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2012 Annual Progress Report and 2013 Program Plan of the Gemini Observatory

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2012 Annual Progress Report and 2013 Program Plan of the Gemini Observatory 2012 Annual Progress Report and 2013 Program Plan of the Gemini Observatory Association of Universities for Research in Astronomy, Inc. Table of Contents 0 Executive Summary ....................................................................................... 1 1 Introduction and Overview .............................................................................. 5 2 Science Highlights ........................................................................................... 6 2.1 Highest Resolution Optical Images of Pluto from the Ground ...................... 6 2.2 Dynamical Measurements of Extremely Massive Black Holes ...................... 6 2.3 The Best Standard Candle for Cosmology ...................................................... 7 2.4 Beginning to Solve the Cooling Flow Problem ............................................... 8 2.5 A Disappearing Dusty Disk .............................................................................. 9 2.6 Gas Morphology and Kinematics of Sub-Millimeter Galaxies........................ 9 2.7 No Intermediate-Mass Black Hole at the Center of M71 ............................... 10 3 Operations ...................................................................................................... 11 3.1 Gemini Publications and User Relationships ............................................... 11 3.2 Science Operations ........................................................................................ 12 3.2.1 ITAC Software and Queue Filling Results ................................................... 12 3.2.2 User software improvements ...................................................................... 13 3.2.3 Quality Assessment Pipeline and Data Reduction ...................................... 13 3.2.4 Science Operations Training and Documentation ....................................... 14 3.2.5 NICI Campaign ........................................................................................... 14 3.2.6 Remote Eavesdropping .............................................................................. 14 3.2.7 Storage and Archiving ................................................................................ 15 3.3 Engineering Operations ................................................................................. 15 3.3.1 Instruments................................................................................................. 15 3.3.2 Telescopes ................................................................................................. 16 3.4 Operations Metrics ......................................................................................... 16 3.5 Safety ............................................................................................................... 18 4 Development .................................................................................................. 20 4.1 FLAMINGOS-2 ................................................................................................. 21 4.2 GeMS/GSAOI ................................................................................................... 22 4.3 Gemini Planet Imager ..................................................................................... 23 4.4 GMOS CCD Upgrade ....................................................................................... 23 4.5 GRACES .......................................................................................................... 24 4.6 GHOS ............................................................................................................... 25 4.7 Acquisition & Guiding Units ........................................................................... 25 4.8 Gemini North Adaptive Optics Development ................................................ 26 4.9 Base Facility Operations ................................................................................ 27 5 Public Outreach and Broadening Participation ........................................... 28 5.1 Public Information and Outreach ................................................................... 28 5.1.1 Primary Outreach Programming ................................................................. 28 5.1.2 Public Information and New/Social Media ................................................... 29 5.1.3 Strategic Communications .......................................................................... 30 5.2 Broadening Participation and Workforce Development ............................... 30 6 Organization and Budget .............................................................................. 32 6.1 Management and Organization ...................................................................... 32 i 6.1.1 Staffing Challenges .................................................................................... 32 6.1.2 Staffing plan for the years 2012 and 2013 .................................................. 33 6.1.3 Advisory and Oversight Bodies ................................................................... 33 6.2 2012 Budget .................................................................................................... 34 6.2.1 Partner Contributions .................................................................................. 34 6.2.2 Expenditures by Fund ................................................................................. 34 7 Program Plan for 2013 and Beyond ............................................................. 36 7.1 Plan through 2016 ........................................................................................... 36 7.2 Future Staffing and Budget ............................................................................ 37 7.2.1 Staffing Plan through 2016 ......................................................................... 37 7.2.2 Partner Contributions 2013–2015 ............................................................... 37 7.2.3 Overall Budget ............................................................................................ 38 7.3 Transition Program Activities ........................................................................ 39 7.4 Operations in 2013 .......................................................................................... 41 7.5 Instrumentation Projects in 2013 ................................................................... 41 7.6 Administration in 2013 .................................................................................... 43 Appendix A. Publications by Staff ................................................................... 44 A.1 Refereed Publications ....................................................................................... 44 A.2 Non-Refereed Publications ............................................................................... 47 A.3 Publications in SPIE Proceedings ................................................................... 50 Appendix B. Publications by Users ................................................................ 53 Appendix C. Staff Research and Achievements ............................................ 67 C.1 Distribution of Effort ......................................................................................... 67 C.2 Staff Achievements: Invited Talks ................................................................... 68 C.3 Research Staff Results and Plans .................................................................... 69 Appendix D. Science Programs 2011B and 2012B ........................................ 89 Appendix E. Organizational Chart ................................................................. 100 Appendix F. Acronyms and Abbreviations ................................................... 101 ii 0 Executive Summary The activities of Gemini Observatory in 2012 have extended well beyond standard operations that offer the international Gemini community astronomical observations on 8-meter telescopes across the whole sky. In addition to scientific discoveries that span the Universe from the Solar System to the largest scales of cosmology, the Observatory and its partners made significant progress on major new instrument projects, including conducting initial observations with unique and world-leading instruments such as the Gemini Multi-Conjugate Adaptive Optics System (GeMS). Fundamentally Observatory operations are changing in preparation for the withdrawal of the United Kingdom (UK) from the Partnership at the end of the year. Some of these “transition” activities have already begun, and they will be a major element of the program for 2013. Accomplishments in 2012 and plans for the near future aim to maximize the scientific return of Gemini and the service it provides to users, within the limitation of the decreased budget, which requires the reduction of some services. Following a brief introduction (Section 1), this report presents science highlights based on user publications during the year (Section 2). These results demonstrate the success of a nimble and adaptable observatory. Astronomers take advantage of the flexible scheduling of observations and the possibility of interrupting immediately during the night with targets of opportunity. Some of the key results thus rely on exploiting the time domain, such as capturing supernovae as they fade after their initial bright explosions, and urgent confirmation of the disappearance of the dusty planet-forming disk around a star. Visiting instruments provide further flexibility for users and exploit existing
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