Project Acronym: OPTICON

Project acronym: OPTICON Project full title: Optical Infrared Co-ordination Network for Astronomy Contract no.: RII3-CT-2004-001566 Integrating Activity

1. Project objectives and summary

The OPTical Infrared Coordination Network for astronomy (OPTICON) brings together all the international and national organizations which fund, operate and develop Europe’s major optical and infrared astronomical infrastructures, together with several world class facilities for solar astronomy located in the Canarian Observatories. OPTICON will incorporate networking, trans-national access and Joint Research Activities (JRA)

Network N1 will manage the consortium. Network N2 will assist in the coordination and integration of the observing facilities at the Canarian Teide and Roques de los Muchachos observatories, described here as the European Northern Observatory Network N3 will identify needs and develop actions to structure the European astronomical community around several large projects such as a European Large Telescope. Network N4 will develop proposals to enhance synergies between space and ground astronomy. Network N5 will develop programmes to bring optical-IR interferometry into main-stream astronomy. Network N6 will provide a forum for telescope directors to monitor and enhance the OPTICON transnational access programme and bring forward co-ordination of plans on developments of mutual interest.

The trans-national access programme will provide access to 17 infrastructures comprising 18 optical-infrared telescopes of between 1.5 and 4m aperture and 4 solar telescopes, as specified in table 6.TA.

JRA-1 will develop the concepts, designs and technologies required for the next generation of Adaptive Optics capabilities which will equip 8-10 m telescopes over the next decade. JRA-2 will define, fabricate and fully characterize a high speed low noise detector for Adaptive Optics applications having high sensitivity. JRA-3 will Investigate the scientific applications and technological challenges required to develop new high speed detectors for applications in astronomy. JRA-4 will develop tools that will enable a larger number of astronomers without specialized technical knowledge to use interferometers for their research and the growth of the interferometric community in Europe. JRA-5 will develop technologies for Integral Field and Multi-Object Spectroscopy and Imaging. This will include technology road-mapping to establish the most promising avenues and links with SME and other research organizations. JRA-6 will develop a prototype European-led technology to build Volume Phase Holographic gratings, a potentially major advance for future astronomical spectrographs.

Close cooperation with the other astronomy I3 and the wider European community will be maintained.

2. Project website address: http://www.astro-opticon.org/

3. Start date: 1 January 2004 Duration: 60 months

4. Access modalities

Eligible user groups are invited to apply under this EC contract in response to the specific Announcements of Opportunity for observing time of the corresponding telescope.

1 No special application forms are needed from research teams applying for time under the auspices of the EC, but standard ones as indicated by the Announcement of Opportunity.

Once a group has been awarded time and informed about this funding opportunity under the present EC contract, any researcher belonging to the user group can apply for Travel and Subsistence support.

As a general rule, only one member from the research team can be supported; additional grants are approved under exceptional circumstances. It is the responsibility of the group leader to decide which member of the user group will be supported.

Further information on how to apply for access can be obtained through our website.

5. Achievements 21,52 % of the total amount of access to be provided under this five-year contract has been already delivered in 2004. This means 310,5 days/nights. All telescopes offering time under the contract in 2004 have received a significant number of applications and all of them have contributed to reach this total amount of access.

64 user-projects have been awarded time during this first year of the Programme, involving 334 users from 23 different countries (members of the user groups). 69 of these users have been granted for Travel and Subsistence (T&S) support when visiting the facility to carry out the observations (basically one observer per project, apart from those special cases in which two grants were needed and awarded).

More than 66% of these visiting astronomers were new observers, and 37 % were young-early stage researchers . The gender ratio among users with T&S grants was 25% female and 75% male

2 6. List of participants

The following legal entities are participants to the contract:

Partic. Partic. Participant Name Participant Country Department/faculty/institute/laboratory Laboratory Date Date Role No. Short Name Short Enter Exit Name Project project CO 1 The Chancellor, Masters and UCAM GB a) Institute of Astronomy IoA start of end of Scholars of the University of project project Cambridge b) Cavendish Laboratory CAV CR 2 Particle Physics and Astronomy PPARC GB a) United Kingdom Infrared Telescope UKIRT start of end of Research Council project project b) United Kingdom Astronomy Technology Centre UKATC

c) William Herschel Telescope WHT

d) Isaac Newton Telescope INT

CR 3 European Space Agency ESA INO Space Telescope European Coordinating Facility ST-ECF start of end of project project Reasearch and Scientific Support Department ESA-RSSD

CR 4 European Southern Observatory ESO INO a) ESO Instrumentation Division ESO-INS start of end of project project b) La Silla ESO 3.6 M ESO 3.6

c) La Silla ESO NTT 3.5 M ESO NTT

d) La Silla ESO MPG 2.2M ESO 2.2

CR 5 CSEM Centre Suisse CSEM SA CH Systems Engineering CSEM start of end of d’Electronique et de project project Microtechnique S.A.

3 CR 6 Institut National Des Sciences INSU/CNRS FR a) Laboratoire d’Astrophysique de Grenoble – LAOG start of end of de L’Univers Universite Joseph Fourier project project b) Institut d’Astrophysique Spatiale IAS

c) Centre de Recherche Astronomique de Lyon CRAL

d) Laboratoire d’Astrophysique de Marseille LAM

e) Observatoire Astronomique de Marseille Provence OAMP

f) Laboratoire d’Astrodynamique, d’Astrophysique et L3AB d’Aeronomie de Bordeaux g) Canada France Hawaii Telescope CFHT

h) Observatoire Haute Pyrennees 1.9 m OHP

i) Observatoire Midi Pyrenees TBL

j) Observatoire de Paris OBSPM k) Institut d’Astrophysique de Paris IAP CR 7 Instituto de Astrofisica de IAC ES a) Instituto de Astrofiscia de Canarias IAC start of end of Canarias project project b) Telescopio Carlos Sanchez TCS

CR 8 Istituto Nazionale di Astrofisica INAF IT a) INAF – HQ INAF-HQ start of end of project project b) Osservatorio de Astrofidica de Arcetri INAF- Arcetri c) Osservatorio Astronomico di Brera INAF-Brera

d) Osservatorio Astronomico di Padova INAF- Padova e) Osservatorio Astronomico di Torino INAF- Torino f) TNG Telescope TNG

4 CR 9 Universiteit Leiden UL NL Leiden Observatory LO start of end of project project CR 10 Stichting Astronomisch ASTRON NL Technical Laboratory Astron start of end of Onderzoek in Nederland project project CR 11 Max-Planck-Gesellschaft MPG DE a) Max-Planck Institut für Astronomie MPIA start of end of (MPG) project project b) CAHA 3.5 M CAHA 3.5

c) CAHA 2.2 M CAHA 2.2

d) Max-Planck-Institut für Astrophysik MPA

e) Max-Planck Institute für Extraterrestrische MPE Physik f) Max-Planck Institut für Radioastronomie MPIfR CR 12 Rijksuniversiteit Groningen NOVA NL Nederlandse Onderzoekschool voor Astronomie NOVA start of end of project project CR 13 Nordic Optical Telescope NOTSA SE a) NORDIC Community NOTSA start of end of Scientific Association project project b) NOT Telescope NOT

CR 14 Greek National Committee for GNCA GR Greek National Community GNCA start of end of Astronomy project project CR 15 Ruhr-Universitaet Bochum RDS DE German National Community RDS start of end of project project CR 16 Schweizerische Akademie der SANW CH Swiss National Community SANW start of end of Naturwissenschaften SANW project project CR 17 Kiepenheuer-Institut für KIS DE a) Kiepenenheuer Institut für Sonnenphysik KIS start of end of Sonnenphysik project project b) Vacuum Tower Telescope VTT

CR 18 University of La Laguna RA3 ES Red Academica de Astrofisica y Astronomia RA3 start of end of project project CR 19 Gran Telescopio Canarias, S.A. GRANTECAN ES Gran Telescopio Canarias, S.A. GRANTECAN start of end of project project

5 CR 20 Kungliga RSAS SE a) Institute for Solar Physics of the Royal Swedish RSAS-ISP start of end of Vetenskapsakademien: The Academy of Sciences project project Royal Swedish Academy of b) Swedish 1metre Solar Telescope SST Sciences CR 21 Universite de Liege ULg BE a) Centre Spatial de Liege, Applied Optical CSL-AOHL start of end of Holography Laboratory project project b) Institut d’Astrophysique et de Geophysique AEOS CR 22 Utrecht University Utrecht Univ NL a) Astronomical Institute AI start of end of project project b) Dutch Open Telescope DOT

CR 23 Politecnico di Milano POLIMI IT Lab of Molecular Dynamics and Vibrational POLIMI start of end of Spectroscopy project project CR 24 Universitat Graz Uni-Graz AT Institut für Geophysik, Astrophysik und IGAM start of end of Meteorologie project project CR 25 THEMIS S.L. THEMIS ES THEMIS S.L. THEMIS start of end of project project CR 26 University of Bremen Uni Bremen DE Laboratory for Precision Machining. Department of UNIBrem start of end of Engineering, University of Bremen project project CR 27 Katholieke Universiteit Leuven IOA-KUL BE Institute of Astronomy Catholic University of IOA-KUL start of end of Leuven project project CR 28 National University of Ireland, NUIG IE Astrophysics and Applied Imaging Group, NUIG start of end of Galway Department of Physics and Information Technology‘ project project CR 29 Universite de Paris-Sud IAS/UPS FR Institut d’Astrophysique Spatiale IAS start of end of project project CR 30 Konkoly Observatory of the Konkoly HU Konkoly Observatory KO start of end of Hungarian Academy of Observatory project project Sciences CR 31 Office National d’Etudes et de ONERA FR Department d’Optique Theorique et Appliquee ONERA start of end of Recherches Aerospatiales project project CR 32 Centro de Astrofisica da CAUP PL Centro de Astrofisica da Universidade do Porto CAUP start of end of Universidade do Porto project project CR 33 Technion – Israel Institute of TECHNION IL Department of Physics TECHNION start of end of Technology project project CR 34 Uniwersytet Mikolaja NCU/UMK PL Torun Centre for Astronomy NCU start of end of Kopernika w Toruniu project project

6 CR 35 University of Durham Univ Durham GB Department of Physics Univ start of end of Durham project project CR 36 Universite de Geneve UNIGE CH Observatoire de Geneve UNIGE start of end of project project CR 37 Forderkreis der LSW DE Landessternwarte Heidelberg LSW start of end of Landessternwarte Heidelberg project project Konigstuhl e.V CR 38 Astronomical Institute of the OO CZ Ondrejov Observatory OO start of end of Academy of Sciences of the project project Czech Republic CR 39 The University of Sheffield USFD GB Department of Physics and Astronomy USFD start of end of project project CR 40 The University of Warwick Warwick GB Department of Physics and Astronomy Warwick start of end of project project CR 41 University of Vienna UNIVIE AT Faculty of Natural Sciences and Mathematics, UNIVIE start of end of Institute of Astronomy project project CR 42 National Observatory of Athens NOA GR a) Institute of Astronomy and Astrophysics NOA start of end of project project b) Aristarchos 2.3m Telescope Aristarchos

CR 43 Institut de Fisica d’Altes IFAE ES Institut de Fisica d’Altes Energies IFAE start of end of Energies project project CR 44 Reflex s r o Reflex CZ Reflex – Advanced X-ray technologies Reflex start of end of project project CR 45 Netherlands Organisation for TNO/TPD NL NETHERLANDS ORGANISATION FOR TNO/TPD start of end of Applied Scientific Research APPLIED SCIENTIFIC RESEARCH (TNO) project project (TNO) CR 46 Liverpool John Moores LIVJM GB a) Astrophysics Research Institute ARI start of end of University project project b) Liverpool Telescope Liv Tel

7 CR 47 Anglo-Australian Telescope AAT Board AU a) Anglo-Australian Observatory AAO start of end of Board project project b) Anglo-Australian Telescope AAT

c) UK Schmidt Telescope UKST

*CO = Coordinator CR = Contractor