Over the past several weeks, ALMA has continued to conduct PI science observations on a best-effort basis while the recovery of the Arrays has been ongoing. The first set of antenna relocations was completed on May 10, 2021, moving the 12-m Array into the C43-6 configuration. In addition, PI science using eight antennas on the 7-m Array began on May 18, 2021. The plan is to go through all remaining configurations (C43-7 to C43-10) by the end of Cycle 7, although for a shorter duration than originally planned for each configuration.

A detailed report of the Cycle 8 2021 Proposal Submission Statistics is now available. The report provides a summary of items such as the number of submitted proposals and time requested, subscription rates, and comparisons with the number of hours requested in previous Cycles.

The European ARC Network invites users to an online training on polarisation observations with ALMA. The session will be held on Thursday June 24, 2021, 11:00 CEST [Zoom link]. In this training session, participants will learn about ALMA’s polarisation capabilities and data products available in the archive. In particular, instructions on how to inspect the diagnostic information on data calibration and how to produce polarisation images will be given.

For its ALMA Regional Centre at the Headquarters in Garching near Munich, Germany, ESO is opening the position of:

ALMA Regional Centre Astronomer

The closing date for receipt of applications to be considered for the position is 10 May, 2021.  

From August 24 to 27, 2021, IRAM will host the virtual 50th Young European Radio Astronomers Conference (YERAC).
The YERAC is a real opportunity for graduate and doctoral students, as well as young postdoctoral researchers to meet together, present their work, tap into different radioastronomical subjects, and discuss research done by others.

ALMA is very pleased to share the positive news that science observations re-started on 17 March 2021. These were the first Cycle 7 data to be acquired since the Observatory shutdown, due to the Covid-19 pandemic, in March 2020. The first newly-acquired datasets have now been calibrated and imaged, and have successfully passed the ALMA quality assurance stages.

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 8 2021 Call for Proposals (CfP) for scientific observations to be scheduled from October 2021 to September 2022. More detail can be found on the ALMA Science Portal.

ALMA is introducing distributed peer review in Cycle 8 2021. To optimize the success of this review method, all PIs are invited to update their "Expertise" on the ALMA Science Portal. This information will be used to best match propsals with their referees.