PATT ITAC Report for Semester 97B

1. Introduction

This document details the allocations for telescope time made by the ITAC for the semester 97B (1st August 1997 - 31st January 1998).

2. Allocations

The individual partner TAGs hold meetings in their respective countries prior to the PATT session to assess applications deemed by the JCMT Board rule to be from their own country. At these meetings informal numbers of shifts are nominated for each application in a priority order. The Chairpersons of each TAG bring their respective lists to the PATT where the ITAC combine the awards, include discussion of the engineering and commissioning requirements, and assess the International applications. The final allocations of shifts are made by the ITAC.

Applications to be considered

UK status		       101
Canadian status#		46
Netherlands status		31
International status*		25
University of Hawaii		14
TOTAL:			       217

# two Canadian long-term carry-overs have not been included in this total.

* this total includes 3 SBI applications through the CSO system.

The PATT meeting was held at the ROE, Edinburgh, UK on 28th & 29th July 1997.

It should be noted that if the PI on an application is a JCMT staff member based in Hilo, then the application is assessed by the appropriate national TAG. However, by Board rule, International status is given to any application where the only named collaborator from any partner country is a JCMT staff member. International applications are assessed by the ITAC members at their meeting.

Time Available (in 16-hour nights)

No. of night set aside in semester 97B 183.0
Engineering & Commissioning		33.5
Set aside for SCUBA2!   		30.0
University of Hawaii (10%)		11.5
Director's discretionary use		 4.0
Available for PATT science:	       104.0

! this total then concludes the SCUBA 2nd round (SCUBA2) allocations.

The above table indicates the order in which nights are removed from the total available for the semester. Semester 97B covers a winter period from 1st August 1997 through 31st January 1998 inclusive. The JCMT is closed on Christmas Eve.

Awards (in 16-hour nights)

UK status		51.625
Canadian status		23.500
Netherlands status	18.750
International status	10.125
University of Hawaii	11.500
TOTAL allocation:      115.500

3. Designated Service time

Allocations for this semester are:

CDN = 5.0 shifts allocated;

NL = 0 shifts allocated (but all Netherlands time is flexibly scheduled);

UK = 0 shifts allocated (but several are on the Ukflex listing)..

4. Non-standard Instrumentation

There is no non-standard instrumentation scheduled for this semester.

Instrument distribution

A-band   		15%
B-band			16%
C-band			 6%
SBI (mainly B-band) 	 6%
SCUBA			57%

5. Applications with Long-Term Status

L/M/96A/C08 was given a further 4 night shifts in 97B to complete the comet observations. The student thesis project, M/Y/C05 was also awarded a further 1 shift which should conclude this project.

6. Short Baseline Interferometry

After negociation amongst the SBI team it was decided that a session of no longer than 8 days would be possible in early November. The constraints were a combination of the availability of the personnel involved, and the scheduling restrictions on both the CSO and the JCMT. One whole night of setup time was required which left 7 whole nights of observing time to be divided equally between ITAC and CSO applications.

7. Use of Daytime Periods

The comet Hale-Bopp remains a daytime object until late September. Then it is observable using morning shifts until early November when it is too far South to be observable with the JCMT. Several daytime shifts have been allocated to the comet watch teams with the same restraints that were imposed during previous semesters (see details in ITAC Report to the previous Board meeting).

8. Engineering & Commissioning

Once again the large amount of time set aside for SCUBA 2nd round observing (SCUBA2) and for the commissioning of instrumentation (RxA3i, RxB3 upgrade, SCUBA interim polarimeter and RxW), all other E&C tasks have been kept to a minimum for the semester.

Commissioning of the antenna and instrumentation continues, with periods required a) to characterise and improve the surface via metrology and beam map measures, b) to monitor the antenna performance and tracking through pointing and inclinometry runs, and c) to measure receiver performances and efficiencies.

Time has been allocated for commissioning of RxA3i, RxW and for the SCUBA interim polarimeter according to the commissioning plans made available by the instrument builders. Several shifts have also been left open for upgrading the mixers in RxB3.

9. SCUBA 2nd Round (SCUBA2)

A total of 60 shifts were set aside from the allocation for semester 97A for flexibly queue-scheduling SCUBA observations. A total of about 120 shifts of SCUBA2 time had been awarded and therefore the outstanding 60 shifts have been set aside from semester 97B to complete these queues. The SCUBA2 queues will not be carried on beyond the end of semester 97B. All applicants with proposals currently in the SCUBA2 queues have been informed of this procedure.

10. Fallback Programmes

A number of applications have been approved by the ITAC to be included in the schedule should any of the instrumentation fail to meet their delivery schedules. The commissioning time set aside for these instruments will be apportioned according to the partner funding ratio after 10% has been given to the University of Hawaii. Applicants on these fallback programmes will be informed by the JCMT Scheduler when/if their time is to be scheduled.

In addition, there are numerous heterodyne applications set aside to be included as fallback for the SCUBA2. These fallbacks continue to be done in serviced mode by JCMT staff.

11. The UKflex System

The UK TAG actually only allocated time to 77.45 shifts of its final allocation of 103.25 shifts. The outstanding 25.8 shifts were designated as UKflex time. A selection of heterodyne A- and B-band applications with high scientific ratings were placed on the UKflex list in priority order and with a nominal time allocation. The intention is that each high-frequency allocation be extended by a shift or two of UKflex time thus increasing the chance of obtaining suitable weather to complete the high-frequency program. Under weather conditions unsuitable for the high-frequency observing, the current observers or staff scientist would undertake observations from the UKflex list in serviced mode. Successful applicants on the UKflex list have been informed that they have to submit complete templates for their observations but that there is no guarantee that any part of their program will be done during the semester.

12. Electronic Submission

Various electronic submission procedures have been tried at other PATT facilities with varying degrees of success. Due to the international status, and because there are currently 3 different collection locations for applications to the JCMT, we have so far kept out of these experiments.

The Netherlands already implement a very successful electronic submission scheme. For the current semester 97B round all Netherlands applications were accepted electronically and made available to Hawaii via FTP. The Canadian community is encouraged to submit electronically and, although the numbers are increasing, the majority of applications are still sent as hardcopy.

A system has now been setup in Hawaii that resembles the HST electronic submission procedures. This software suite is under licence from the STScI. For semester 98A, International applicants were encouraged to submit their proposals directly to a designated account at the JAC. If this trial is successful then it will be expanded to include the UK community and also to link to the Canadian and Netherlands schemes. Further details on the electronic submission system is contained in a separate Board paper.

13. Procedures for Semester 98A

The deadline for for semester 98A (1st February through 31st July 1998) applications was 30th September 1997 for ALL applicants. This deadline encompasses applications for all available instrumentation on the JCMT (RxA2, RxB3, RxC2, and SCUBA). There is also likely to be an SBI run during the semester. It is not possible to apply for features specific to either RxA3i or to RxW (ie: no D-band observations) since these instruments will not have been commissioned prior to the ITAC meeting in early December. Due to the special nature of the SCUBA interim polarimeter, it may be available for use during semester 98A provided it successfully passes its commissioning tests.