Edited by Peter Lawson

2002 Working Group Meeting
Waikoloa Village, Hawaii (USA)

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Hilton Waikoloa Village, August 29-30, 2002

Meeting Announcement | Agenda | Participants | Photos: Day 1 and Day 2 | Hilton Waikoloa Village

Minutes of the Meeting

The Working Group held a two-day meeting on the Big Island of Hawaii, 29-30 August 2002, following the SPIE's conferences on Telescopes and Astronomical Instrumentation. The format of the meeting was similar to the meeting in 2001, but the early sessions now included presentations from the Eur-Interferometry Initiative, and the Michelson Science Center at Caltech.

European Southern Observatory

Andreas Glindemann
Viewgraphs, Website

The way the European Southern Observatory and the VLTI work with astronomers and instrument builders was described. The VLTI follows VLT policy in every respect. Individual scientific collaborations are done as they are in other institutions. The VLTI observes every night with VINCI and the siderostats. Observing programs can be queued. All commissioning data is released regularly, every three months or so. Technical data are available on demand. ESO archives are only open to ESO member states. Guaranteed-time observations are the "property" of the instrument PIs. The PIs of instruments such as AMBER and MIDI have guaranteed observing time which is a fraction of the total interferometer time.

Instruments are built only with the approval of the ESO Council, the STC, and the Finance Committee. ESO cannot fund general Research and Development for instrumentation. Even second generation instruments need to be focused on hardware that fulfills a specific task. For example, ESO has bought an IONIC beam combiner because of concerns of the performance of the MONA combiner in VINCI. The ESO Council determines how instrument builders are rewarded. The selection of what instruments are built is determined by committee. ESO works with various Centers through the establishment of work packages.

Applications for observing time are open to PIs of non-eso member states. See the ESO Proposal Preparation and Submission webpage. The VLTI has a list of protected sources, which it will make available.

ESO suggests a standard list of calibrator stars, and there is a support astronomer at Paranal who will discuss the measurements with you. The list of calibrator stars will be made public.

Data processing is an area where the VLTI is interested in collaborating.

Eur-Interferometry Initiative

Alain Chelli (JMMC), Thomas Henning (FRINGE), and A. Quirrenbach (NEVEC)
Viewgraphs, Website

The Eur-Interferometry Initiative aims to facilitate communications between European scientists and institutes involved in optical/IR long-baseline interferometry, to coordinate European workshops and symposia, software standards, and to develop long-term strategic planning for optical/infrared interferometry facilities. The initiative involves participants from 14 European countries and includes both the European Southern Observatory and the European Space Agency. It was established on January 30, 2002 by the Jean-Marie Mariotti Center (Grenoble, France), the NOVA-ESO VLTI Expertise Center (Leiden, The Netherlands), and the Frontiers of Interferometry in Germany (Heidelberg, Germany). FrInGe is different from the other centers in that it is principally a clearing-house for industry contracts, but does not serve as a center for software or hardware expertise. Plans are underway to submit a proposal for support within the European Union's Integrated Infrastructure Initiative.

Michelson Science Center, Caltech

Rachel Akeson and Andy Boden (California Institute of Technology)
Viewgraphs, Website

The Michelson Science Center (previously the Interferometry Science Center) at Caltech serves to support the science programs of NASA's ground and space interferometry projects within the Origins Program. Experience with the Palomar Testbed Interferometer is being used to support science with the Keck Interferometer and planning for the Space Interferometry Mission. Other missions that will be supported include the Large Binocular Telescope, and the Terrestrial Planet Finder.

The Observation planning tool getCal, developed initially for PTI and currently in use with the Keck Interferometer, is scheduled for public release in November 2002. The use of getCal was illustrated and discussed. The external calibration tools wbCalib and nbCalib were also described. A list of calibrators used at PTI and KI are being accumulated and are expected to be made publically available through the MSC website. This will include a list of bad calibrators.

Areas for which collaborations are encouraged include getCal extensions, data fitting and modelling for externally calibrated data, the FITS data format standard, and the evaluation of calibrators.

Future Paths

Harold McAlister (Georgia State University)
Viewgraphs

The working group could formulate long-term plans for beyond 2010 and be prepared well in advance of 2008 to be influential in the next US decadal survey. The timescales in Europe may be shorter than in the US. This would involve an assessments of scientific contribution and limits of Extremely Large Telescope projects now underway. Our thinking should be more than a simple extrapolation of what we now have. To help obtain a broader support base, we should develop stronger ties to the non-interferometric community and should incorporate theorists in writing white-papers and on all panels. It is also important to give interferometry talks at theorist meetings.

It would nonetheless be useful to establish technical boundary conditions - so that our plans for after 2010 are, for example, based on known technology in 2008. We could take an active role and encourage periodic workshops on this subject. Would it be more productive to aim towards the development of one large project or of several smaller projects? Can we as a group develop support for optical/IR interferometry in the same way that Adaptive Optics has had a center of excellence funded as an area of focused research with US National Science Foundation? Is it possible for the IAU to endorse an NSF grant application? We should examine a small number of scientific objectives and form instrument teams to study the technical issues that are currently unresolved.

Although subjects related to this material were discussed, it was nonetheless felt by most working group members that it was still premature to plan for future projects beyond the Keck Interferometer and the VLTI. European representatives were, however, in the process of providing ESO with a whitepaper of future directions in interferometry and high-angular resolution astrophysics.

