(Given in Dutch, the course is described in Dutch only).
At ASTRON, The Netherlands Institute for Radio Astronomy, about 180 scientists and engineers from many countries have built up an international reputation in the research of our universe and in the development of specialised equipment to detect and analyse very weak radio waves from space.
Radio telescopes are used to observe our universe and to provide astronomers with detailed images and spectra.ASTRON’s R&D department develops antenna technology to receive radio signals from the universe. There are different types of antennas: dishes such as used in the Westerbork Synthesis Radio Telescope (WSRT), and dipoles such as used in the Low Frequency Array (LOFAR). Many antennas are required to be able to do our science for the signals are very weak and because we need very sharp images. The WSRT has 14 dishes and LOFAR consists of over 100.000 small dipoles. Combining the signals from all antennas is called interferometry and requires electronic boards, photonic links, supercomputers and a lot of algorithms and software.
RF course (Toegepaste RF-techniek)
The market for wireless devices has grown unimaginably. Cordless telephone, cable modem, anti-theft labels, remote control, wireless internet: Radio frequency technology (RF) has penetrated all aspects of daily life.
Many technicians, including test and verification engineers, work with high-frequency systems. Understanding the coherence of system components is extremely important for overseeing effects, causes, and consequences. Because high frequency aspects play an increasingly important role in the design of embedded electronics, the RF course is also excellent as an introduction for Digital / Analog engineers who are or will be involved in the development of RF systems. More information (site is in Dutch).
The 78th Dutch Astronomers’ Conference (“Nederlandse Astronomenconferentie”) will be organized by ASTRON the Netherlands Institute for Radio Astronomy under the auspices of the Koninklijke Nederlandse Astronomenclub/Royal Netherlands Astronomical Society (KNA/RNAS) from 15 to 17 May 2023. The conference venue is the WestCord WTC hotel in Leeuwarden.
The third edition of the Next Generation Space VLBI workshop (ngSVLBI-2022), co-organised by JIVE and ASTRON in Dwingeloo (The Netherlands) will be held on 17-19 October 2022.
The ngSVLBI-2022 workshop will focus on the future of high-resolution radio interferometry. Next-generation Space VLBI missions would be natural extensions of advanced Earth-based facilities such as global VLBI networks, (ng)EHT, LOFAR, as well as former Space VLBI missions VSOP and RadioAstron. The workshop will address the topics of Space VLBI mission concepts and supporting technology developments aiming at achieving the highest angular resolution observations in all domains of the radio spectrum, from megahertz to terahertz. The programme will highlight recent scientific and technological developments laying the foundation for future space-based very long baseline interferometry. In particular, the programme will include the following topics:
- Multi-disciplinary science applications at extremely high angular resolutions
- mm/sub-mm domain
- cm/dm domain
- ultra-long-wavelength interferometers
- Space-borne antennas for high-resolution interferometers
- Analogue instrumentation for ngSVLBI
- Digital SVLBI instrumentation, data handling and processing
- Heterodyning and synchronization
- Orbital dynamics and uv-plane coverage optimisation
- Baseline state vector determination
- Mission concepts, incl. “Space-Earth” and “Space-only” configurations
The programme of the workshop will consist of invited (oral) and contributed (oral and poster) presentations.
For more information, visit the ngSVLBI-2022 workshop website.
Additional information
The Joint Institute for VLBI ERIC (JIVE) has as its primary mission to operate and develop the EVN data processor, a powerful supercomputer that combines the signals from radio telescopes located across the planet. Founded in 1993, JIVE is since 2015 a European Research Infrastructure Consortium (ERIC) with seven member countries: France, Italy, Latvia, the Netherlands, United Kingdom, Spain, and Sweden; additional support is received from partner institutes in China, Germany, and South Africa. JIVE is hosted at the offices of the Netherlands Institute for Radio Astronomy (ASTRON) in the Netherlands.
Contact
Leonid Gurvits and Giuseppe Cimò,
on behalf of the ngSVLBI-2022 SOC and LOC
ngSVLBI2022@jive.eu
Jorge Rivero González
JIVE Science Communications Officer
rivero@jive.eu
Dear Colleagues,
The NRAAC (Netherlands Radio Astronomy Advisory Committee) is pleased to announce the NL Radio Astronomy Community Day 2022 – the first in what we intend to be an annual event. After two years of Covid pandemic it will be especially nice to see each other in person!
