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1. ESO Call for Proposals P97 Proposal Deadline 01 October 2015 12 00 noon CEST Call for Proposals ESO Period 97 Proposal Deadline 1 October 2015 12 00 noon Central European Summer Time Issued 28 August 2015 Preparation of the ESO Call for Proposals is the responsibility of the ESO Observing Programmes Office OPO For questions regarding preparation and submission of proposals to ESO telescopes please contact the ESO Observing Programmes Office opo eso org The ESO Call for Proposals document is a fully linked pdf file with bookmarks that can be viewed with Adobe Acrobat Reader 4 0 or higher Internal document links appear in red and external links appear in blue Links are clickable and will navigate the reader through the document internal links or will open a web browser external links ESO Call for Proposals Editor Gaitee A J Hussain Approved _____ Tim de Zeeuw Director General Contents I Phase 1 Instructions 1 1 ESO Proposals Invited 1 1 1 Important recent changes since Periods 95 and 96 oo o 2 1 2 Important reminders io siria ada a da bee aE A Se ee a 7 1 3 Foreseen changes in the upcoming periods o 11 2 Getting Started 12 2 1 Exposure Time Calculator o ecra a a dra A a 12 2 2 The ESOFORM Proposal package asocio ia a AA 13 2 21 ESOFORM lmportant motes nd nae ae oe PRA A OR Se Ge 13 2 6 Proposal Submission lt sa sp 4 4 260544 a bebe
2. Quality Control and Instrument Trending The ESO pipelines are used to mon itor the performance of the various instruments and their temporal trends Extensive information about Paranal data handling and processing e g zero points colour terms wavelength solutions is maintained on the ESO Quality Control webpages e La Silla Support during observing runs and transportation schedule A streamlined operation is in effect in La Silla La Silla instruments are only offered in Visitor Mode Technical and logistical support will be delivered as usual by ESO staff but no specific support astronomer is assigned Please note that the transportation schedule to and from La Silla may have an impact on the arrival and departure days of the observers at the site Please check the online instructions for visiting astronomers Large Programmes are not allowed on the NTT telescope 3 6 m telescope Large Programmes can span four periods up to Period 100 There is a minimum length of 3 nights for runs to be executed with La Silla tele scopes Proposals including La Silla runs with a duration of less than 3 nights will be rejected at submission time by the automatic proposal reception system with three exceptions 1 There is no minimum duration for runs to be carried out with Visitor Instruments see Section 3 However in order to minimise the overheads associated with their installation and removal such instruments are normall
3. CRIRES was taken out of operations in July 2014 to undergo a major upgrade that will transform it into a cross dispersed echelle spectrograph It is therefore not offered in Period 97 Operations will likely not start before the end of 2017 NACO A major intervention is planned in the first half of Period 96 Information regarding the intervention will be posted on the NACO news page SPHERE Spectro Polarimetric High contrast Exoplanet REsearch is an extreme adap tive optics system and coronagraphic facility The primary science goal of this second generation VLT instrument is imaging low resolution spectroscopic and polarimetric characterization of extra solar planetary systems The instrument design is optimized to provide the highest image quality and contrast performance in a narrow field of view around bright targets in the visible or near infrared bands SPHERE is installed at the Nasmyth focus of UT3 and includes x the Common Path and Infrastructure CPI which receives direct light from the telescope and provides highly stabilized AO corrected and coronagraphic beams to the three science instruments the Infra Red Dual Band Imager and Spectrograph IRDIS which provides Classical Imaging CI Dual Band Imaging DBI Dual Polarization Imaging DPI and Long Slit Spectroscopy LSS in low resolution covering the range 0 95 to 2 32um with resolving power of R 50 LRS or medium resolution from 0 95 to 1 65 um with R 40
4. At the time of occurrence of the predicted event the PI of the programme or one of his her delegates must activate it and at the same time provide the missing information for completion of the OBs The service observer will update and execute the specified OBs Further details are available on the Phase 2 ToO Procedures page 6 Policy Summary Several policies regarding all aspects of the use of ESO telescopes have been refined over the years by the ESO Observing Programmes Committee OPC and by the Science and Technology Committee STC Here we summarize those policies relevant for ESO proposers for Period 97 For details on individual policies we refer to the VLT VLTI Science Operations Policy document 6 1 Who may submit time allocation policies ESO proposals may be submitted by any group or individual One single person the Principal Investigator or PI must be assigned to be responsible for the programme The PI will also act as the official contact between ESO and the proposers for all later correspondence Phase 2 information data distribution etc By submitting a proposal the PI takes full responsibility for its contents in particular with regard to the names of Cols and the agreement to follow the ESO policies and regulations including the conditions specified in the present Call for Proposals Following the introduction of the ESO User Portal Pls identify themselves uniquely in Phase 1 proposals by their User Portal us
