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2011-2012:institute

Institute

Preparing for the next funding cycle

The Joint Institute for VLBI faced an international review in March 2012, as a first step to arrive at a new funding agreement between its partners. The preparations in 2011 included formulating the long-term strategy and various evaluation documents. In parallel, discussions concerning whether JIVE should transform into an ERIC (European Research Infrastructure Consortium, a legal entity with a EC basis) continued. A panel of recognized international experts visited JIVE and evaluated the operations, research and development programme (Figure XX), as well as the scientific potential of the EVN and JIVE. In its report the panel expressed great confidence in JIVE, stating, “We cannot imagine the job being done more effectively”. The panel endorsed the strategic priorities that JIVE set for its future development. Most notable was the observation of the panel that “VLBI has a very exciting and broad science case that the EVN can exploit, particularly in synergy with other SKA pathfinders”.

FIGURES IN SEPARATE DOC FILE

1. Institute 1.1. Preparing for the next funding cycle

The Joint Institute for VLBI hosted an international review in March 2012, as a first step to arrive at a new funding agreement between its partners. The preparations in 2011 for this review included formulating the long-term strategy and various evaluation documents. Also, discussions concerning whether JIVE should transform into an ERIC (European Research Infrastructure Consortium, a legal entity with a EC basis) continued. The panel made up of recognized international experts visited JIVE and evaluated the operations, research and development programme (Figure XX), as well as the scientific potential of the EVN and JIVE. In its report the panel expressed great confidence in JIVE, stating, “We cannot imagine the job being done more effectively”. The panel endorsed the strategic priorities that JIVE set for its future development. Most notable was the observation of the panel that “VLBI has a very exciting and broad science case that the EVN can exploit, particularly in synergy with other SKA pathfinders”. The details of the process and the report can be found at http://www.jive.nl/jive-review-2012.

INSERT FIGURE Figure XX. Demonstration of the UniBoard prototype during the review of JIVE on March 5, 2012 After a number of meetings and negotiations, the positive outcome of the review was followed by a decision of the international partners to sign a two-year extension of the JIVE contributions agreement, recognising this period as a transition to the establishment of an ERIC.

Very relevant in this process was the positive decision by the South-African NRF to become a member of JIVE in May 2012. The Hartebeesthoek telescope has been a long-standing member of the EVN. However, with the construction of the MeerKAT and the ambition to start an African VLBI Network, this formal partnership could be the starting point for building up important new VLBI capabilities during the years that the SKA is being constructed, and even during its operation.

INSERT FIGURE The JIVE board at the occasion of NRF South Africa joining JIVE.

The review was held after serious construction work had started in Dwingeloo. Several JIVE staff members moved to temporary offices in the spring 02012, and during the summer there were considerable further disturbances as the old building was prepared for integration with the new wing. New JIVE offices were ready just before Christmas, and the last days of 2012 were used for moving staff into the new wing.

1.2. Enhancing the VLBI capabilities

An outstanding fact in the operations of JIVE in the years 2011 and 2012 was the transition of EVN correlation from the Mk4 to the EVN software correlator at JIVE (SFXC). As a consequence an increasing number of VLBI capabilities could be offered by the EVN facility. The software correlator started with a focus on special modes, like wide field, pulsar gating and spectral line modes, but with increasing computing resources becoming available, it had taken over virtually all correlation by the end of 2012, including e-VLBI. Notably, the results of the first tests of new VLBI digital equipment at the telescopes were obtained on the SFXC, considerably improving the sensitivity by capturing data at 2 and 3 Gbps.

These correlator upgrades have a strong synergy with JIVE’s on-going push to make e-VLBI a more robust, flexible and sensitive technique. This effort is subsidised by the EC through the FP7 NEXPReS project. This project has been focusing on methods to implement the best of both worlds: e-VLBI data streaming in real-time, as well as transparent caching if the data is needed (again) in a later stage. In this project the consortium members are also pioneering methods to allocate connectivity bandwidth on demand. The progress of the project was rated excellent by the EC’s review panel in September 2012.

