rubinann16026 — Announcement

Rubin Digest 22 July 2016

22 July 2016

Project News

Registration for the LSST Project and Community Workshop 2016 (LSST 2016) stands at 230 participants, and closes TODAY for both the workshop and hotel block (although we’ll keep it open through Monday for last minute registrations).  The registration page is here.

All subsystems are consumed with preparations for the NSF/DOE Joint Status Review.  A Director’s Review, essentially a dry run, will be held at SLAC next week in advance of the actual review August 16 – 18 in Tucson.

We’ve just received word that the LSST Town Hall at AAS 229 is scheduled for Wednesday, 4 January 2017.  This Town Hall will describe the complimentary missions of the LSST Project, LSST Corporation, and LSST Science Collaborations, highlighting ways for community members to get involved in LSST now, and soliciting community feedback.

LSST is making plans to hold community workshop at the DPS 48 / EPSC 11 Meeting in Pasadena, CA.  More information will be circulated as it is known.  

PFlow Industries performed a successful setup and test on July 18th of their platform lift, which will be installed in the summit facility to transport the LSST mirrors and camera.  The lift platform is pictured with the test load of approximately 140,000 lbs of concrete blocks.  As witnessed by Bill Gressler, Jeff Barr, Freddy Muñoz and the PFlow engineering team, the lift functioned smoothly and flawlessly under load and was also tested for safety interlocks and response to fault conditions. The entire lift assembly will now be disassembled, painted, and packed for shipment to the construction site - anticipated to arrive in October and begin its installation in November.

Corporation News

Oxford University hosted a Dark Energy Science Collaboration (DESC) Meeting and an LSST Galaxies Science Collaboration Workshop this week.  The DESC Meeting included an installment of the LSST Dark Energy School.  The Galaxies Workshop brought the US and UK ‘Galaxies’ communities together, for the first time since the UK joined LSST in December 2015.

Personnel News

SLAC is hosting two students this summer: Cole Jones, a rising junior mechanical engineering major from USC, and Ben Bartlett, a rising senior physics/computer science major from Caltech.  Cole and Ben are working on the readout electronic boards (REB) production assembly and test effort. The students are gaining experience in prototyping and qualification testing as well as the development of procedures and writing CCS scripts for automated testing.

Two new jobs were added to the LSST hiring page this week: a Junior Integration Engineer and a Software Engineer, both in the Telescope & Site group.  LSST continues to seek top talent to work in a team environment that inspires excellence!

Upcoming Meetings with LSST Involvement

(those with asterisk* are LSSTC funded):

July 27-29: 2016 Director's Review of Project Status, SLAC

August 1-5, 2016: LSSTC Data Science Fellowship Program *, Northwestern University, IL

August 15-19: LSST 2016 Project & Community Workshop, Tucson, AZ

August 16-18: LSST Joint Status Review, Tucson, AZ

October 16 – 21: DPS 48 / EPSC 11, Pasadena, CA

October 27 - 29: Society of Women Engineers Meeting, Philadelphia, PA

November 16-18: Preparing for Supernova Science in the LSST Era: A Kick-Off Workshop* University of Pittsburgh, PA

December 1-2: Precision Astronomy with Fully Depleted CCDs*, BNL

Late Nov/ Early Dec: Towards Science in Chile with the LSST 2016* Vina del Mar, Chile

January 3, 2017 (TBC): ZTF Community Workshop at AAS 229* AAS 229 Meeting, Grapevine, TX

January 3-7, 2017:LSST AGN Science Collaboration Roadmap Development Meeting* AAS 229 Meeting; Grapevine, TX

February 27 March 2, 2017: Detecting the Unexpected: Discovery in the Era of Astronomically Big Data* Location TBD