ALMA

• The Current Status of the Antenna Procurement
• ESAC members
• The Present Status of the ALMA Regional Center
• ALMA People
• Upcoming events

Presently the ALMA antenna procurement process is being delayed until further tests of the prototype antennas in Socorro NM, USA are finished. These tests involve some astronomical measurements, so winter is the most favorable time period. Once the tests are finished the results will be evaluated and a decision about the choice of ALMA antenna will be made. As all should understand, great caution is needed in reaching this decision, since the ALMA antennas will be the largest single investment in the project.

From Janunary 2005, Jose Cernicharo has become the spanish member of the European Science Advisory Committee (ESAC). He replaces R. Bachiller. The other national members have not changed.

The concept of the ALMA Regional Center (ARC) for Europe has been discussed by the European Science Advisory Committee (ESAC) in September 2003. This discussion is summarized in an appendix to the ESAC report. The ARC functions are divided into 'User Support', which is funded within the ALMA project, and 'Science Support' which is not a part of the basic ALMA plan. Recent accounts of the 'User Support' and 'Science Support' functions were given at the ALMA Community Day. After further discussions within the European ALMA Board, the STC and ESO Council, the ESO Council approved a 'Call for Expressions of Interest', with the request to submit letters of intent by 31 October 2004. Seven replies have been received. These will be discussed in a face-to-face meeting at ESO in early 2005 with the groups involved. Thus progress is being made on the organization of ARCs, and we will provide more details in future issues of the Newsletter.

Elena Zuffanelli (left) joined ESO in 1989, starting in the Instrumentation Division under the supervision of Prof. S. D'Odorico. She studied foreign languages in her hometown in Italy, Florence, and after graduating she started working in the fashion and the touristic environment. For study reasons she moved to Munich in 1986 and worked for the American Army for two and half years as Administrative Clerk. She joined the ALMA Division in October 2002 after returning from her maternity leave and takes care of all administrative tasks of ALMA, in particular Meetings organisation and EDM Archive.

Nathalie Thebaud (right) joined ALMA in February 2004 as division secretary. She was trained on the ALMA EDM system, and since January 2005 she has been taking care of all administrative tasks related to the ALMA Configuration Control Board. Nathalie comes from the south of Brittany in France where she studied Physics and Chemistry for 5 years before she moved to Germany in 1998. Before starting at ESO, she worked as assistant for several companies, for the last three years for a consulting company in Munich.

Gie Han Tan was born in 1961, in Nijmegen, the Netherlands. In 1987 he graduated in electrical engineering, specialising in microwave technology, at the Technical University Twente in Enschede, the Netherlands. A post-academic degree in business administration was obtained in 1993 from the Dutch Open University. In 1986 and 1987 he worked as a design engineer at Hollandse Signaalapparaten b.v. (currently part of the French Thales Group) in Hengelo, on non-linear microwave circuits. He joined ASTRON in Dwingeloo in 1987. As a scientific project manager he was mainly involved in research, development and management activities of receiver projects. In addition he was adviser to several external institutes and organizations, including European Space Agency and the Indian Giant Meter-wave Radio Telescope (GMRT). In 1997 he became responsible as a senior project manager for system design and engineering within the newly formed Technical Laboratory of ASTRON. He was awarded with the prestigious Dutch Veder Price 1999 for his contribution to the development of new receiver systems for the Westerbork Synthesis Radio Telescope. From January 1999 until March 2000 he was seconded to Rohde & Schwarz in Munich, Germany, to work on research for broadband antenna systems. This activity focused mainly on active antenna concepts for a novel radio telescope, called LOFAR, operating in the HF range. In April 2000 he joined ESO in Garching, as the European system engineer for the ALMA project. In 2002 he switched to the position of European ALMA Front End project manager.

Engineer of the DGA, the French Defense Procurement Agency, Eric Pangole has been at ESO since October 2002. After a first engineering project at the University of Melbourne, he started his career at CELAR in Rennes, France, the DGA technical expertise center for electronic systems. Starting in the electronic warfare area, he participated to various programs like simulations of an anti-air defense system or technical support to the French-German joint procurement of a prototype ground surveillance radar. Then he moved to the military telecommunication environment where he was responsible to set-up at CELAR the European interoperability test center for a NATO tactical data link radiocommunication system. In parallel he was also involved in the procurement of software radio demonstrators by France and Germany. At ESO Eric is working in the ALMA System Engineering and Integration IPT. He's involved in various ALMA SE&I activities such as the control of the system specifications and ICDs, requirements analysis, the system electrical budget, reliability analyses or the implementation of engineering tools such as the ALMA inventory and maintenance control system.

Hans Rudolf received the Dipl.-Ing. and the Dr.-Ing. degrees in electrical engineering from the University of Karlsruhe in 1994 and 1999, respectively. He received the Dipl. Kfm. degree from the University of Hagen in 2001. In 1995 and 1996 he was with the Daimler Benz research center in Ulm (Germany) working on a polarimetric mm-wave Radar. From 1996 to 1999 he had a Marie-Curie fellowship from the European Commission and worked at the JRC in Ispra (Italy) on a interferometric and polarimetric Synthetic Aperture Radar. From 1999 to 2002 he was with Siemens ICM in Munich, Germany, working on GSM/EDGE Base-stations. Since 2002 he is with ESO in Garching, Germany as ALMA Front End Sub-System engineer. His research interests are in the field of mobile communications, radar, and radio astronomy.

The SZ Effect and ALMA
7-8 April 2005, Orsay (Paris area), France
To register: email Pierre.Cox@ias.u-psud.fr

IAU Symposium 227 Massive Star Birth: A Crossroads of Astrophysics
16-20 May 2005, Acireale, Italy
Deadline for registration is 31 March 2005

Planning has been started for a 'Global ALMA Meeting' to be held in Madrid in 2006. This will be the first world-wide ALMA science meeting since the Washington DC meeting in 1999. The local organization of the meeting will be headed by R. Bachiller (OAN), while the scientific organization will be led by the Alma Science Advisory Committee.