A highlight for the NEXPReS participants and all e-VLBI operators around the world was the global e-VLBI meeting in November 2011 in South Africa (Fig YY). The meeting and its location were particularly suitable in view of the regional ambitions to develop an African VLBI Network based on decommissioned communication dishes in various African countries.

INSERT FIGURE Participants at the 10th international e-VLBI workshop at Amanzingwe near Johannesburg, South Africa

After extensive efforts by the JIVE management to help shaping the proposal, the RadioNet3 project launched in January 2012, making a seamless connection with the RadioNet FP7 programme. Both provide the vital Trans National Access funds, which are deployed to implement user support for VLBI in Europe. Besides, RadioNet3 also supports JIVE’s user software efforts. And it continues to provide for JIVE plans to commission an FPGA based correlator, based on the so-called UniBoard concept. In 2011, the first prototype was delivered and first fringes were reported in 2012. As part of the follow-up RadioNet3 programme, UniBoard2 will investigate even more powerful and energy efficient solutions for future correlator and beam-forming applications, for example in the SKA.

Several externally funded programmes support the development of techniques for near-field VLBI observations of planetary spacecraft. JIVE collaborates with international partners to facilitate such experiments in order to enhance the science return of current and future space missions. Among the experiments carried out were the detailed measurements of the orbit of the Venus Express (e.g. Fig XX). Later experiments measured the drag forces on the Venus Express when skimming the Venus upper atmosphere

INSERT FIGURE Accurate VLBI observations of the Venus Express spacecraft X-band radio signal demonstrate the capabilities of obtaining spacecraft state-vectors with unsurpassed accuracy (Duev et al. 2012, accepted by A&A)

Major efforts also went into preparing the science case for various future missions, such as the Marco-Polo-R and JUICE (Fig. YY). Actual measurements were made of the RadioAstron orbiting radio telescope, in order to eventually refine its state vector and getting fringes on space baselines based on these precise determinations.

INSERT FIGURE Figure YY. JIVE’ Giuseppe Cimo’ and Dmitry Duev discussing details of the Space application programme; still from the JIVE movie available at http://www.jive.nl/jive-movie

1.3. JIVE happenings

The review panel will of course also be presented with the science output of the EVN and the JIVE staff. In 2011 and 2012 there was a considerable output to report from the EVN, where it was notable that the delays between observations and presentation were shorter than before, probably this effect is due to the impact of e-VLBI real-time observing on the scientific process. With the advant of e-VLBI and the software correlator, there was also an increase of astronomical topics that were addressed, as was also noted by the review panel.

The productivity of the JIVE staff was very tangible in 2011 and 2012. Clearly this was related to the fact that over two years 7 students associated with JIVE finished their projects and obtained their PhD’s (Fig AA)

INSERT FIGURE Seven students receiving their PhD’s with JIVE-related topics. Nikta Amiri at Leiden, Linjie Chen at Shanghai, Jintao Luo at Shanghai, Kalle Torstensson at Leiden, Stephen Bourke at Galway. Guiffre Molera at Turku, Dmitry Duev at Moscow.

INSERT FIGURE Participants at the XX EVN symposium at place de la Bourse in Bordeaux

A notable event showcasing the effort of the JIVE and EVN teams was the 11th EVN symposium. In the great setting of Bordeaux the EVN users demonstrated the breadth of modern VLBI science, particularly showing the latest scientific progress with e-VLBI and software correlation.

With briefly over 35 people at JIVE in 2012, the number of employees was at its ever highest in this period. Most of the numbers come from externally funded projects, which provided temporary resources. It seems that these levels are not sustainable in the near future and despite some flexible arrangements, we had to say goodbye to a number of fine colleagues. It was good to see that they all found new and interesting jobs, sometimes close, sometimes faraway.

2011-2012/institute.txt · Last modified: 2013/05/07 09:24 by poll