FUSE News
Contents:
1) FUSE Cycle 3 NRA released
2) FUSE-JHU Restructuring
3) Reaction Wheel Hiccup.
4) Documentation Updates
5) FUSE Data Reduction Pipeline Available
6) Moving Targets Capabilities Demonstrated
7) Second Data Workshop Presentations on the Web
8) Next FOAC meeting
1) FUSE Cycle 3 NRA released
We are pleased to bring to your attention the release of the call for
proposals for the third year of general observations ("cycle 3").
The NASA Research Announcement (NRA 01-OSS-02) was released on February 16
and calls for Letters of Intent to be submitted by March 30. Proposal
are due to NASA by May 11, 2001.
Although FUSE is a PI-Class mission, the majority (75%) of the Cycle 3
FUSE observing time is available to the general astronomical community.
NASA expects to allocate approximately 5700 kiloseconds of on-target exposure
time to GI programs in Cycle 3.
Please note that the proposal templates, as well as the LaTeX style
file, have been updated from cycle 2. The current files and instructions can
be retrieved by sending an e-mail to fuseprop@fusewww.gsfc.nasa.gov with the
word(s) "help" or "request templates" in the "subject" line.
For further information please consult the following FUSE web sites:
Programmatic & proposal information:
http://fusewww.gsfc.nasa.gov/fuse/
Technical information:
http://fuse.pha.jhu.edu
2) FUSE-JHU Restructuring
In December 2000, the FUSE Chief of Science Operations, Bill Oegerle,
left JHU for new opportunities as UV/Optical Branch Chief at NASA/GSFC.
We thank Bill for his strong leadership in guiding the project through its
development phase and the first year of science operations.
With an eye toward the future, the project at JHU took this opportunity
to restructure itself, giving more visibility to user support and planning for
extended mission operations. Bill Blair became the new Chief of Observatory
Operations, with Jeff Kruk as his Deputy Chief, as well as Operations Scientist,
with primary responsibility for the technical side of operations. B-G Andersson
now heads the User Support Group, which is expected to grow, and Alice Berman
is now Head of Planning and Scheduling. We look forward to working with you
all as the project moves forward.
3) Reaction Wheel Hiccup.
On February 16 we encountered a problem with one of four reaction
wheels on FUSE, similar to a problem that occurred to the pitch axis wheel
last August (please see the September 2000 FUSE Newsletter). The attitude
control system determined that the yaw wheel was not generating the expected
torque, and took it out of the control loop. Luckily, this happened at a
time when we had good ground station coverage, and we recovered back onto the
science timeline (working in three wheel mode) in about 14 hours.
Analysis of the telemetry showed a number of similarities to the
earlier event, but some subtle differences as well. Prudence dictated that
we return the wheel to service as soon as possible in case another wheel
began to have problems. We started recovery operations for the yaw wheel
early on Friday 23 February, and the wheel was fully recovered and back in
service on Tuesday 27 February.
The recovery of this wheel took quite a bit more time than the pitch
wheel recovery. The drag on was significantly higher, and while we cleared one
obstruction fairly quickly, the residual drag did not reduce to pre-event
values right away, and we saw significant `glitches' in pointing off and on.
By Tuesday, these glitches had almost disappeared and the magnitude of the
remaining events was small enough that science operations would not be affected.
We recovered back onto the science timeline and things have gone smoothly
since that time.
4) Documentation Updates
As part of the cycle 3 preparations, as well as in support of the
release of the CALFUSE pipeline, we have updated and expanded our technical
and support documentation. Updates include those to the "FUSE Observer's
Guide", the templates and instructions to the proposal forms and the FUSE IDL
routines. New support documents include the "CalFUSE Reference Guide",
"Reference Guide for the FUSE IDL tools" and the "FUSE Data Analysis Cookbook".
We'd appreciate your feedback and comments, particularly on the new "cookbook".
The support documentation can be found at:
A list of FUSE related documentation and other, hopefully useful,
references can be found in a presentation from the second FUSE Data Workshop:
FUSE GI Dr. Stephan McCandliss of JHU has kindly made his molecular
hydrogen optical depth templates available to the FUSE user community. The
templates and associated idl programs can be found linked at:
5) FUSE Data Reduction Pipeline Available
As those of you attending the FUSE data workshop heard the FUSE data
reduction pipeline (v1.8.7) has now been publicly released.
In this release, versions for the Solaris and LINUX operating systems are
available. Installation and basic operations manuals are also available on
line at:
6) Moving Targets Capabilities Demonstrated
The ability of FUSE to acquire and track Moving Targets (MTs) has been
tested and demonstrated during observations of several Solar System objects.
As of February 2001, FUSE has successfully observed Saturn's satellite Titan,
the Io plasma torus, the northern and southern auroral zones of Jupiter, and
Comet McNaught-Hartley (C/1999 T1). The latter comet was moving at an
apparent rate of ~0.05 arcsec/sec and is the fastest MT observed by FUSE to
date.
7) Second Data Workshop Presentations on the Web
The second FUSE (GI) Data Workshop was recently held here in
Baltimore, with about 55 people attending. For those of you who did not
attend, we have endeavored to collect most of the presentations, or the
appropriate document references, on our website:
8) Next FOAC meeting
The FUSE Observer's Advisory Committee (FOAC) is scheduled to meet
again during the spring, with exact dates still undecided. If you have any
issues that you think the FOAC should address, please contact the FOAC chair,
Prof. Steven Federman at the University of Toledo (sfederm@uoft02.utoledo.edu),
or any of the other FOAC members.
