ALMA Science Day 2023

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Allegro is pleased to announce that the next ALMA Science Day will take place in the second half of November 2023. At the Science Day, the latest scientific results obtained with ALMA by the Netherlands astronomical community will be highlighted. We will also hear the latest updates on the status of ALMA, the start of Cycle 10, and upcoming news. The meeting will also allow ample time to discuss user experiences and other ALMA related topics. We welcome contributions from all scientific topics and synergies with other facilities.

Stay tuned for more information on the exact date and location!

ALMA Cycle 10 Statistics

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The ALMA cycle 10 proposal submission statistics again saw some new records. The number of overall submitted proposals for all arrays was 1679 – with 91 as ACA stand-alone projects and 44 large programs (compared to 40 large programs in Cycle 9).  Even though the total number of submitted proposals is lower than for the previous two cycles (1769 proposals in Cycle 9) the overall time requested actually surged again, with over 29,000 hours requested on the 12-m array. The region that saw the highest number of proposals submitted was (again) Europe with a request of 12,177 hours on the 12-m array, also now withstanding the highest oversubscription (8.4), followed by North America (9196 hours, oversubscription of 6.4) , East Asia (5940 hours, oversubscription of 6.2) and Chile (1508 hours, oversubscription of 3.5).  The percentages of proposals for the 12-m array per region, science category, and requested receiver band for regular (top) and large programs (bottom) are shown in the figure below.

 

The percentage of proposals for the 12-m array per region, science category, and requested receiver band for regular programs.

The percentage of proposals for the 12-m array per region, science category, and requested receiver band for large programs.

 

A novelty of Cycle 10 was the introduction of Joint proposals, which resulted in a great success for the observatory: there were 26 proposals submitted to ALMA jointly with JWST, 10 with VLA and another 10 with the VLT, of which 3 proposals requested time in 2 or more partner observatories. 

The final accepted list of proposals contained four large programs (in the categories of planetary science, high-mass star formation, and galaxies (mid- and high-redshift), four joint proposals for which ALMA is the main observatory (with the VLA and JWST), and six VLBI proposals. Despite the high oversubscription, the statistics for the Netherlands were also positive, with 15 PI  proposals accepted (for 36 submitted) and a much wider 96 proposals accepted as collaborators. Of the 7300 hours requested for the 12m array, ~ 3200 hours were awarded in Category 1 (High-z Universe), ~1600 hours in Category 2 (Galaxies), ~850 hours in Category 3 (Star Formation), ~1400 hours in Category 4 (Disks) and finally ~300 hours were awarded in Category 5 (Stars). 

You can find more information about the ALMA Cycle 10 statistics at this link: https://almascience.eso.org/documents-and-tools/cycle10/cycle-10-proposal-submission-statistics

ALMA at 10 years: Past, Present, and Future

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The ALMA partnership is organizing a conference to commemorate 10 years of ALMA Science Observations, taking place in Puerto Varas, Chile, on 4-8 December 2023. The aim of the conference is to look back on the observatory’s accomplishments, highlight the latest ALMA results from all scientific fields, as well as look forward to future technical developments. The latter will include a focus on its ambitious 2030 development roadmap and in particular the ongoing plans for the Wideband Sensitivity Upgrade that will ultimately quadruple the system bandwidth and improve observing efficiency and sensitivity for both continuum and spectral line observations. 

The conference will have a hybrid format and while in-person attendance has reached capacity and is closed, on-line participation, including posters, is open until November 1, 2023 (register for online attendance here). 

For more information, visit the conference website: https://www.almaobservatory.org/en/alma-at-10-years-past-present-and-future/

Lorentz Workshop: Tuning to the high frequency ALMA Universe

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In the week of September 4-8, an ALMA-dedicated workshop will take place at the Lorentz Center in Leiden.  The workshop aims at gathering the ALMA community to discuss and further develop the unique science that can be achieved at the highest frequencies offered (Bands 8, 9, and 10).  ALMA is the only ground-based interferometer that can routinely observe at frequencies > 350 GHz, making it a truly unique instrument. At the workshop, we aim to discuss the status of high frequency observations for galactic and extragalactic science and to explore which questions have arisen in the field that can be answered with high frequency observations. We will also discuss future developments, technologies, and the ALMA upgrade. The overall goal is to create new ideas, collaborations and synergies within our community and the observatory that will enhance the discovery space of ALMA.

The workshop will be attended by 50 participants from several relevant scientific areas from all ALMA regions, the executives and the Joint ALMA observatory. 

