From lucyna.chudczer at astronomyaustralia.org.au Tue Sep 24 12:41:19 2019 From: lucyna.chudczer at astronomyaustralia.org.au (Lucyna Chudczer) Date: Tue, 24 Sep 2019 12:41:19 +1000 Subject: [ASA] 2020A Blanco telescope (CTIO) Call for Proposals for Australian Community ***Extended deadline*** Message-ID: <005001d57281$8bfaba30$a3f02e90$@astronomyaustralia.org.au> 2020A Blanco Telescope (CTIO) Call for Proposals The proposal deadline for the Blanco Telescope in Semester 2020A (February 2020 - July 2020) has been extended and it is now: 27 September 2019, at 17:00 Australian Eastern Standard Time (UTC + 10 hrs) The AAL and NOAO/CTIO is continuing a time-swap arrangement between the AAT and the 4m Blanco Telescope in 2020 to allow our respective communities to maximise their scientific opportunities through access to a broader range of facilities. This semester, there will be 6 nights of CTIO time on the Blanco Telescope available to Australian community. Proposals will be assessed by the Australian Time Allocation Committee (ATAC), and as such they must follow the new ATAC Policies and Procedures and be submitted before the deadline using the Lens proposal form ( https://www.aao.gov.au/lens/). All graded proposals will be provided to CTIO for scheduling. The Blanco telescope offers two instruments, the wide-field imaging camera DECam and the CTIO Ohio State Multi-Object Spectrograph (COSMOS). The purpose-built Dark Energy Camera (DECam) was used for the Dark Energy Survey that imaged nearly a billion galaxies. Note that DECam can produce useful imaging in the reddest filters (izY) on all but the very brightest nights. The COSMOS instrument can be used in imaging, long-slit and multi-object spectroscopy modes. Further details about the available nights and instruments can be found from the last NOAO 2019B Call for Proposals . The NOAO 2020A Call for Proposals is due for release 01-Sep-2019 (MST; UTC-7:00) with the updated information. All scheduled observations will be carried out in classical mode, with observers required to travel to the telescope at their own expense. How to apply for Blanco time All ATAC applicants should check the ATAC Policies and Procedures and recent Policy Announcements . For further clarification on any issue, please contact the ATAC Technical Secretary (aat - at - astronomyaustralia.org.au ). Those who wish to apply for Blanco time should do so using the Lens proposal system ( https://www.aao.gov.au/lens/home ) described below, selecting "CTIO 4m" from the telescopes menu on the first page of the proposal form. Lens proposal submission system All proposals should be submitted with the AAT's online application system Lens (https://www.aao.gov.au/lens/home ), which will open on the day this call is made. This system is a user account based system, which allows for improved security and better tracking of past and current proposals. There is a FAQ available for Lens online, or available via the FAQ tab in Lens itself. All new users must register (https://www.aao.gov.au/lens/register ) with the system. Note that users cannot be added to proposals if they are not registered in Lens. Please ensure that all investigators on a proposal have registered well before the deadline! For any queries or comments, please email: lens - at - aao.gov.au Proposal content Full technical details, outlining how you derived your time estimates, observing constraints, and any special requests should be included in the scientific case (preferably under a separate section heading). Proposers should demonstrate that their team has the skills and experience with the required observing modes to effectively conduct the proposed observations. Proposals should be written so that the content and significance is understandable by astronomers with different backgrounds. If the observations are essential to the completion of a student's PhD thesis, then a full explanation must be given in the science case. No special consideration is given to proposals involving PhD students, except when attempting to schedule proposals near the scientific ranking cut-off, when some priority may be given. A list of the principal targets should be prepared as a separate PDF document. The target list should contain target name, RA (h m s), Dec (d m s), target brightness, and priority. There is a 2-page limit for this target list PDF file. Other document formats will not be accepted. Proposal submission details Prepare your main proposal offline, including an abstract, target list, science case, and technical justification. The science case and technical justification together should be in PDF format, no more than three pages total, with two pages for the science case and one page for technical justification. Those three pages should include all references and figures, use 11pt font (or larger), and have at least 10mm margins. Numerical referencing should be used (e.g. "as shown by [1].", instead of "as shown by Smith et al. (2017)" ). Colour figures are accepted. Other document formats will not be accepted. Submitting your proposal When your proposal details are ready, submit your application to ATAC through Lens, the AAT's online proposal submission system. As noted above, this is a user-account-based system and all investigators on a proposal must be registered. Contacting the ATAC Secretariat Postal Address: PO Box 2100 Hawthorn VIC 3122 Street Address: AAO - Macquarie University 105 Delhi Rd, North Ryde NSW 2113 Australia Phone: +61 (0)2 93724842 E-mail: aat - at - astronomyaustralia.org.au Web: www.astronomyaustralia.org.au/aat.html -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From chris.power at uwa.edu.au Thu Sep 26 11:27:47 2019 From: chris.power at uwa.edu.au (Chris Power) Date: Thu, 26 Sep 2019 01:27:47 +0000 Subject: [ASA] Reminder: Register now for the 2019 Australasian Leadership Computing Symposium (ALCS) Message-ID: <832AF46E-0F9F-4897-A30E-C3A52CF1CE9E@uwa.edu.au> Hi all, A reminder that you can still register - deadline October 1st 2019 - for the 2019 Australasian Leadership Computing Symposium (ALCS), https://protect-au.mimecast.com/s/L2NwCWLJY7i3k3wKH6dUiZ?domain=opus.nci.org.au to be held at the Australian Academy of Science and The Australian National University in Canberra from November 6th until 8th, at https://protect-au.mimecast.com/s/0IEPCXLKZoiAJA7RUVf8eb?domain=eventbrite.com.au . ALCS 2019 will be Australasia?s research supercomputing users? forum, and a flagship promotion of high-performance computing (HPC) and high-performance data (HPD) in Australasia. Astronomy is one of the computational science disciplines that will have its own dedicated stream - the others are genomics, geoscience, climate and weather, and materials science - and one of the aspirations of ALCS is to share knowledge about HPC and HPD in practice within and across these communities. More broadly, it?s an opportunity to extend networks, share leading practice, learn from peers, and build understanding of the role of HPC and HPD in current and future work. The astronomy programme is almost finalised, and will be online soon. We will cover a broad range of topics from a diverse list of speakers over 1.5 days, ranging from * applications of machine learning in radio astronomy, to the * real-time detection of gravitational waves, to * observational surveys and theoretical simulations of dark matter, to the * challenges astronomers face in the exascale computing era. For an international perspective, we will hear from keynote speaker Dr Mark Wilkinson, project director of the UK DiRAC HPC facility. For Australian current and future perspectives, Prof Lisa Kewley, director of the ARC CoE ASTRO 3D and The Australian National University, will be one of the ALCS plenary speakers. Please register by October 1st for what promises to be an exciting event in Australasian research HPC and HPD. Registration ($200 full rate, $50 reduced rate for EMCRs and students) includes access to all plenary sessions and astronomy sessions. Morning tea, lunch, and afternoon tea for Wednesday/Thursday/Friday and the Thursday conference dinner are included. Best wishes, Chris, on behalf of the Astronomy Stream Organising Panel (Minh Huynh, Simon O?Toole, CP, and Katrina Sealey) -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From trevor.mendel at anu.edu.au Fri Sep 27 12:02:25 2019 From: trevor.mendel at anu.edu.au (Trevor Mendel) Date: Fri, 27 Sep 2019 02:02:25 +0000 Subject: [ASA] =?utf-8?q?Second_announcement=3A_=22Apples_to_oranges=3A_a?= =?utf-8?q?_comparison_of_the_simulated_and_observed_Universe=E2=80=9D?= Message-ID: Dear Colleagues , This a second announcement for the workshop ?Apples to oranges: a comparison of the simulated and observed Universe?, which will take place the week of Nov. 18-22nd, 2019 in the Hunter Region of New South Wales, Australia. The focus of this workshop will be on facilitating a fair and meaningful comparison between simulations and observations spanning sub-galactic, galactic, and halo scales. Our plan is for this meeting to be highly interactive, with several invited talks each day and the remaining time divided between science highlights and less-structured time to focus on developing projects and collaborations. The event will be held at the Oaks Cypress Lakes Resort (https://protect-au.mimecast.com/s/RiH6Cr8DLRtMWzDYi7ltu5?domain=oakshotels.com). The registration fee for the workshop is AUD$450, which includes lunch, morning and afternoon tea, and a welcome BBQ dinner on Monday evening. The Oaks Resort offers a range of room options from single rooms (AUD$165/night) to 2/3/4 bedroom Villas (AUD$200-550/night). On-site childcare will be provided. You can find additional information on the website here: https://protect-au.mimecast.com/s/evlfCvl0PoC1RPy5fXaDKb?domain=jtmendel.wixsite.com. To register your interest, please fill out the following form (https://protect-au.mimecast.com/s/1l0XCwVLQmi624RmI9DslT?domain=forms.gle) by Friday, October 4th. We will then contact you with payment details and information regarding accommodation. Please get in touch if you have any questions, and we hope to see you all in the Hunter Valley! Cheers, Trevor Mendel (on behalf of the SOC) SOC: Emily Wisnioski, Lilian Garratt-Smithson, Rob Bassett, Tiantian Yuan, Jesse van de Sande, and Trevor Mendel -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From clancy.w.james at gmail.com Fri Sep 27 13:45:16 2019 From: clancy.w.james at gmail.com (Clancy James) Date: Fri, 27 Sep 2019 11:45:16 +0800 Subject: [ASA] Multi-messenger and high-energy white paper: request for comments Message-ID: <0EE0406F-C209-40F2-A96F-EBB375CEFB1A@gmail.com> Dear ASA members, Please find attached a draft version of the high-energy and multi-messenger white paper for the mid-term review of the 2016-2025 Decadal Plan. Any and all comments are welcome by close of business Wednesday, October 2nd 2019. Please reply to clancy.james at curtin.edu.au A final version of the White Paper will be prepared by Friday October 4th for the Mid-term Review Committee. In preparing this document, I have been overwhelmed by the broad range of astrophysics in which high-energy and multimessenger data plays a critical role. However, I am sure that some aspects have been left out, in particular the theoretical and observational synergies. This is your opportunity to have your relevant science mentioned in the document. In other words, please do not feel shy about sending an email to highlight your personal work - this includes PhD students! Regards, Clancy James -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: High_Energy_and_Multimessenger_White_Paper.pdf Type: application/pdf Size: 5726521 bytes Desc: not available URL: -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: