org | Subscribe to ICRAR's eNewsletter | ICRAR on Twitter | ICRAR on Facebook -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: PastedGraphic-1.tiff Type: image/tiff Size: 41804 bytes Desc: PastedGraphic-1.tiff URL: From james.murray at astronomyaustralia.org.au Thu Jun 14 16:55:18 2018 From: james.murray at astronomyaustralia.org.au (James Murray) Date: Thu, 14 Jun 2018 16:55:18 +1000 Subject: [ASA] Call for nominations to the AAL Science Advisory and Project Oversight Committees In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: Dear ASA members, I quick reminder that Astronomy Australia Limited is calling for nominations to sit on two new advisory committees, the AAL Science Advisory Committee and on the AAL Project Oversight Committee. These committees will make important contributions to the decisions AAL makes regarding investing over nine million dollars each year in infrastructure for astronomical research. Details of the committees and their terms of reference can be found in the attached pdf file. Nominations are sought from all interested candidates with relevant skills and experience. Applications close at 5pm AEST on Tuesday the 19th of June. For more details email applications at astronomyaustralia.org.au or contact us on the phone on the numbers below Mark McAuley, CEO, 03 9214 8036 James Murray, Senior Program Manager, 03 9214 8426 Mita Brierley, Senior Program Manager, 02 9850 6371 -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: AAL Committee Advertisement 2018.pdf Type: application/pdf Size: 187391 bytes Desc: not available URL: From richard.mcdermid at mq.edu.au Thu Jun 14 19:26:32 2018 From: richard.mcdermid at mq.edu.au (Richard McDermid) Date: Thu, 14 Jun 2018 09:26:32 +0000 Subject: [ASA] MAVIS Science Update: Email list, ESO TLRs, and revised White Paper deadline: 15th July In-Reply-To: <856813C8-6649-4705-AADB-B93E605F8460@mq.edu.au> References: <421E9666-59EF-43EC-B012-B1B53E99E20F@mq.edu.au> <5D7A059F-F3D7-4B25-B228-C6F44E081138@mq.edu.au> <856813C8-6649-4705-AADB-B93E605F8460@mq.edu.au> Message-ID: Dear ASA Colleagues, This email provides a progress update on ?MAVIS? - a new AO-fed optical imager and spectrograph for the VLT that Australia is leading in response to a recently issued call for instrument proposals by ESO. In summary: 1) Following the release of the call for proposals from ESO, we have revised the submission deadline for final MAVIS White Papers to July 15th. There is still time to get involved! 2) To receive future updates on the MAVIS project, please sign up to the MAVIS mailing list by emailing project-scientist at mavis-ao.org, with subject ?MAVIS email list?. More details are given below. You can also follow the progress of MAVIS via the project blog: https://protect-au.mimecast.com/s/09BTCGvmB5iZrXqjUKpg_H?domain=mavis-ao.org. Best wishes, Richard McDermid (MAVIS Project Scientist) Francois Rigaut (MAVIS Principle Investigator) https://protect-au.mimecast.com/s/09BTCGvmB5iZrXqjUKpg_H?domain=mavis-ao.org ?? Update on MAVIS White Papers We have had an impressive international response so far to our call for MAVIS White Papers, with around 50 individual projects proposed involving over 110 researchers, spanning a broad range of science. The current list of projects and authors is available here: https://protect-au.mimecast.com/s/VdHFCK1qJZtxQp93C3zpKV?domain=mavis-ao.org. Author affiliations indicate 60% of authors are from our Italian partners, 20% from within Australia, and the remainder from various ESO and non-ESO member countries. There is still time for you to put your science case forward as a White Paper if you have not expressed your interest already, and you are very much encouraged to do so. Please see the MAVIS pages for more details, and/or get in touch via project-scientist at mavis-ao.org. ESO Call for Proposals: Top-Level Requirements (TLRs) ESO has now formally issued a call for proposals for a visible AO instrument. The MAVIS consortium has confirmed with ESO its intention to respond to this call by submitting a proposal by the deadline in mid September. The call for proposals includes a set of Top-Level Requirements (TLRs), which describe the baseline instrument capabilities. Briefly summarising the key points for the imager and spectrograph (please see the linked document above for the full requirements): Imager: - U-z-band capabilities - >30 arcsec diameter field - Strehl ratio >7-10% (depending on tip-tilt star brightness) - Sensitivity of V=29th mag in 1 hour with S/N>=5 Spectrograph: - R>5000 - Wavelength coverage 370-950nm - IFU capability with 3? diameter minimum field of view - Simultaneous sky capability - Diffraction limited in R-band - Sensitivity of S/N>=10 at V=24 Sky coverage: >=50% at the Galactic pole (for faint-end performance, >=7% Strehl in V-band) These are in line with expectations, though the spectrograph and overall performance are now specified more clearly. Impact for the White Papers While the TLRs are similar to what was anticipated in our White Paper call, we would like to provide additional time for authors to incorporate this information into their MAVIS White Papers, if needed, and address more clearly how the proposed science aligns with these TLRs specifically. We therefore extend the final deadline for White Papers to July 15th, 2018. For those of you who already submitted a final version, please feel free to make any modifications you like, and resubmit by this revised date. For those of you who have not yet indicated your intention to submit a paper, there is still time to do so. During the recent MAVIS Sydney workshop and institution