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ALMA Cycle 9 Call for Proposals

The ALMA Director, on behalf of the Joint ALMA Observatory (JAO) and the partner organizations in East Asia, Europe, and North America, is pleased to announce the ALMA Cycle 9 Call for Proposals (CfP) for scientific observations to be scheduled from October 2022 to September 2023. The proposal submission deadline is 15:00 UT on 21 April 2022.

For this CfP, the JAO anticipates having 4300 hours of approved science time on each of the 12-m, 7-m, and the Total Power arrays. Projects with observations in the highest-frequency Bands 8, 9, and 10 are strongly encouraged. Cycle 9 will not include a Supplemental CfP for stand-alone ACA observations. The community is therefore encouraged to submit ACA standalone projects, especially in the LST range of 20h to 10h, for the April 2022 deadline.

More information can be found in the official announcement.

 

Using ALMA archival data - A Primer

ALMA has released a new document for Cycle 9 called Using ALMA archival data - A Primer. This document, which was co-edited by Kazi Rygl at the Italian ARC Node and George Bendo at the UK ARC Node, provides basic introductory information of how to use the ALMA data available through the ALMA Science Archive (ASA), including how to query, extract and scientifically exploit the content of the ASA. The aim is to assist readers with the exploitation of archived ALMA data by providing a concise summary of the data and practical examples that include CASA tasks.

The document starts with a description of querying the ASA and a description of selecting and downloading data. This is followed by examples of how to inspect and evaluate the quality of the data and images in the archive, how to recreate the calibrated visibilities and how to re-image the calibrated data (which includes a chapter summarizing data combination). Two additional chapters describe how to use calibrators as science targets and how to use the ALMA Calibrator Science Catalogue. The document then concludes with a description of useful CASA packages, a list of frequently encountered issues and additional information on obtaining assistance with archive mining and science exploitation.

This new document is accessible from the Cycle 9 Documents page and the Archive Documentation page on the ALMA Science Portal. While this primer is intended for archival researchers, principal investigators (PIs) of ALMA data may also find it useful.

 

Cycle 9 Version of the Observation Support Tool

A new version of the Observing Support Tool (OST), the online tool for simulating ALMA observations, has been released. This new version not only retains all the functionality it had previously but also includes Cycle 9 antenna configurations (listed as Cycle 9 C-X values in the webform).

The OST may be accessed from https://almaost.jb.man.ac.uk/.