5. as well as the recent related results are emphasised in a way that can be understood by their peers regardless of their expertise Precipitable Water Vapour PWV Users of VISIR and the APEX instruments in service mode must specify PWV as an observing constraint during their Phase 1 and Phase 2 preparation Examples are shown in the ESOFORM package template files Also see Section 2 2 Observing conditions The definitions of the observing conditions for Phase 1 and Phase 2 can be found on the Observing Conditions webpage Please note that the seeing is now defined as the seeing in the V band at zenith see Section 1 1 PI access to raw and reduced data via http archive eso org The ESO Science Archive Facility see link above is the sole access point to all data obtained with ESO telescopes Principal Investigators of Service and Visitor Mode pro grammes and their data delegates have access to their proprietary raw data as soon as the data have been ingested in the ESO Archive which typically happens a few hours after the observation This is also when the proprietary period starts Access to the data is provided through the ESO User Portal The CalSelector archive service for VLT instruments combines the science files with any ancillary files that are needed to process the data e g acquisition images calibrations etc In addition to raw data science grade data products are available on a monthly basis for the f
6. preparation of RRM observations can be found at the Phase 2 RRM Observation page 4 5 Guaranteed Time Observations Guaranteed Time Observations GTO arise from contractual obligations of ESO vis vis the external consortia who build ESO instruments see the GTO Policy page Guaranteed Time Observers must submit proposals for their GTO time using the Normal Programme templates and by the standard proposal deadline All GTO proposals will be evaluated and ranked together with Normal Programme proposals to provide feedback to the GTO teams on the scientific standing of their GTO programmes In exceptional cases badly ranked GTO proposals may not be scheduled The policies describing the obligations of Guaranteed Time Observers are defined in Appendix 2 of the ESO Council document ESO Cou 996 GTO runs must be conducted in Visitor Mode Section 5 1 The only exceptions are those explic itly stated in the contractual agreement between ESO and the corresponding external consortium However ESO may exceptionally transfer some GTO runs from Visitor Mode to Service Mode for operational reasons such as the availability of certain VLTI baselines or instruments 21 Some GTO programmes require ToO runs see Section 4 4 If this is the case then this should be specified in the ESOFORM package using the ObservingRun macro of the ATEX template 4 6 Proposals for Calibration Programmes ESO operates a large number of complex instruments w
7. II describes the policies and procedures regarding proposing for carrying out and publishing ESO observations ALMA proposals are handled through a separate channel Further details are available via the ALMA Science Portal at ESO 1 1 Important recent changes since Periods 95 and 96 This section describes important changes which took place during Periods 95 and 96 as well as changes expected to take place during Period 97 e General changes Recent Changes News items related to the technical capabilities of the ESO instru ments have been moved to the Recent Changes in Instrumentation link Any weather proposals ESO strongly encourages programmes that can effectively exploit the worst observing conditions on the VLT More specifically we solicit proposals that request gt 1 2 seeing in the V band thin thick clouds and have no moon constraints on the four UTs VISTA and VST These proposals will be evaluated by the OPC but do not have to achieve the best grades to be considered for scheduling However when preparing these proposals PIs should be aware that only a fraction of their programme may be completed over the course of the semester This is because these programmes will only be executed when the service mode queue is depleted of all higher ranked runs Seeing and Image Quality Starting from Period 96 the seeing information to pro vide in Box 3 of the proposal form is the seeing in the V band at zenith
8. This change now ensures that the scheduling tool uniformly takes the seeing into account Service mode users for approved programmes will enter the Image Quality for the airmass and wavelength of interest required for their observations as a constraint during Phase 2 The article by Martinez et al entitled On the Difference between Seeing and Image Quality in Volume 141 of the ESO Messenger describes the meaning of these two quantities and further information can be found on the Observing Conditions webpage The Exposure Time Calculators have been modified accordingly and clearly distin guish between the two quantities using a slightly modified version of the formula given in the above article Exposure Time Calculators in addition to the change mentioned in the previous point a number of ETCs are now using a new sky model developed as part of the Austrian in kind contribution see Noll et al 2012 A amp A 543 92 Jones et al 2013 A amp A 560 91 and The Cerro Paranal Advanced Sky Model Monitoring Programmes Monitoring programme proposals enable users to request a limited amount of time to monitor targets over more than one period Proposers should use the normal proposal template with the appropriate macro in order to apply for a Monitoring Programme See Section 4 2 for the detailed definition of a Monitoring Programme the instruments offered for this programme type and any associated restric tions No Monitor
9. UTs using an integrated optics combiner It provides low spectral resolution in the H band PIONIER is designed for imaging with a specific emphasis on fast fringes recording to allow precision closure phases and visibilities to be measured PIONIER is offered as a facility instrument in both service and visitor modes since Period 96 Therefore it is no longer mandatory to contact the instrument team and to add them to the proposal list of co investigators x VLTI UTs and ATs By early Period 97 all UTs Coud and all ATs will be exclusively equipped with Star Separator Systems STS in view of operations with GRAVITY x VLTI ATs The AT configurations changed slightly starting in Period 96 but the overall characteristics will remain Three different quadruplets are offered small baselines from 10 to 40m medium baselines from 40 to 100m and large baselines from 60 to 140m Specifically the small configuration is covered by the config uration AQ B2 C1 D0 instead of A1 B2 C1 DO the medium configuration is cov ered by K0 D0 G2 J3 instead of HO DO G1 I1 the large configuration is covered by AO J2 G1 J3 instead of A1 K0 G1 J3 See the list of all offered baselines at the VLTI Configurations Overview Page The installation of GRAVITY the second generation VLTI instrument for precision narrow angle astrometry and interferometric imaging starts in 2015 during the VLTI laboratory refurbishment Commissioning of the instrument star