For more information visit: https://www.lorentzcenter.nl/tuning-to-the-high-frequency-alma-universe.html

IAU I-HOW Radio Astronomy Workshop

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A joint Iran and Türkıye radio astronomy workshop is set to take place at Erciyes University in Kayseri in Türkıye in the next two weeks (Sep. 4-15). The workshop is part of the IAU Hands-On Workshops (I-HOW) initiative that aims to train young scientists in developing countries in accessing, analyzing and using the vast amounts of astronomical data currently available in archives for their research projects. The workshop will focus on teaching students and young researchers how to analyze radio data from arrays such as VLA, ALMA, MeerKAT, and LOFAR. The two-week workshop will provide ample time for lectures, tutorials, scientific talks of a wide range of topics, and hands-on projects. The students are also given an opportunity to present their own scientific works and request assistance on their own projects from the team of lecturers. Experts from Allegro as well as the Italian and UK ALMA Regional Centre Nodes will be at the workshop training students on how to access, calibrate, image, and analyze ALMA observations. For more information, see the website of I-HOW Radio Astronomy Workshop.

New Allegro computing hardware

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Allegro has purchased a new set of more powerful computing servers and a new disk server with a larger amount of storage space, in order to provide enhanced computing services for our user community. We will have five new computing servers available to our user community for the processing and analysis of their ALMA data. Each server will have dual 32-core/64-thread 3.25GHz processors and 512GB of RAM. Our new disk server will provide 1.5 Petabytes of storage for our user community. The disk server will have 84 disks, along with 128GB of RAM and dual 16-core/32-thread 3.0GHz processor. The servers are connected to each other with a dedicated 2×25 Gigabits per second network and will be externally accessible via a 10 Gigabits per second network. Allegro’s investment in increased storage space and improved computing hardware will allow us to continue to meet the growing demand for our computing resources from our user community. Don’t hesitate to contact us if you are in need of computing or storage resources.

Science Highlight: All quiet at z=4.5

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Standard galaxy formation models expect that young galaxies should be highly turbulent and kinematically chaotic, as a result of violent gas accretion and frequent mergers. Observations appear to tell a very different story. In this paper, Roman-Oliveira (Kapteyn Institute), Fraternali and Rizzo (2023, MNRAS 521, 1045) show archival ALMA data of the [C II] 158 micron line of five galaxies at z ~ 4.5 at 0.1-0.2 arcsec resolution (~1 kpc). All these galaxies show clear velocity gradients in the [C II] line. Four of these can be explained as rotationally supported disk, and only one is a likely unresolved merger. Turbulent velocities are low, showing that quiescent disks are common even at z ~ 4.5. This paper also shows that the high resolutions offered by ALMA are essential to separate the quiescent disks from localized kinematic features such as inflow/outflow. It also illustrates the potential for discovery through publicly accessible ALMA archival data, even for previously published data that were never interpreted together.

 

Figure: Observed and modeled velocity patterns of ALMA archival [C II] line emission of the five galaxies at z~4.5 studied by Roman-Oliveira et al. (2023).

First fringes for the ALMA Band-2 pre-production receivers

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Over the next few years, ALMA will open up the 2.6-4.5 mm wavelength range for scientific observations with its slew of newly developed Band 2 receivers. The first three Band-2 ‘pre-production’ receivers were recently installed at ALMA, developed and built by the NOVA submillimeter group at the University of Groningen together with GARD/Chalmers University, Sweden, INAF Italy, NAOJ Japan, the University of Chile, and ESO. ‘First fringes’ were obtained with this set of receivers, marking the moment when ALMA opens its eyes at these wavelengths. [more information]

Postdoctoral Support Position at Allegro

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Allegro, the Netherlands node of the European ALMA Regional Centre (ARC) at Leiden Observatory, invites applications for one or more postdoctoral support position(s).

The position offers the opportunity for research at one of the major centres of astronomy in the Netherlands as well as an in-depth involvement in the development and operations of ALMA. In particular, we are interested in candidates who (wish to) pursue research with ALMA or ALMA data as a prominent part of their scientific interest. Standard 50% time will be available for personal research and successful candidate(s) will have access to the full resources of Leiden Observatory. Besides independent research, the appointee is expected to spend time on the technical and user support of ALMA and we are looking for an enthusiastic and motivated applicants to work within the Allegro team on a variety of topics.

Qualifications: PhD in Astronomy, Physics, or related field, or proven track record of relevant experience. Research experience in fields directly related to submm astronomy. Experience with radio interferometric data and CASA software is highly desirable. Proficiency in Linux. The Leiden ARC node values diversity in its workforce.

The appointment will be for two years initially, renewable up to a maximum of four years based on need, funding, and performance. The position comes with a competitive salary and full benefits of an employee in the public sector.

Applications can be submitted electronically at: https://jobs.strw.leidenuniv.nl/2023/AllegroPD1/

Included Benefits:
Leiden University offers an attractive benefits package that includes additional vacation (8%) and end-of-year (8.3%) bonuses, sick leave, maternity and parental leaves, and retirement benefits. Candidates from outside the Netherlands may be eligible for a substantial tax break.

Application Deadline:
Friday, September 15, 2023