Call for Proposals on the Gemini, Keck, and Subaru Telescopes

The deadline for Gemini proposals in Semester 2010A has now passed. We will begin accepting proposals for Semester 2010B in early March 2010.

This page contains a summary of the Gemini call for proposals, together with Australia-specific information and some hints on how to maximise your chances of getting data. It should be read in conjunction with the Gemini Observatory Call for Proposals web page, which gives more details on the operational modes available.

What's new in 2010A?

In the interests of consistency, ATAC now expects all applicants to list the full set of literature references cited in their scientific and technical justification sections as a text attachment to that section, rather than within the body of the section itself. Applicants may then use the full quota of 1000 words in each section for their science and technical cases, without worrying about the number or formatting of references cited.
Following the Joint Subaru/Gemini Science Meeting in May 2009, the time exchange agreement between Gemini and Subaru has been significantly expanded. At least 5, and up to 10 classical nights on Subaru are available to the Gemini community, with all facility instruments (see below).
The near-infrared camera and multi-object spectrograph FLAMINGOS-2 was delivered to Chile in July 2009. Acceptance Tests are now underway on Gemini South, and pending successful commissioning it is anticipated that a call will be made sometime during Semester 2010A for Science Verification proposals.
The refurbished GNIRS near-infrared spectrograph will be commissioned on Gemini North in 2010A, but a Call for Science Verification proposals is not likely until 2010B.
New CCDs with much-improved red sensitivity are due to be installed in GMOS North late in 2010A, but applicants should assume the use of the current CCDs in their proposals.

The Gemini Observatory has announced the 2010A Call for Proposals for use of the Gemini North and Gemini South Telescopes, as well as exchange time access to the HIRES instrument on Keck, and all facility instruments (except FMOS) on Subaru.

The instruments available on Gemini North are:

the GMOS optical imager, multi-object, and integral field spectrograph.
the NIRI near-infrared imager and spectrograph.
the NIFS near-infrared integral field unit spectrograph. As NIFS and Michelle currently share the upward-looking port, NIFS will be available between March and June only.
the Michelle mid-infrared imager and spectrograph. As NIFS and Michelle currently share the upward-looking port, Michelle will be available in February and July only.

ALTAIR

natural

laser

The instruments available on Gemini South are:

the GMOS optical imager, multi-object, and integral field spectrograph.
the NICI near-infrared adaptive optics-fed, dual-channel coronagraphic imager. As NICI and T-ReCS currently share the upward-looking port, NICI availability will be somewhat limited between April and July.
the T-ReCS mid-infrared imager and spectrograph. As NICI and T-ReCS currently share the upward-looking port, T-ReCS will only be available between April and July.
the Phoenix near-infrared high resolution spectrograph. Note that Phoenix availibility in the second half of 2010A may be limited due to commissioning of MCAO and GSAOI.

The instruments available on Subaru are:

COMICS, a mid-infrared camera and spectrograph.
FOCAS, an optical imager and spectrograph with longslit, multi-slit, polarimetry, and spectropolarimetry modes.
HDS, an optical high dispersion spectrograph with a resolution up to R=160,000.
IRCS, a near-infrared camera with coronagraphic and natural guide star adaptive optics (AO188) modes, as well as longslit spectroscopy with resolution up to R=20,000.
MOIRCS, a wide-field near-infrared imager and multi-object spectrograph.
Suprime-Cam, a prime-focus optical wide-field imager.

minimum of 1 night

maximum of 4 nights

Bright - May 23-June 3 or June 20-30,
Grey - February 19 - 23,
Dark - March 12-19 or April 10-16.

The only instrument available on Keck is HIRES, an optical high-dispersion spectrograph offering resolutions up to 85,000. Proposals must request between 1 and 2 nights in the periods 20 Feb - 6 March, 21 March - 4 April, or 19 June - 5 July. All applicants for Keck/HIRES time must also complete a Keck cover sheet (you will need to register for a login name and password first), which should then be e-mailed to the Australian Gemini Office (ausgo -@- aao.gov.au) before the proposal deadline.

There are strict target accessibility limits in force. Targets for Gemini North should have 7 < RA < 22 and -37 < Dec < +79; for Gemini South targets should have 7 < RA < 23 and -89 < Dec < +28. Exceptions may be allowed for very short observations, or with relaxed observing constraints. Note however that Michelle, T-ReCS, and Laser Guide Star target constraints are even more restrictive than these.

Available Time

A total of 55 hours of time on Gemini North, and 43 hours on Gemini South will be available for ATAC to allocate. This is still less than in earlier semesters, but takes account of Australia's share of the NICI Planet-Finding Campaign nights, as well as reflecting the fact that Australian programs have achieved a much higher completion rate than other partners, and the resulting imbalance in partner share still needs to be rectified. If one telescope is far more oversubscribed than the other, we may arrange a swap of nights with another partner country with an opposite imbalance, so as to even out demand.

ATAC encourages applications which can tolerate a wide range of observing conditions on Gemini. Note that by being able to relax their observing condition constraints, and avoiding the most sought-after right ascensions, every single ATAC program in Band 3 for Semester 20008B was able to be 100% completed! ATAC would also welcome more ambitious Gemini proposals seeking substantial fractions of Australian time, as well as large programs seeking time jointly with other Gemini partners.

Submitting a Proposal

The Gemini Phase I Proposal Tool (PIT) is a Java program which must be installed on the applicant's own computer (Solaris, Mac OS-X, Linux, or Windows); a new version is available for the 2010A round, and must be used. It can be downloaded from PIT Installation. Please see the Supporting Information web page for further details about:

Applicants are strongly encouraged to ask for a fraction of time in a multi-partner (Joint) proposal proportional to their intellectual involvement in the project, rather than divided up in proportion to the partner share of the proposers from different countries.

