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National Optical Astronomy Observatories NATIONAL OPTICAL ASTRONOMY OBSERVATORIES NATIONAL OPTICAL ASTRONOMY OBSERVATORIES FY 1998 PROVISIONAL PROGRAM PLAN July 31,1997 TABLE OF CONTENTS I. INTRODUCTION AND OVERVIEW 1 II. THE DEVELOPMENT PROGRAM: MILESTONES PAST AND FUTURE 2 A. Milestones for FY 1998 3 B. Milestones for FY 1997 4 m. NIGHTTIME PROGRAM 6 A. SOAR 6 B. Access to the Hobby-Eberly Telescope and to the MMT 7 C. Joint Nighttime Instrumentation Program 8 1. Overview 8 2. Description of Individual Major Projects 9 D. USGP 13 E. Telescope Operations and User Support 13 1. Telescope Upgrades at CTIO 13 2. Instrumentation Improvements at CTIO 17 3. Telescope Improvements at KPNO 20 4. Changes in User Services at KPNO 26 IV. NATIONAL SOLAR OBSERVATORY 27 A. Major Projects 27 1. Global Oscillation Network Group 27 2. RISE/PSPT Program 29 3. FY 1998 Program Plan Contribution for CLEAR Study 30 B. Instrumentation Program 31 1. NSO/Sacramento Peak 32 2. NSO/KittPeak 33 V. THE SCIENTIFIC STAFF 36 VI. EDUCATIONAL OUTREACH 37 VH. COMPUTER SERVICES 37 A. NOAO-Tucson 37 B. KPNO - Kitt Peak 38 C. CTIO - Cerro Tololo 39 D. CTIO Communications 40 E. NSO/Sacramento Peak 41 1. Main Lab Plan for FY 1998 41 2. Telescope Computers 42 F. NSO/Tucson 42 G. NSO/KittPeak 43 H. IRAF 44 VIH. FACILITIES MAINTENANCE. 46 A. CerroTololo 46 1. Fire Prevention and Fire Fighting 47 2. Renovation of the Vehicle Fleet 47 3. Improvement of the Main Access Road 47 4. Repainting 4-m Blanco Telescope 47 5. Cerro Tololo Power House 48 6. Water System - Cerro Tololo Pipeline 48 7. Control of Light Pollution 48 8. Enclosure for the TELOPS Cable Car 48 9. Bulldozer for Cerro Tololo 48 B. KPNO 48 C. Tucson: Central Facilities and Operations 50 D. NSO 51 1. Sac Peak 51 2. KittPeak 52 IX. CENTRAL SERVICES 53 A. NOAO Director's Office 53 B. Central Administrative Services 53 C. Tucson Facilities 53 X. THE BUDGET 54 A. KPNO Operations 54 B. USGP 56 C. Instrumentation Program 57 D. Budget Details 58 Appendix 1 - NOAO Organizational Chart Appendix 2 - NOAO Management Appendix 3 - Scientific Staff: Research Interests and Service Roles CTIO i KPNO xiii USGP xxviii INSTRUMENTATION DIVISION xxxv NSO xli Appendix 4 - User Statistics, FY 1996 Appendix 5 - Budget Tables Appendix 6 - KPNO and USGP Staffing Models I. INTRODUCTION AND OVERVIEW AURA has recently submitted a long range plan for NOAO for the time interval 1998-2002. That long range plan defines the program for a critical phase in the evolution of NOAO: the nighttime program will complete the transition from an earlier generation of telescopes and instruments to an almost completely new suite of facilities; and the solar program will be redefined, with the primary goal being initiation of construction of the first large-aperture solar telescope to be built in this country in nearly 40 years. The program plan for FY 1998, which is described in this current submission, provides more detail on the specific activities that will be undertaken during the first of the five years covered by the long range plan. To place the program plan in context, we summarize here the long-term goals of NOAO. Gemini South is currently scheduled to begin scientific operations in 2002. This milestone will mark the completion of an effort to replace essentially the entire complement of telescopes offered by NOAO to the community with the exception of the Blanco and Mayall 4-m telescopes, which will remain in operation. The construction that remains to be completed includes the 4-m SOAR telescope, for which it now appears that funding is available from Brazil, the University of North Carolina, and Michigan State University, and the 2.4-m wide-field O/IR imaging telescopes, which we believe are essential for supporting Gemini observations. Funding for these two telescopes has not yet been identified. During this same period, we expect to complete several major instruments, including 8K x 8K mosaic CCD imagers for both CTIO and KPNO; a multi-fiber spectrograph for the Blanco telescope, which will match the capability of the Hydra spectrograph already at WIYN; medium resolution IR spectrometers for both CTIO and KPNO, with the CTIO instrument being a clone of the Gemini IRS and the KPNO spectrograph being a simpler device with more limited capability; wide-field IR imagers for both sites, with one being a single channel device with a lKx IK detector and the other being the multi-channel SQITD, upgraded to 500 x 500 arrays; a single high resolution (R = 100,000) spectrometer to be shared by both sites and with Gemini; and possibly a very high throughput single object optical spectrometer. A high resolution IR imager will be shared between CTIO and Gemini South during commissioning. We expect to provide a low-order natural- guide-star adaptive optics system at WIYN. At the end of this time period, NOAO