Monthly Archives: June 2018

By / par Sarah Gallagher, MSE Science Advisory Group Member
(Cassiopeia – Summer / été 2018)

As many readers will have heard at CASCA 2018, the MSE collaboration continues its work towards preliminary design starting in 2019. The MSE Management Group has added two institutions from the United States as observers: Texas A&M University and the National Center for Optical-Infrared Astronomy (NCOA). Including recent discussions with Texas A&M, the partnership has identified about half the resources (cash and in-kind contributions) needed for preliminary design, and are discussing possible contributions from NCOA beginning in 2019. The partnership will continue to identify and secure resources while preliminary design activities get underway.

The preliminary design phase will be governed by a Statement of Understanding (SOU) to be signed by the current MSE participants – Canada, France, Hawaii, China, Australia, and India – and endorsed by future participants when they join the project. The MSE SOU specifies the (non-binding) contributions that Canada anticipates providing during preliminary design, and the framework within which participant contributions will be converted into a "Beneficial Interest" in MSE.

As was the case in the early days of the Thirty Meter Telescope (TMT) partnership, the Association of Canadian Universities for Research in Astronomy (ACURA) has been approached to be the Canadian signatory to the MSE SOU. The ACURA Board is considering this request in recognition of MSE's strong support in the 2010 Long Range Plan and 2016 Mid-Term Review, and the significant role Canadians have played to date in developing the Detailed Science Case. Without a signatory to the MSE SOU, Canada will be downgraded to Observer status and lose voting rights on the MSE Management Group. If you support Canadian involvement in MSE during the preliminary design phase leading up to the next Long Range Plan, contact your institution's ACURA representative and let them know. A slightly dated list of representatives can be found here.

Preparation for CFI Proposal

Ultimately, maintaining a role in MSE will require that Canada make further cash and/or in-kind contributions to the preliminary design phase within the next few years. To support this aim, we are engaged in planning for a CFI proposal submission for the next round (anticipated in 2019). If you are interested in contributing to this effort, the relevant points of contact are Colin Bradley (Victoria Engineering Professor and CFI Project Manager for MSE; Enclosure), Michael Balogh (Waterloo; Low/Medium Resolution Spectrographs), Sarah Gallagher (Western; Software), and Kim Venn (Victoria; Fiber Transport System). Additional industrial partners to support these design components are also needed; sharing your connections would be greatly appreciated. The points of contact can also help develop promising leads for industrial partners.

Status of Science Team Membership

In response to the call for new science team members, the MSE Science Team now has 203 participants, including 31 Canadians from 15 institutions in six provinces. The Project Office is currently organizing team members into Science Working Groups in preparation for Design Reference Survey work that will begin within the next couple of months. If you signed up for the Science Team but have not been receiving e-mails, please contact MSE Project Scientist Alan McConnachie.

MSE Project Scientist Search

After successfully shepherding MSE through the conceptual design process, Alan McConnachie will be stepping down as Project Scientist at the end of 2018, though he will continue his involvement with the Science Team. The Canadian MSE team would like to thank Alan for his excellent leadership during his tenure as Project Scientist. He deserves significant credit for bringing the project to the stage where the external reviewers were “very impressed by the level of sophistication that the MSE project team has brought to this project”. A search for a new Project Scientist is underway.

The MSE website may be accessed here. Questions or comments about MSE governance can be directed to your MSE Management Group Members, Greg Fahlman and Pat Hall. Scientific questions or comments can be directed to your MSE Science Advisory Group Members, Sarah Gallagher and Kim Venn.

From / de David Naylor, SPICA Canadian HoN and Co-I, University of Lethbridge
and / et Doug Johnstone, SPICA Science Team, NRC-Herzberg
(Cassiopeia – Summer / été 2018)

On 7 th May 2018, SPICA was selected by the European Space Agency (ESA) as one of three candidate missions to be studied in parallel over the next three years in preparation for a final 2021 down-select for ESA’s fifth medium class mission in its Cosmic Vision science programme. If successful in the 2021 down-select, SPICA would be built to launch around 2030. SPICA is a joint European-Japanese project that offers significant gains in far-infrared spectroscopic and survey capabilities. Detailed information about SPICA and its three instruments can be found here and here.

Canada was a founding member of the SPICA/SAFARI consortium and through its contributions over the last decade is now positioned to build the mission critical high resolution polarizing Fourier transform spectrometer (Martin-Puplett Interferometer – MPI) for the SAFARI instrument. This MPI builds on Canada’s contribution to the Herschel/SPIRE instrument and was recognized by the SAFARI consortium as an area of excellence both in Canadian academia and industry. The return from this investment to the Canadian astronomical community will be several times more than that awarded to the Canadian Herschel/SPIRE team. Herschel was, of course, an amazing success, in part due to the significant contributions from the Canadian scientists involved. Indeed, the recent success of SPICA is regarded by many as a direct result of the success of Herschel.

As stated in the SPICA Press Release that accompanied its ESA selection:

“The promise of SPICA is made possible by the combination of a number of significant innovations. A key component is the use of a large 2.5 metre diameter telescope that is cooled to almost 270 degrees below zero, to reduce the background radiation emitted by the telescope itself to the absolute minimum. With such a low background the extremely sensitive Transition Edge Sensors (TES), developed both in the Netherlands at SRON as well as in partner institutes in the UK and the US, can be used to their full potential. The combination of the cold telescope and the ultrasensitive detectors will make SPICA the most sensitive observatory in the mid- and far-infrared ever – with this extreme sensitivity the SPICA instruments will be able to take the spectral fingerprints of objects out to the farthest reaches of the universe.

The observatory will have three instruments covering the full mid- and far-infrared, the wavelength domain between 12 and 350 microns. A combined mid-infrared camera and spectrometer will be provided by a large Japanese consortium led by the University of Nagoya, a French-led European consortium will build a compact imaging polarimeter, and a large SRON-led international consortium will design and implement the largest and most complex instrument, the far-infrared spectrometer SAFARI.

SPICA will be used by the world-wide astronomical community. As is the custom for other great ground based and space observatories all astronomers can propose observations. A panel of independent specialists will rate the proposals according to their scientific quality and determine if and how much time will be awarded for the observations. Proposers will have about a year proprietary access to the measurement, after that period the data are made public to be used by anyone that is interested.”

David Naylor and Doug Johnstone attended the SPICA/SAFARI consortium meeting in Groningen at the end of May, where they were able to partake in the celebration of this significant milestone and actively engage in discussions around the critical paths forward. David Naylor provided an extremely well received report on the progress of the Canadian SAFARI instrument activities. Doug Johnstone also provided an update on the science case for time-domain research with SPICA.

In order to promote the science capabilities of SPICA and build additional enthusiasm and support amongst the international research community, there will be a dedicated international science conference next year on the island of Crete, “Exploring the Infrared Universe: The Promise of SPICA”, 20-23 May 2019. While the project is still over a decade away, the next three years are pivotal in defining the instrumental requirements and observing modes, and we strongly encourage Canadian participation at this meeting.

The recent success of SPICA at ESA in Europe and the strong support for SPICA at JAXA in Japan bodes well for the mission. Canadian astronomers wishing to become more active with SPICA science should contact David Naylor or Doug Johnstone in order to be added to the Canadian SPICA mailing list and/or to be put in contact with like-minded researchers within the SPICA consortium.