Prospective applicants should familiarise themselves with the various modes of observing offered by Gemini, as well as the web pages of the instruments they want to use.

The electronic submission process built into the PIT for Australian proposals will send the proposal XML file and associated attached files to the Australian Gemini Office at the Anglo-Australian Observatory, which is the service organization for ATAC. As part of the submission process, the proposal will be automatically validated and if errors are found, these will be reported via a pop-up window within the PIT. Invalid proposals are not accepted and it is the proposer's responsibility to fix the error(s). If validation is successful, receipt of the proposal XML file and attachment will be acknowledged and the proposal will be assigned a reference number. Again this occurs via a pop-up window within the PIT.

Poor weather proposals can be submitted at any time. These are submitted directly to Gemini and assessed by the Head of Science Operations at each Gemini telescope, so there is no need to worry about proposal rounds (or getting the proposal past ATAC).

ATAC Specific Requirements

If time is being requested on both Gemini North and Gemini South for the one scientific program, then separate proposals need to be submitted for each telescope.
You should enter raw text only (no LaTeX markup commands) into the PIT, and may attach up to three figures individually.
Abstract: should have a maximum of 120 words.
Scientific (and Technical) Justification: These fields within the PIT need to be completed, with a maximum of 1000 words each. Note that the full list of References cited should now be included as a text attachment within the PIT. Up to three figures can also be attached; formats accepted include JPEG, GIF, and PDF but not Postscript. Postscript figures should be converted to PDF first.
Publications: limited to (a) PI and/or Co-I papers relevant to the current proposal, and (b) PI publications resulting from previous allocations of Gemini time, both within the previous two years only.
Previous Time Allocations: limited to the previous 4 semesters, include all Gemini allocations, but only allocations on other telescopes relevant to the current proposal.

Need Help?

All requests for assistance and information regarding new proposals, the available instruments, the PIT, etc, should be handled through the Gemini HelpDesk. This Web-based system will forward the query initially to AusGO staff, who may then escalate it to other National Gemini Office staff, or Gemini Observatory staff, as required.

Some hints on maximising your chances of getting time (and data!)

Due to the very high demand for a limited number of exchange nights on Keck and Subaru, ATAC applicants are strongly encouraged to consider submitting Joint proposals with other Gemini partners in order to improve their chances of getting exchange time.

ATAC proposals have to be read and assessed against a cohort of proposals extending across all of astronomy. ATAC members therefore have a wide range of backgrounds and expertise spanning all areas of astronomy. However, not all committee members may be experts in your area, and familiar with all its acronyms and jargon. Even when all acronyms are defined as they are used, the excessive use of acronyms can quickly exhaust the mental stack of even the most careful and committed reader. Proposals that assume all readers have an intimate knowledge of all the acronyms and jargon used across all of astronomy, and/or an infinite capacity for remembering new acronyms, may therefore put themselves at an unnecessary disadvantage when it comes to being easily read and understood by ATAC members.

Applicants are advised to clearly state (in your technical justification) a realistic minimum total time required for their project to be viable. Please note that there is no penalty involved in quoting a minimum time less than the requested time, as ATAC does not normally allocate less than the requested time. Indeed, allocations in Band 3 will sometimes be for larger amounts of time than originally sought, to partly compensate for the poorer observing conditions under which such programs will need to be executed. Such a statement could help you in two circumstances:

Firstly, if your proposal is ranked near the cut-off, there may not be enough Australian time left to give you your full allocation. Your statement will help ATAC decide whether it is scientifically useful to give you less than your requested time, or whether the time should be given to another smaller proposal. Several proposals that set "minimum time = requested time" have in the past been unsuccessful for exactly this reason.
Secondly, if your proposal asks for time from several partner countries, and Australia ranks it highly but other partners rank it poorly, it will help ATAC decide whether it is worth giving you just the Australian time, or whether this is scientifically useless by itself. This too is a not infrequent occurrence.

Applicants are also required to state clearly what you would do if your proposal was awarded time in Band 3. There is a special tab in the PIT to do this. Note that filling in this tab in no way reduces your chances of being ranked in Band 1 or 2; leaving it blank however can severely limit your chances of getting into any band. Proposals in Band 3 are very unlikely to be carried out if they require the best (and most requested) weather conditions. If your program is ranked in the highest bands, this will make no difference. But if it is ranked in Band 3, we will ask you (if necessary) to think about shortening it, downgrading the weather constraints, picking brighter targets or a wider range of potential targets, and otherwise increasing the chance that it will actually get done. If ATAC does not feel that these changes can be made in a way that preserves at least some useful science, your proposal may be dropped from the list and replaced by one with a lower scientific ranking, but more chance of being executed in Band 3. Gemini also offer several suggestions for making the most of Band 3 time.

Having a range of targets at different RAs and Decs can help your chance of being executed in the Gemini queue. List as many targets as you like, but insert a note explaining how many you actually are requesting time to observe. Where possible, try to avoid the most-requested RAs.

Due to the requirement that all Laser Guide Star targets receive clearance in advance from US Space Command, it is recommended that all such programs be split into blocks of no more than ~1.5 hrs each in order to be schedulable. Also, the need for Laser Guide Stars when observing calibration targets should be weighed up against the risk of not being able to schedule the calibration observations alongside the science target observations.

Getting your Phase II program completed early (for targets observable early in the semester) can do wonders for the chances of your program being executed. In some cases, programs allocated time in the next semester have been executed before the current semester has even finished!

Australian Gemini Office, ausgo -@- aao.gov.au