will be the only organization that offers observing time in both hemispheres, on telescopes with a range of apertures, and with a broad complement of infrared and optical instrumentation. In order to take advantage of this uniqueness, we must learn how to use this suite of telescopes in an optimum fashion. How do we match complex observing programs to telescopes in order to maximize the scientific output? How do we inform the community most effectively about options for their programs? How do we best support programs that require the use of more than one facility? What kinds of supporting infrastructure are required in order to use the time on Gemini and the large telescopes at the independent observatories most effectively? The long range plan outlined steps that we propose to take to develop answers to these questions and to provide user support that is unified across all of the facilities accessed through NOAO. The changes in the nighttime offerings of NOAO, including access to Gemini and some of the independent observatories through the NSF instrumentation program, represent a qualitative change in what we offer the community. There will be fewer (by about a factor of 2) individual nights available, but the throughput of photons per unit time will in some cases be literally orders of magnitude higher than it was two decades earlier. It is almost certainly true that we will support fewer users than we have in the past, but this higher throughput will enable new types of science, including much larger sample sizes for programs ranging from the study of stellar activity levels in nearby open clusters to the analysis of the dynamics of distant clusters of galaxies. The use of new observing modes, such as queue scheduling, can potentially increase efficiencies still further and enable studies, that have up until now been impossible, of variable objects and targets of opportunity. During the period covered by this long range plan, we will re-examine the way we schedule the telescopes and experiment with a variety of modes of observing (queue, remote, and service, in addition to conventional observing with the astronomer present) so that we can understand what strategies will best support the diverse science proposed by the large community served by NOAO. NOAO continues to look beyond 2002 in its long range planning. The crucial question is whether major gains in sensitivity and angular resolution beyond what is provided by the 8- to 10-m class telescopes linked to satellite telescopes for interferometry can be achieved most cost effectively in space or on the ground. We are working with a variety of groups and committees, including most notably ACCORD (the council of directors of major US observatories), to evaluate this issue. We also continue to work on the development of interferometry techniques through our participation in CHARA, which is building an interferometry on Mt. Wilson. The issues that will be addressed by NSO during the next five years are very different from the issues confronting the nighttime program. It has been nearly forty years since a large-aperture solar telescope was built by NSO. In that same period of time, the nighttime program has built two generations of facilities: the Mayall and Blanco telescopes, followed by new technology telescopes in the form of WIYN, SOAR, and Gemini. The GONG project is an excellent example of how new techniques can yield fundamental advances in our understanding of solar structure. Application of modern technologies to the construction of a large-aperture solar telescope for studies of the solar disk and atmosphere can be expected to lead to equally profound advances in our understanding of the nature, variability, and origin of solar activity. During the next five years, the central effort in the solar program will be to define the scientific requirements for a large-aperture telescope, establish the technical feasibility of building a telescope that will meet those requirements, identify the best possible site, and prepare and submit a proposal for such a telescope to the NSF. The remainder of the NSO program is well defined and includes the continuation of GONG for at least one 11-year solar cycle; the preparation of a proposal to upgrade the spatial resolution of the GONG cameras by a factor of 4; the construction by the time of the next solar maximum of SOLIS, which is a suite of instruments designed to support Synoptic Optical Long-term Investigations of the Sun; completion of the construction and the operation of the PSPT (Precision Solar Photometric Telescopes) to study irradiance variations; demonstration and use of a low-order adaptive optics system at the NSO/SP Vacuum Tower Telescope; and the continuation of the infrared program at the McMath-Pierce Telescope with upgraded cameras based on the IK x IK InSb arrays.
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