10. early as ESO cannot provide support for proposal submissions after 11 00 CEST on the day of the deadline Requests for submissions or amendments after the deadline will not be considered In order to efficiently verify and submit your proposal please note that e Postscript figures are not accepted The proposals are compiled using the pdfl4Tpx package which accepts only PDF up to version 1 4 and JPEG file formats Please note that there is a size limit of 1MB for each figure to be uploaded e Always compile your proposal locally with pdfATFX Some of the checks are made at the IXT EX level and checking your proposal in this way will save you time If there are errors please read the output carefully in order to identify the problem e Further checks are made by the web software the receiver which uploads your proposal and checks that it complies with ESO s requirements The receiver allows you to verify your proposal without actually submitting it You should take advantage of this feature to check that your proposal is technically correct well before the Phase 1 deadline This can be done by verifying a skeleton version of the proposal early this version should contain all the technical details but not necessarily the full scientific description This will ease the final submission process considerably e Plan ahead Over past periods congestion of the proposal submission system has repeatedly occurred in the last few hour
11. request which is evaluated by the Observatory Pre imaging for VLT instruments and modes A separate pre imaging run must be specified in the proposal to be executed in Service Mode Failure to do so will result in the deduction of the time necessary for the pre imaging from the allocation to the main part of the project see Section 6 6 Monitoring in Service Mode Monitoring a target in Service Mode in a particular period is carried out on a best effort basis only i e a monitoring sequence in any particular period may be interrupted by long periods of unsuitable weather conditions Visitor Mode scheduling or telescope availability All the time needed to observe one target in one period should be included in one single run this can be split into the single epoch observations using a time linked series in version 3 of the Phase 2 Preparation Tool P2PP see Section 5 2 1 for more information Rapid Response Mode RRM FORS2 UVES XSHOOTER SINFONI HAWK I and MUSE continue to be offered in this mode in Period 97 RRM observations that correspond to events with exceptional characteristics may be activated during either Service Mode or Visitor Mode runs over which they have observational priority unless the Service or Visitor mode runs involve strictly time critical observations For details on the RRM policies see Section 4 4 1 VISTA and VST Due to ongoing Public Surveys only a limited amount of open time is available on VIST
12. 0 MRS the Integral Field Spectrograph IFS which provides a data cube of 38 monochro matic images either covering the range 0 95 to 1 35 um Y J at spectral resolution of R 50 or 0 95 to 1 65 um Y H at R 30 and the Zurich IMaging POLarimeter ZIMPOL which provides diffraction limited clas sical imaging and differential polarimetric imaging DPI at 15 mas resolution in the visible SPHERE is offered in selected modes which are listed in the ESOFORM In particular some modes are offered only in Visitor Mode as described in the SPHERE Overview page As described in the CPI section of the SPHERE Overview page the quality of the correction strongly depends on the seeing In particular seeing conditions for SPHERE must be better than 1 4 VIMOS Public Spectroscopic Surveys started in Period 94 and use all the dark and grey time in good conditions PHO CLR seeing lt 1 0 in RA ranges 00 05 30h and dark time in RA ranges 08 12h also see the Public Survey webpages Please note that even though the best observing conditions in the RA ranges above are substantially committed to the ongoing Public Spectroscopic Surveys some time may be allocated to a very strong scientifically compelling Normal or DDT programme VISIR Users must specify PWV as an observing constraint during their Phase 1 and Phase 2 preparation Examples are shown in the ESOFORM package template files Also see Section 2 2 SINFO
13. A and VST these observations are carried out in Service Mode only and for restricted Right Ascension ranges Open time proposals should clearly justify the scientific goals and why they are not achievable through the scheduled public survey observations Only those proposals that have complementary constraints and coordinate ranges with respect to public survey observations may be scheduled as the highest priority is given to advance public surveys on these telescopes As VST also has a significant GTO commitment Normal Programme proposals on the VST are restricted to filler programmes requesting poor weather conditions i e no moon constraints seeing gt 1 4 thin thick clouds Target of opportunity proposals will also be considered for the VST Calibration Plans ESO has implemented calibration plans for all Paranal instruments The primary purposes of these plans are to assure data quality monitor instrument performance and calibrate science observations Based on these plans calibration data are obtained for certain standard instrument modes on a regular basis Paranal calibration data are reviewed on a daily basis by Paranal Science Operations and the Garching Data Processing and Quality Control group A brief summary of the calibration data is available online for each instrument for ex ample for FORS2 FORS2 Pipeline calibration data Please read the appropriate user manual and online documentation carefully as not all instrumen