Christoph Leinert volunteered to develop a website with a database of coatings and beamsplitters used by existing interferometers. This should list problems with coatings and specific vendors, and also serve as a clearinghouse for open problems. It was thought possible that this might be facilitated through Opticon. It was also felt that a "laundry-list" of technology challenges from the 2000 NSF meeting in Socorro should be made available through OLBIN.

Calibrator Stars and Catalogs

Stephen Ridgway (NRAO)
Viewgraphs

Markus Wittkowski (ESO/VLTI)
Viewgraphs

Research on calibrator selection and ongoing programs of calibrator monitoring were reported. The possibility of a common database of calibrator stars was discussed at length, and the Michelson Science Center was invited to participate in European efforts in this activity.

VisCalc, a web-based version of VisiTools, a VLTI visibility calculator, will be made publically available. The VLTI List of VLTI Calibrators is also to be made avalable, as well as a calibrator selection tool, and the MIDI catalog.

Andreas Quirrenbach suggested that a small list of stars near the equator could serve as a common set of calibrators for the Keck/VLTI interferometers, and would also be useful for VLTI 200-m baselines and CHARA 300-m baselines.

Gilles Duvert suggested that a common list could be managed at CDS or throught Opticon, and that it would be useful to develop it under XML.

Alain Chelli suggested that the calibrator selection tools developed at the Jean-Marie Mariotti Center and at the Michelson Science Center should be formally compared at the 2003 Meeting of the Working Group.

FITS Format for Calibrated Imaging Data

John Young (Cambridge University)
Viewgraphs, Website

Pascal Ballester (ESO/VLTI)
Viewgraphs

Andy Boden and Rachel Akeson (California Institute of Technology)
Viewgraphs

The FITS format for calibrated imaging data was reported to be near completion. After a brief presentation, a call was issued for final comments on the draft. The format has already been included in software packages from various centers. Comments on the draft were presented by participants from the European Southern Observatory and the Michelson Science Center at Caltech. The format is expected to be completed in November 2002. It was suggested that XML is an emerging standard, and should also be considered for the format.

John Monnier reported developing IDL Utilities using FTOOLS that read and write the format.

The Exchange Data Standard has been incorporated into standard software being developed at ESO for the VLTI, intended for formating data after pipeline processing.

Please see http://www.mrao.cam.ac.uk/~jsy1001/exchange/ for more details.

Imaging Algorithms and Modeling

Guy Perrin (Observatoire de Paris)
Viewgraphs

Eric Thiebaut (Observatoire de Lyon)
Viewgraphs

Progress in imaging algorithms were reported, although insufficient progress had been made since 2001 to merit a formal comparison between techniques. It was reported that AIPS++ has been used to image data from the Navy Prototype Interferometer.

It was suggested that if sufficient progress had been made in 2002-2003 that the imaging "beauty contest" should be organized for the 2003 Working Group meeting.

Action Items from Meeting

Following this meeting, a long list of action items were tabled for ongoing work in the next year. Items for the Chair to follow-up (Lawson):

Collect viewgraphs from speakers (PDF) Done
Write up minutes and circulate to email list Done
Organize next meeting in Sydney in July of 2003 Done
Report activities of Working Group to Division IX Done
Collect links to calibrator lists from GI2T, VLTI, PTI, IOTA, and Keck. Add recent lists to OLBIN. Done
Follow up with NEVEC, FrInGe, JMMC, and ISC to coordinate a catalog database that is a common resource.
Advertise the release of ISC Software (when released in November 2002). Done
Advertise the observing opportunities at the VLTI (2002) Done and keck (2003).
Investigate how the IAU formalises catalogs. Done
Follow-up with Ridgway on NSF proposal and funding stemming from the Socorro workshop. Possibly stategic funding? Take advantage of recommendations from the decadal survey
Inquire if the IAU can endorse applications for grants. Done
Determine how the working group can co-sponsor meetings. Done
Determine the steps necessary to become a commission. Done
Change the way meetings are monitored for OLBIN to separate astronomy/astrophysics meeting from interferometry and instrumentation meetings. Done

General Recommendations:

No more "astronomy with interferometers" meetings. Instead, have more frequent co-sponsored single-topic IAU Workshops, Symposia, and Colloquia.
Publish four times and write a review article: encourage press releases about significant results
Declare interferometers a success (widely) where appropriate, of course.
Given interferometry talks at theorist meetings
There is no need to attempt for interferometry to be all things to all people. Excellence in stellar astrophysics should insure its own future.
Look for problems seeking solutions, not visa versa.
Take an active role in creating workshops on subtopics.
Can a multi-disciplinary "Center for Stellar Astrophysics" be created?

Specific Actions:

Christoph Leinert to set up a web-based catalog of information on coatings and beam-splitters. He will solicit updates regularly.
McAlister to contact Breckinridge with recommendations for future SPIE meetings. Done
Richichi to coordinate calibrator meetings with ISC involvement. Done
Ridgway to follow-up on NSF proposal.
Bill Cotton, Tom Pauls, John Young, and John Monnier to pursue the imaging beauty contest for Sydney in 2003.

The working group will meet next in July 2003 at the IAU General Assembly in Sydney, Australia.

Maintained by Peter Lawson
MS 301-451, Jet Propulsion Laboratory, 4800 Oak Grove Drive, Pasadena, CA 91109

2002 Working Group Meeting Waikoloa Village, Hawaii (USA)