The Community Day will be May 13th, from 10:00 – 16:30, including drinks and snacks at the end (a ‘borrel’).
The venue is the ASTRON Auditorium in Dwingeloo, and we strongly encourage you to join in person. The event will also be broadcast using Zoom.
With this community day, we aim to engage and inform the Dutch radio astronomy community (and other interested parties). The day will feature scientific and technical updates from ILT/LOFAR, WSRT/Apertif, EVN/JIVE, ALMA/EHT and SKA. Astronomers and engineers of all (academic) ages are encouraged to attend. Through communication and coordination our community can continue to have a large impact globally. We are looking forward to lively discussions and perhaps also new collaborations that will result from the community day.
Click here for a video recording of the event.
The programme can be found here.
Please get in contact with reception@astron.nl if you require transportation from the train station in Hoogeveen.
More about NRAAC: The Netherlands Radio Astronomy Advisory Committee (NRAAC) is a national committee whose aim is to optimise and help guide Dutch participation in radio astronomy. NRAAC has representatives from all NOVA institutes, and ASTRON, as well as all the major radio astronomy projects that the Netherlands is participating in. The committee serves to further the common good of radio astronomy in the Netherlands, with a focus towards
ILT/LOFAR, WSRT/Apertif, EVN/JIVE, ALMA and SKA. This is achieved in three ways:
1) The NRAAC will inform the radio astronomy community in the Netherlands and streamline and cohere discussions on radio astronomy in the Netherlands.
2) The NRAAC will provide advice to the RvdA, on behalf of the radio astronomy community in the Netherlands.
3) The NRAAC will use its forums to optimise effective participation of the Dutch astronomical community in national and global radio astronomy.
NRAAC is:
Betsey Adams – ASTRON / WSRT/Apertif
Filippo Fraternali – Groningen
Michiel van Haarlem – ASTRON / SKA
Elmar Körding – Nijmegen
Jason Hessels – ASTRON/UvA / Chair NRAAC
Michiel Hogerheijde – Leiden / ALMA
Huib-Jan van Langevelde – JIVE
Raymond Oonk – SURF
Huub Röttgering – Leiden / LOFAR
Jacco Vink – Amsterdam
Ralph Wijers – Amsterdam / LOFAR
The ASTRON, JIVE and ILT/LOFAR Directors also have standing invitations to NRAAC meetings
ERIS 2022 is a week-long training in techniques of radio interferometry via lectures and tutorials. This school is the ninth of a series of summer schools sponsored by RadioNet and is hosted by JIVE – Joint Institute for VLBI ERIC & ASTRON – Netherlands Institute for Radio Astronomy.
The topics covered by the lectures/tutorials will include:
- Calibration and imaging of continuum, spectral line, and polarization data
- Low frequency (LOFAR domain), cm-wave (e-MERLIN domain), decimetre-wave (HI/OH domain), high frequency (ALMA/IRAM domain), and VLBI interferometry
- Extracting the information from astronomical data and interpreting the results
- Choosing the most suitable array and observing plan for your project.
The number of participants is limited to 85. We strongly encourage the potential candidates to proceed with the online registration as soon as possible. If oversubscribed, we will select the participants based on their career level, location and gender.
Please be aware that we will enforce the officially mandated Covid-19 regulations at the conference venue. As these rules are subject to change, we will inform you about the details a little closer to the conference date.
Earlier ERIS events:
(Given in Dutch, the course is described in Dutch only).
At ASTRON, The Netherlands Institute for Radio Astronomy, about 180 scientists and engineers from many countries have built up an international reputation in the research of our universe and in the development of specialised equipment to detect and analyse very weak radio waves from space.