visits, we have discussed alternative concepts for MAVIS, and in particular around the spectrograph concept. While the TLRs clearly outline a 3 arcsec diameter contiguous-field IFU, we are still very open to exploring additional spectrograph concepts as part of the Phase A process. Therefore, if your science case requires (or could benefit from) additional spectroscopic capabilities within reason - for example: multi-object capabilities across the 30arcsec field; a spectral resolution <5000; multi-IFU capabilities; or a larger IFU field, perhaps with coarser sampling - then please include (and justify) such requirements within your White Paper. The same holds for other additional capabilities, e.g., tuneable filters. MAVIS email list To start connecting the MAVIS community more broadly (and to avoid further traffic through the ASA exploder), we are creating a dedicated mailing list for future important updates on the MAVIS project. If you would like receive these periodic updates, even if you just want to know what is going on but are not intending to author a White Paper, then please send an email to project-scientist at mavis-ao.org, with the subject ?MAVIS email list?. We will be careful not to over-use the list, with more frequent updates coming through other channels (such as the MAVIS blog: https://protect-au.mimecast.com/s/09BTCGvmB5iZrXqjUKpg_H?domain=mavis-ao.org). As usual, if you have any questions or comments, or if anything is unclear, please feel free to get in touch. Hope to see many of you in person at the ?ESO? special session of the ASA meeting later this month. With best regards, Richard & Francois -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From Paul.Francis at anu.edu.au Fri Jun 15 12:08:48 2018 From: Paul.Francis at anu.edu.au (Paul Francis) Date: Fri, 15 Jun 2018 02:08:48 +0000 Subject: [ASA] 2018B SkyMapper Call for Proposals Message-ID: SkyMapper Call for Proposals for non-survey time on the SkyMapper Telescope: Semester 2018B (Jul-Dec) Application deadline: 23:59 on 24 June 2018 Hours available: --------------------- dark: 32.5hrs -- ANU: 25.0hrs, AU: 7.5hrs grey: 25.0hrs -- ANU: 19.5hrs, AU: 5.5hrs bright: 14.5hrs -- ANU: 11.0hrs, AU: 3.5hrs -------------------------------- Total: 72.0hrs -- ANU: 55.5hrs, AU: 16.5hrs dark - Moon phase < 35% + Moon phase < 65% when Moon below the horizon grey - Moon phase 35-65% when Moon in the sky + Moon phase 65-94% bright - Moon phase > 94% ------------ How to apply ------------ For full instructions for proposals and information on SkyMapper please refer to http://www.mso.anu.edu.au/~skymap/instructions_SMprop.html Additional Notes for 2018B The SkyMapper mosaic is currently operating without 1 of its 64 amplifiers. The time scale for restoring full function of the mosaic is currently unknown. Observing time on SkyMapper was made available to the Australian community for a 5-year period, beginning in early 2014. Thus, the 2018B semester is currently expected to be the last "B" semester for which proposals can be submitted. You can only apply for images that will not replicate the observations of the public SkyMapper Southern Sky Survey (all-sky dec < +2, 100 sec images in u,v (6 visits) and g,r,i,z (4 visits)). The SkyMapper team can prioritise public survey fields to a limited extent in any given semester. If you'd like a field to be observed with priority, please do not submit a proposal, but contact the SkyMapper team (skymapper at anu.edu.au) who will help on a best-effort basis. Proposals should not directly compete with SkyMapper legacy science projects, which are listed at http://skymapper.anu.edu.au/science-projects/ All proposals MUST specify how their time is to be broken down between ANU and other Australian time. All proposals MUST specify the required Moon phase (bright/grey/dark) for their observations. This is necessary to ensure the long-term balance between survey and non-survey observations. Proposals should include a two-page scientific and technical justification. Please email your proposal to paul.francis at anu.edu.au before the deadline. If you do not receive confirmation that we've received your e-mail within 24 hours, please contact us again. Your proposal will be ranked by the ANU-TAC and, if successful, forwarded to the SkyMapper team for scheduling and robotic observation. All images will receive basic processing by the SkyMapper Science Data Pipeline alongside survey observations (and thus will be done in temporal order). We also remind users of the availability of SkyMapper Discretionary Time of up to 3 nights per semester in total. Requests for this time can be sent at short notice during the observing semester by email to christian.wolf at anu.edu.au , but will only be granted for urgent and potential high-impact observations that exploit the uniqueness of SkyMapper under circumstances, where a regular proposal could not have been anticipated. ----------------- Telescope Summary ----------------- SkyMapper is a 1.3m telescope with a 5.7 sq. deg. FoV and a 268 Megapixel camera. There are six primary filters (u,v,g,r,i,z), plus an H-alpha filter subject to strong scheduling constraints. If you have any questions not answered in the documentation, the SkyMapper team is available to help (skymapper at anu.edu.au). ________________________________ Prof. Paul Francis ANU Distinguished Educator Mt Stromlo Observatory and Physics Education Centre Room 104, Building 38a Tel: +61 2 6125 2824 or +61 2 6125 8031 The Australian National University http://www.mso.anu.edu.au/pfrancis/ CRICOS Provider #00120C -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: