[ASA] MAVIS Science Update: Email list, ESO TLRs, and revised White Paper deadline: 15th July

[Richard McDermid]

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<mailto: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<https://protect-au.mimecast.com/s/l8AyCJyp0qhLkMy0UGylCI?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<https://protect-au.mimecast.com/s/oH9WCL7rK8tM08XEImWiIR?domain=mavis-ao.org> for more details, and/or get in touch via project-scientist at mavis-ao.org<mailto: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<https://protect-au.mimecast.com/s/GH14CMwvLQTVpm9ETQym1D?domain=eso.org> (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<mailto: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<https://protect-au.mimecast.com/s/l8AyCJyp0qhLkMy0UGylCI?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

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