14. In general runs requiring non standard configurations will only be accepted in Visitor Mode 6 4 Observing programme execution Observations in both Visitor and Service Mode must be executed as described in the Phase 1 proposal including the instrument modes and specified targets Departures from Phase 1 specifi cations and targets will not generally be allowed unless a sound scientific justification exists and provided that the change does not involve a significant increase in the pressure factor on oversub scribed regions of the sky The request for changes of targets and instrument set up s along with the corresponding scientific justification must be submitted via the web based form available at http www eso org sci observing phase2 ProgChange Please note that target change requests are not allowed for runs carried out in Designated Visitor Mode For any other departure from Phase 1 specifications a justification must be provided in writing to paranal eso org at least one month before the beginning of the observations for runs scheduled in Visitor Mode For Service Mode runs these requests and associated justifications must be sub mitted to usd help eso org or to p2pp waiver eso org clear instructions are available at http www eso org sci observing phase2 SM Guidelines WaiverChanges html at least one week before the Phase 2 deadline also see Section 6 5 28 ESO reserves the right to reject the changes if they a
15. NTI An upgrade of the SPIFFI optics is planned for January 2016 its main goal is to improve transmission in the J band This will be obtained by replacing J and K filters by new ones with higher transmission and replacing the pre optics to improve transmission in the J band The replacement of the existing mirrors by ones with better surface quality will improve the line spread functions Additionally an enlarged sky baffle will cure vignetting of slits 1 and 32 Activities related to the installation of the Adaptive Optics Facility on UT4 Yepun The following activities occurred during Period 95 and 96 installation of the first Laser Guide Star Unit LGSU took place in March 2015 and was commissioned during Period 95 installation of GRAAL on the telescope and re commissioning of HAWK I took place in August 2015 commissioning of GRAAL with the first LGSU takes place early in Period 96 installation of the 3 other LGSUs and commissioning of common features with all LGSUs and GRAAL takes place during the second half of Period 96 During Period 97 the following activities affect operations on UT4 commissioning of the 4 LGSUs will continue early in Period 97 during which the telescope is not available for about 10 nights The installation and commissioning of the Coud train for ESPRESSO will take place during Period 97 No focus is available for a Visitor Instrument on the VLT in Period 97 VIRCAM A Ca
16. S Visual Multi Object Spectrograph VIRCAM VISTA InfraRed CAMera VISIR VLT Imager and Spectrometer for mid Infra Red XSHOOTER UV Visual NIR medium resolution chelle spectrograph Chajnantor LABOCA Large Apex BOlometer CAmera SHFI Swedish Heterodyne Facility Instrument ARTEMIS Architectures de bolom tres pour des T lescopes grand champ de vue dans le domaine sub Millim trique au Sol FLASH First Light APEX Submillimeter Heterodyne receiver SEPIA Swedish ESO PI receiver for APEX Further information can be found via the Phase 1 webpage Details on the instruments and ESO facilities offered in Period 97 can be found on the La Silla Paranal Observatory Call for Proposals webpage The main characteristics of all Period 97 instruments offered at La Silla Paranal and Chajnantor are described in the Instrument summary table Further useful information can be accessed from the Phase 1 Important Links webpage e g telescope pressure and definitions of observing constraints Any updates after the release of this Call will be listed on the Late Breaking News webpage The ESO proposal submission deadline is 1 October 2015 12 00 noon Central European Summer Time Please note that it is the PI s responsibility to resolve any verification or upload problems related to the instrument configuration LaTeX file or associated figures well before the deadline ESO cannot provide support b
17. SADR eRe Bae 13 3 Visitor Instruments 14 II Proposal Types Policies and Procedures 15 4 Proposal Types 15 4 1 Normal Programmes ondaa a e eae o a eee as 16 4 2 Monitoring Programmes o oio corra eed A a 16 43 Larse Programmes Cilia A ee SS 4 17 AA Target Ol Opporiumity scans gad He ieee ee pad SE Ee ee we ee 18 4 4 1 ToO using the Rapid Response Mode RRM system 19 4 5 Guaranteed Time Observations s so secada aoet aeaa e ee ee 20 4 6 Proposals for Calibration Programmes o e ss oei ca cana wea mi enie i eea a 21 4 1 Director s Discretionary THOG 65 5 6 isea a bo Pe a 21 Ais Host State Proposals clio a a E a a ee BS Gg 22 4 9 Non Member State Proposals e e 22 4 10 VLT XMM proposals sac 5 ee ee sara a a 22 5 Observing Modes 23 Dl Visitor Modo 05 24 5 ee ede de a be ye ee Pe ee ed 23 5 1 1 ToO programme execution during VM observations 24 5 1 2 Designated Visitor Mode d gted iae ee es 24 D2 PEVCE Mde oca ees E dake ee ek Ade rae Pee ee a 24 B21 Service Mode policies ca ee a a mes k RAE he ee a dao 25 6 Policy Summary 26 6 1 Who may submit time allocation policies o o 26 6 2 Requesting use of non standard observing configurations 27 6 3 Policy regarding offered available observing configurations 27 6 4 Observing programme execution te dogar ias 27 6 4 1 Service Mode tunvexecution
18. SO Outreach Department information eso org as soon as possible preferably no later than when the paper is submitted for publication ESO reserves the right to use any data obtained with ESO telescopes as part of programmes allocated ESO time for press releases 30 Part III Appendix A Acronyms AMBER APEX ARTEMIS AT CHAMP CI CIAO Col CONICA CPI CRIRES DBI DDT DPI EFOSC2 ESO ESPRESSO ETC FLASH FLAMES FLASH FORS2 GTO HARPS HAWK I IFS IR IRDIS ISAAC KMOS LABOCA LGS LRS LSS LST MATISSE MIDI MOS MPIfR MRS MUSE NACO NAOMI NAOS NGS OB OMEGACAM OPC OPO Astronomical Multi BEam combineR Atacama Pathfinder EXperiment Architectures de bolom tres pour des T lescopes grand champ de vue dans le domaine sub Millim trique au Sol Auxiliary Telescope for the VLT Interferometer Carbon Heterodyne Array of the MPIfR Classical Imaging GRAVITY Coud Infrared Adaptive Optics CIAO system for the VLT Interferometer Co Investigator High Resolution Near Infrared CAmera Common Path and Infrastructure Cryogenic high resolution IR Echelle Spectrometer Dual Band Imaging Director s Discretionary Time proposal Dual Polarization Imaging Differential Polarimetric Imaging ESO Faint Object Spectrograph and Camera 2 European Southern Observatory Echelle SPectrograph for Rocky Exoplanet and Stable Spectroscopic Observations Exposure Time Calculator First Light Apex Sub millimeter Heterod
