The Allegro ALMA Regional Centre node is organising a proposal preparation workshop on Thursday the 20th of April 2023 in advance of the upcoming ALMA proposal deadline (expected to be the 10th of May 2023). We would like to invite you to attend online or in person at Leiden Observatory.

The workshop will have two sessions:

1. Morning (10:00 – 12:00): Introduction to writing and preparing ALMA proposals.
2. Afternoon (13:00 – 14:00): Summary of new features and changes in Cycle 10.

The morning session will introduce attendees to writing and preparing ALMA proposals. The topics covered will include the dual anonymous review process, distributed peer review, accessing the ALMA archive and using the ALMA Observing Tool (OT) to prepare your observing programme. No prior ALMA experience is necessary for attendance.

The afternoon session will cover the differences between Cycle 10 and Cycle 9. In particular, we will highlight the new capabilities of ALMA in this cycle, including the new ALMA Band 1 and the new availability of joint proposals with JWST, the VLA and the VLT. The afternoon session is designed for returning ALMA users and is also suitable for attendees of the morning session.

Both sessions will have time for your questions, and tea, coffee and biscuits will be provided for in person attendees. You can register to attend online or in person for one or both of the sessions before Thursday, April 13, 2023 using our registration form. For more information about the expected dates and what will be on offer in Cycle 10, please see the ALMA Cycle 10 Pre-announcement. 

In addition to this proposal preparation day, you can request a meeting with the Allegro staff (e-mail us) to discuss your proposal or come to our drop-in sessions (April 24, May 1, and May 8 at HL-1122 from 14:00-16:00).

• Program
• Directions

Directions to Leiden Observatory

The address of Leiden Observatory is Niels Bohrweg 2, 2333 CA Leiden. Note that this is not the old observatory in the center of Leiden. Instructions on how to get to Leiden Observatory, including transportation from Schiphol Airport or the central trains station, can be found here. Leiden Observatory is located on the 4-5th floors of the Oort building (seen on the right in the photo below), and the Huygens building (the taller building seen on the left in the photo below). Allegro offices are located on the 11th floor of the Huygens building.

The workshop will take place in room EM 1.09 in the New Gorlaeus building. We will have signs and there is also a reception at the entrance of the building where they can provide you with directions.

For those joining us online, connection details will be sent to you by email before the start of the event.

Useful resources:

• • Cycle 10 pre-announcement
  • Cycle 10 Call for Proposals

The ALMA Cycle 8 2021 Call for Proposals is now open with a submission deadline on April 21, 2021. 

The Allegro ARC Node would like to invite you to attend a proposal preparation workshop. The aim of this workshop is to assist you in making the most out of ALMA’s new capabilities, getting an overview of the new modes offered, and proposal preparation through the ALMA Observing Tool (OT). We will also offer guidance with writing double-anonymous proposals and in the new stages of proposal writing and reviewing (the “distributed proposal review process”) that will be in use from Cycle 8 2021.

The format of our workshop will be virtual, and it will consist of:

1. a live online event with the Allegro team on March 29th with a few presentations and an extensive Q&A session
2. online video tutorials that will be uploaded after the online event (watch last year’s video tutorials here)
3. online drop-in sessions on Wednesdays 14-15 and Fridays 9-10
4. individual 1-1 support that can be booked at any time (e-mail us)

Our online event will be used to address questions related to proposal submission and the distributed proposal review process that will be adopted from Cycle 8 2021 onwards. Since proposals will have to be written in a fully double-anonymous fashion this year, the Allegro team will provide advice on how this can be achieved, and explain how one can refer to unpublished data and previous ALMA projects without accidentally violating the double-anonymous guidelines.

You can register to attend the online event on March 29th using this registration form.

An overview of important dates and what’s offered in Cycle 8 2021 can be found in the Call for Proposals. As a reminder, the Cycle 8 2021 will include configurations from C-1 up to C-8, with a special focus on high frequency observing. New capabilities that will be offered include Solar observations in Band 5, a passive-phasing mode for VLBI, high-frequency observations (Bands 9 and 10) with the stand-alone 7-m array, mosaicking of continuum line polarisation observations (Bands 3 to 7), spectral scans with the 7-m Array and up to 75 hours of full polarisation observations of a single field with the 7-m Array. No long baseline observations are offered in Cycle 8 2021.

We look forward to seeing many of you at the ALMA Proposal Preparation Day on March 29th! Meanwhile, don’t hesitate to e-mail us if you have questions, concerns, or need support. We would be happy to set up a remote meeting with you. PIs who are considering a Large Program are especially encouraged to contact Allegro early so we can explore the many ways we can support your project and help optimize your program.

• Program
• Participants
• Connection details will be sent to registered participants