Radio telescopes are used to observe our universe and to provide astronomers with detailed images and spectra.ASTRON’s R&D department develops antenna technology to receive radio signals from the universe. There are different types of antennas: dishes such as used in the Westerbork Synthesis Radio Telescope (WSRT), and dipoles such as used in the Low Frequency Array (LOFAR). Many antennas are required to be able to do our science for the signals are very weak and because we need very sharp images. The WSRT has 14 dishes and LOFAR consists of over 100.000 small dipoles. Combining the signals from all antennas is called interferometry and requires electronic boards, photonic links, supercomputers and a lot of algorithms and software.
RF course (Toegepaste RF-techniek)
The market for wireless devices has grown unimaginably. Cordless telephone, cable modem, anti-theft labels, remote control, wireless internet: Radio frequency technology (RF) has penetrated all aspects of daily life.
Many technicians, including test and verification engineers, work with high-frequency systems. Understanding the coherence of system components is extremely important for overseeing effects, causes, and consequences. Because high frequency aspects play an increasingly important role in the design of embedded electronics, the RF course is also excellent as an introduction for Digital / Analog engineers who are or will be involved in the development of RF systems. More information (site is in Dutch).
The International LOFAR Telescope (ILT) is preparing for a significant upgrade, LOFAR2.0, for which a Large Programme Portfolio will be composed. The online information sessions will take place on:
Thursday, 7 October 12-15 UT
Tuesday, 12 October, 7-10 UT
Hour 1:
- Welcome word – René Vermeulen (5min)
- LOFAR2.0 expected observing capabilities – Jason Hessels + Cees Bassa for COBALT2.0 + Jean-Mathias for NenuFAR + Tim Shimwell for commissioning plans (10min+5min questions)
- LOFAR2.0 White Paper – Jason Hessels (10min+5min questions)
- LOFAR2.0 development and roll out – Wim van Cappellen + Carla Baldovin for Timing and L4SW (15min+5min questions)
- Break (10min)
Hour 2:
- SDC development and operations – John Swinbank (10min+3min questions)
- RAPTHOR pipeline for LOFAR imaging – André Offringa (10min+3min questions)
- LOFAR long baseline status – Leah Morabito (10min+3min questions)
- LOFAR LBA imaging status – Francesco de Gasperin (10min+3min questions)
- Break (10min)
Hour 3:
- LOFAR2.0 Large Programmes process – Jason Hessels (15min+30min questions and discussion)
All the slides of the presentations as well as the video recordings of both events are available, please click this link. Please note that in order to view the full videos, you will need to download them first.
The status of the LOFAR2.0 development programme and the process of defining LOFAR2.0 Large Programmes will be presented in these information sessions. Note that the info session programme is identical on both days and is repeated in order to facilitate live participation. Substantial time has been planned for questions and discussion. The sessions will also be recorded.
Large LOFAR2.0 observing programmes are expected to be coordinated by expert LOFAR users in partner countries, but must benefit the broad community and satisfy various criteria to facilitate maximal science return. An open call will be issued for brief Expressions of Interest, due towards the end of 2021, with a further programme definition and selection process in 2022, involving independent peer review.
Rene Vermeulen, Director ILT
Jason Hessels, LOFAR2.0 Project Scientist
Deadline for EoIs: Friday December 3rd, 2021
Notes on EoIs:
EoIs are not observing proposals. Rather, these are intended to inform how to best organise community workshops in 2022, in which we will invite all EoI submitters to together take stock of the ideas and consider how a global LOFAR2.0 Large Programme Portfolio would look. That means that EoIs should inform how best to organise the workshop(s), as opposed to providing a detailed scientific justification at this stage. The workshop(s) include considering what programmes could run in parallel and what teams may wish to collaborate. The LOFAR2.0 (Deputy) Project Scientists — Jason Hessels, Cees Bassa and Tim Shimwell — will facilitate this process. The EoIs and community workshops in 2022 will serve as the basis for detailed observing proposals, which will be reviewed by external referees. This will then lead to advice to the ILT Board, who will establish the Large Programme Portfolio based on science excellence, feasibility and timeliness, and other considerations — including the overall breadth, legacy value, and productivity of LOFAR, specific relevance for partner country research communities, and general impact and engagement of the wider community.
Provide feedback & contributions for the LOFAR2.0 White Paper.
Stay informed about the LOFAR2.0 Large Programmes.