19. acility should be submitted to the Observatory for which the greatest amount of time is required The primary criterion for the 23 award of observing time is that both VLT and XMM Newton data are required to meet the scientific objectives of the proposal The project does not need to require simultaneous XMM Newton and ESO telescope observations Targets of Opportunity and Triggered Observations are excluded from this cooperative programme It is the proposers responsibility to provide a full and comprehensive scientific and technical justi fication for the requested observing time on both facilities Both the ESO and XMM Newton ob servatories will perform feasibility checks of the approved proposals They each reserve the right to reject any observation determined to be unfeasible for any reason The rejection by one Observatory could jeopardize the entire proposed science programme Apart from the above the general policies and procedures currently in force for the final selection of the proposals the allocation of observing time the execution of the observations and the data rights remain unchanged for both ESO and the XMM Newton Observatory 5 Observing Modes In Period 97 most VLT and VLTI instruments will be offered in two modes Visitor Mode VM and Service Mode SM These modes have been extensively described in the Data Flow Operations section of the December 1997 and June 1998 issues of The ESO Messenger Further info
20. ameters used by the ETCs are based on data collected during instrument commissioning and operations The ETC parameters are frequently updated and changes will be reflected by the running version number To help the observatory staff assess the technical feasibility of observations proposers are requested to specify the version number of the ETC they used in the section 9 Justification of requested observing time and observing conditions of their proposals Please check the ESO webpages for the ETC version to be used in Period 97 Please note that while the sky background values used in the ETCs generally reflect actual conditions on Paranal they do not account for local effects such as the zodiacal light 13 Proposers of VLTI observations should check the feasibility of their proposed observations with the visibility calculator viscalc available from the ETC page At Phase 2 users are also encouraged to select a suitable calibrator star for their planned observations using the CalVin tool available also from http www eso org observing etc Service Mode proposers are reminded see Section 6 5 that the requested observing conditions are binding in Phase 2 The ETC s were modified in Period 96 and require the seeing in the V band at zenith in order to estimate the observing time necessary to complete the programme Proposers should ensure that the observing conditions specified in the proposal are consistent with those us
21. and the target position the tele scope instrument will be at the location of the target within about 6 minutes following the arrival of the alert at Paranal Depending on the target brightness and instrument mode target acquisition may take some more time RRM observations in Period 97 are subject to the following restrictions e The requested instrument must already be in operation No change of instrument and tele scope focus is accepted by the automatic RRM system e RRM activations will be accepted during Service Mode and Visitor Mode runs They have overriding priority over other observations unless the latter are strictly time critical Additionally the following instrument specific restrictions apply e UVES can only be used with standard wavelength settings e FORS2 can only be used in the broad band imaging long slit spectroscopic imaging polari metric and spectro polarimetric modes e SINFONI is available in NGS and noAO mode but not in LGS mode e HAWK I all the filters can be used but the trigger requesters must follow the users manual indications closely as far as brightness restrictions of objects in the field are concerned The delivery of the encoded alerts to the Paranal Observatory is entirely the responsibility of the PI Successful PIs will be asked to provide a set of OBs by the Phase 2 deadline to be certified for execution as is done for other Service Mode runs Details on the activation mechanisms and the
22. ators will be informed of their DVM time allocation via the web letters Designated VM observations are scheduled on specific dates slots as if they were regular Visitor Mode runs but they are executed by an ESO staff member in close contact e g via phone Skype or video link with the Principal Investigator or someone the PI designates to serve as the liaison with the Observatory More details including all requirements concerning the preparation of DVM runs are provided on the Paranal Sciences Operations webpage As for normal Visitor Mode runs the users can request additional science targets instrument setup changes and backup targets However such requests must be submitted at least 4 days in advance of the run in time with the submission of the overall material to the Observatory Otherwise such requests will not be processed 5 2 Service Mode Over half of the total time available for observations on Paranal will be carried out in Service Mode SM SM is also the only mode supported for APEX VST and VISTA It is not offered on any La Silla telescope Investigators with runs allocated in SM time will be required to specify their programme by submit ting a Phase 2 package in advance to ESO This package consists of OBs finding charts a Readme form and if applicable ephemerides Observers intending to submit proposals to be executed in SM may find it useful to familiarize themselves with the Phase 2 Service Mode guidelines Onc
23. ature requiring the immediate observation of a sudden and unexpected astronomical event e proposals requesting observations on a highly competitive scientific topic e proposals asking for follow up observations of a programme recently conducted from ground based and or space facilities where a quick implementation should provide break through results e proposals of a somewhat risky nature requesting a small amount of observing time to test the feasibility of a programme 1The possibility for GTO teams to request ToO observations as part of their guaranteed time is restricted to those cases in which this option is explicitly mentioned in the GTO contract 22 DDT programmes that have target of opportunity runs should mark their corresponding Run Types as TOO in the ObservingRun macro See the ESOFORM User Manual for more details DDT programmes involving TOO runs should also fill in the TOORun macros in the ESOFORM proposal template as instructed Approved DDT proposals are carried out in Service Mode on Paranal and Chajnantor or in Visitor Mode override on La Silla Very few non time critical DDT proposals are foreseen to be approved so proposers should provide a clear justification in Box 8b of the application form why the pro gramme should be considered for DDT allocation and why it was not submitted through the regular OPC channel In the absence of such a justification the proposal will not be considered for DDT allocati
24. ck that their planned observations are not duplicating Guaranteed Time proposals for Period 97 see GTO for Period 97 or ongoing Public Survey observations Public Surveys Nine public imaging surveys are being carried out on the VISTA and VST telescopes Four public spectroscopic surveys are being carried out on the NTT EFOSC2 amp SOFT the UT2 FLAMES GIRAFFE amp UVES and UT3 VIMOS telescopes Further details are available on the ESO Public Surveys Projects webpage Overheads Proposals must include all overheads when computing the total observing time request for both Service Mode and Visitor Mode runs see the Overheads webpage Non standard observing configurations The use of non standard instrumental modes configurations or filters requires the prior approval by the ESO User Support Department A detailed justification should be sent to usd help eso org at least two weeks before the proposal submission deadline If proposers wish to use non standard filters on cryogenic instruments further restrictions apply See Section 6 2 for more details Backup programme Although Phase 1 proposals requesting Visitor Mode do not need to include backup targets and or a backup programme the observer should prepare one in case of unfavourable weather conditions The original science goals must be adhered to in this backup scenario Approval of a backup programme must be sought at least one month in advance of the observi
25. constraints Alves 2005 The ESO Messenger 119 20 Observing scheduling constraints that are not indicated or that are inaccurately specified in BOX 12 of ESOFORM are unlikely to be taken into account by the scheduler Retrofitting scheduling constraints after the release of the schedule is not possible Precipitable water vapour PWV constraints PWV constraints must be specified for VISIR and all APEX instruments in the Additional Notes column of the Target macro Please see the ESOFORM User Manual for more details e VLT XMM Proposals Proposers must indicate in the ESOFORM if they are applying for VLT XMM time under the ESA ESO agreement see Section 4 10 VLT XMM proposals may include observing runs to be executed in Period 97 and or 98 e Proposal resubmissions If the proposal is a re submission of an old proposal then the OPC comments must be addressed in this new submission 2 3 Proposal Submission Proposals must be submitted in their final version by the submission deadline 1 October 2015 12 00 noon Central European Summer Time This is done via a web upload procedure that can only be accessed by logging into the ESO User Portal at 14 http www eso org UserPortal Please note that the ESO deadline will be strictly enforced users should plan accordingly It is the PI s responsibility to resolve any verification or upload problems related to the instrument configuration LaTeX file or associated figures
26. ctivities will take place during Period 96 to make the system ready for operations Interested users are invited to consult the HARPS News page before the start of their run The upgrade of the optical fibres successfully took place in May and early June 2015 See the HARPS News page NTT A large fraction 40 of the available science time on the NTT telescope is committed to ongoing programmes see the Telescope Pressure webpage with a sig nificant number of dark and grey nights already committed Bright time programmes are particularly solicited for the NTT Large Programmes are not offered on the NTT in this period e Paranal Information regarding changes affecting Paranal instruments and facilities can be found at the La Silla Paranal Observatory CfP webpage VLT XMM proposals Proposals are invited for scientific programmes requiring both VLT and XMM Newton observations Section 4 10 These proposals may be submitted for the next XMM Newton cycle which extends over ESO Periods 97 and 98 However proposers should take the limited availability of some of the VLT I instruments in Periods 97 and 98 into account see the Large Programme item above and Section 1 3 for details on instrument availability Distribution of VLT instruments In Period 97 the distribution of offered instru ments on the UTs will be UT1 FORS2 KMOS NACO UT2 FLAMES UVES XSHOOTER UT3 SPHERE VIMOS VISIR UT4 HAWK I MUSE SINFONI
27. cts of Chilean astronomers in cooperation with astronomers of ESO member countries Following the recommendations of the OPC and a technical feasibility check the ESO Director General grants observing time based on the OPC ranking and the availability of telescope time 6 2 Requesting use of non standard observing configurations Proposers should pay particular attention to the fact that as indicated in the instrument manuals use of certain non standard instrumental modes or configurations requires prior approval by ESO This approval must be obtained before submitting the Phase 1 proposal Corresponding requests including a brief justification must be submitted by email to usd help eso org at least two weeks before the proposal submission deadline Failure to follow this rule may lead to the rejection of the proposal by ESO for technical reasons Users who wish to request a new own filter to be installed particularly in the cryogenic instruments e g HAWK I VIRCAM VISIR must approach ESO via usd help eso org at least 3 months before submitting a proposal requesting that filter Failure to follow these guidelines may lead to the rejection of the proposal by ESO for technical reasons 6 3 Policy regarding offered available observing configurations Users will be promptly informed if it becomes impossible to support some currently offered instru ment mode and may be asked to switch from Service Mode to Visitor Mode or vice versa
28. d at Phase 1 in their Phase 2 submissions unless explicitly authorized by ESO see Section 6 4 The relaxation of observing constraints is allowed at Phase 2 only See Section 6 4 for more details on how to request waivers for Service Mode runs 6 6 Pre imaging runs A separate run must be specified for a VLT programme requiring pre imaging If this is not specified in the proposal the time needed for the execution of the pre imaging will be deducted from the total allocation of the project Pre imaging runs are always scheduled in priority class A but must be specified as pre imaging runs as this will not occur automatically Please be sure to indicate the pre imaging character of the run by using the corresponding INSconfig macro in the ETEX ESOFORM template Note that pre imaging OBs are not allowed to be in concatenation containers The execution time for the pre imaging run has to be calculated for single OBs 29 6 7 Data rights archiving data distribution All data obtained with ESO facilities are ESO property ESO grants a 12 month proprietary period for science and acquisition data to the PI of the programme as part of which these data were obtained This period applies to each data file individually The proprietary period starts as soon as the data is made available to the PI or respective delegates via the ESO Science Archive Facility i e as soon as the data are ingested Should you wish to specify a shorter period than the nomina
29. e the OBs are completed they will be submitted to ESO for verification and acceptance Accepted OBs will be executed by ESO staff based on their OPC recommended priority and a proper match between the requested and the actual observing conditions An article about SM scheduling appeared in The ESO Messenger 2001 v 105 p 18 The article helps proposers understand how they may optimize their use of this observing mode and it should be considered compulsory reading for SM proposers SM PIs and their data delegates have direct access via their personal ESO User Portal account to their own raw proprietary data as soon as the data is ingested in the ESO Archive Note that in Service Mode the proprietary period for a given science file starts as soon as the data are made electronically available to PIs or to those to whom they have delegated their data access rights 25 Please note that SM proposers must include overheads for all science exposures Guidelines are provided in the Overheads page ESO will absorb all the time required to complete the calibration sequences to the level of accuracy foreseen in the calibration plan as well as overheads associated with such calibrations More infor mation on the Paranal Calibration plans can be found from the VLT VLTI Instrument Pipelines webpage and the respective instrument User Manual If those calibrations are not adequate the SM proposer must include time for any additional calibrations incl
30. e ESO database with the complete information needed to allow them to be executed as part of the regular Service Mode queues 4 4 1 ToO using the Rapid Response Mode RRM system During Period 97 ESO continues to offer the VLT Rapid Response Mode RRM system for the following instruments FORS2 on UT1 UVES and XSHOOTER on UT2 and HAWK I SINFONI and MUSE on UT4 RRM proposers should note that e A RRM trigger is a special ToO trigger that can only be activated up to 4 hours after an event 20 e RRM runs must be exclusively used for triggering the RRM system Therefore they must be specified as runs separate from hard or soft ToOs in the ESOFORM template In particular this means that observations to be executed in the same night of an event but more than 4 hours after it should be requested through a hard ToO trigger follow up observations of a target observed using the RRM system must be requested through the activation of a hard or soft ToO trigger or a normal programme depending on the classification described above e As with ToO programmes proposers will need to indicate in the BTEX template the number of targets per run and the requested number of triggers per target Upon receiving an encoded alert indicating the coordinates of the target and the associated Observing Block OB to be executed any ongoing integration will automatically be terminated and the RRM OB will be executed Depending on the instrument
31. ed in the ETC This is also true for the requested sky transparency and lunar phase Non photometric sky transparency can be simulated by adding 0 1 0 2 mag to the object magnitude for CLEAR THIN CIRRUS conditions respectively 2 2 The ESOFORM Proposal package All Phase 1 proposals must be prepared using the ESOFORM Proposal Package configured for Period 97 as the package is updated every period The ESOFORM package may be obtained by logging into the ESO User Portal following the instructions at http www eso org sci observing phasel esoform html The ESOFORM User Manual in the proposal package describes in detail how to fill the TAT X template and the information required to prepare a valid proposal 2 2 1 ESOFORM Important notes e Definition of Service Mode and Visitor Mode runs An observing programme as described in a single proposal may consist of one or more runs Multiple runs should only be requested for observations with different instruments for different observing modes e g service mode visitor mode or pre imaging runs Proposers should split Visitor Mode obser vations at different epochs e g due to different target RAs into separate runs Service Mode runs should not be split according to time critical windows or used to group targets according to their Right Ascensions e Scheduling constraints must be specified correctly as the telescope schedules are prepared using software that relies on accurate
32. elevant UT4 activities described in Sections 1 1 and 1 3 taking into account that the schedule described is provisional Large Programmes are only accepted on some instruments in Period 97 see Table 3 See Section 1 1 for more information on the availability of instruments for Large Programmes in this Period Up to a maximum of 30 of the observing time distributed by the OPC on the VLT VLTI can be allocated to Large Programmes An ESO Large Programme is defined by the criteria listed below e A programme requiring a minimum of 100 hours of ESO telescope time For ESO telescopes one night in visitor mode is defined to be 8 hours in even periods and 10 hours in odd periods e A programme that has the potential to lead to a major advance or breakthrough in the field of study has a strong scientific justification and a plan for a quick and comprehensive effort of data reduction and analysis by a dedicated team e Large Programmes can span from 1 to 4 periods i e up to a maximum of two consecutive years e A good organisational structure of the proposing team availability of resources and relevant expertise must be demonstrated e ToO programmes cannot be submitted as Large Programmes Section 4 4 A special TEX template must be used for Large Programmes Section 2 2 The proposers may use a total of three pages not including figures for the four sections of the scientific description A Scientific Rationale B Immediate Object
33. en periods and 10 hours in odd periods e Both Service Mode and Visitor Mode observations are allowed e MP proposals must request a minimum of 2 periods and can span up to 4 periods e MPs will be judged in the same way as normal programmes but must be amongst the highest ranked programmes in order to be scheduled e For APEX instruments observations for approved MPs can only be carried out in ESO time Hence targets can be monitored with a bi monthly cadence at best e ToO programmes cannot be submitted as Monitoring Programmes Section 4 4 17 Monitoring programme proposals should be prepared using the appropriate macro in the TAT X template for normal proposals template tex See the ESOFORM User Manual for more details 4 3 Large Programmes Table 3 Available Instruments Large Programmes Telescope Instrument keywords UT1 FORS2 KMOS UT2 FLAMES UVES UT3 SPHERE VISIR UT4 HAWK 1 MUSE SINFONI VLTI AMBER PIONIER 3 6 HARPS Special3 6 APEX LABOCA SHFI 1 Large Programmes for VISIR are restricted to normal imaging low and high resolution spec troscopy 2 Large programmes for UT4 instruments must be compatible with constraints imposed by the UTA activities and to a lesser extent CIAO installation and commissioning activities described in Sections 1 1 and 1 3 taking into account that the schedule described is provisional 3 Large programmes on the VLTI must be compatible with the VLTI and if r
34. ereo ens 4 454262 244 bbw eae ee 28 6 5 Phase 2 Service Mode policy constraints and targets are binding 28 OG PESAS DUDE aei Eo eee Sg da a Paw sh we ek a te Re ia a 28 6 7 Data rights archiving data distribution 29 6 8 Publication of ESO telescope results o e ees 29 6 9 Press Releases occ oa 52 A A See aed 29 III Appendix 30 A Acronyms 30 Part I Phase 1 Instructions 1 ESO Proposals Invited The European Southern Observatory ESO invites proposals for observations at ESO tele scopes during Period 97 1 April 2016 30 September 2016 The following instruments are offered in this period La Silla EFOSC2 ESO Faint Object Spectrograph 2 HARPS High Accuracy Radial velocity Planetary Searcher Soff Son of ISAAC Paranal AMBER Near infrared interferometric instrument FLAMES Fibre Large Array Multi Element Spectrograph FORS2 FOcal Reducer low dispersion Spectrograph 2 HAWK I High Acuity Wide field K band Imager KMOS K band Multi Object Spectrograph MUSE Multi Unit Spectroscopic Explorer NACO NAOS CONICA High Resolution NIR Camera and Spectrograph OMEGACAM Wide Field Imager for the VST at Paranal PIONIER Precision Integrated Optics Near infrared Imaging ExpeRiment SINFONI Spectrograph for INtegral Field Obs in the NIr SPHERE Spectro Polarimetric High contrast Exoplanet REsearch UVES UV Visual Echelle Spectrograph VIMO
35. ername Note that each individual is allowed to have only one account in the User Portal database multiple accounts must not be created Failure to comply with this restriction may lead to the rejection by ESO of the corresponding proposals All valid proposals received by ESO prior to the submission deadline will be reviewed by the OPC who will rank them according to the scientific merit and the importance of its contribution to the advancement of scientific knowledge Furthermore proposals should provide evidence that the proposing individual or team have the expertise and sufficient resources to carry out the analysis 27 Proposals should be self contained The evaluation will be based solely on their contents For non member state proposals Section 4 9 the following additional criteria will be taken into account e The required telescope instrumentation is not available at any other observatory accessible to the applicants e If an ESO member state proposal and a non member state proposal are rated equally prefer ence will be given to the ESO member state proposal The following policy extracted from the agreement between ESO and its host state Chile governs the allocation of time to Host State Proposals Section 4 8 Chilean scientists who present meritorious projects shall have the right to obtain up to 10 of the observing time of ESO tele scopes For VLT projects at least one half of this 10 shall be dedicated to proje
36. es or time critical observations will not be accepted on this PI instrument Users who would like to use FLASH must contact the instrument PI Dr Rolf Guesten rguesten AT mpifr bonn mpg de at least two weeks prior to submitting their proposal Members of the PI team should be included as Cols on the proposal The operation of this PI instrument requires the presence of the instrument team so all ESO FLASH observations will be scheduled on fixed dates the exact dates have not been determined yet FLASH observations will be done by the PI team over a maximum of 3 days Preference will be given to proposals using the dual beam wide bandwidth capabilities of FLASH due to limited ESO observing time SEPIA this new instrument is offered conditional to a successful commissioning in September 2015 It can house up to 3 ALMA type receiver cartridges In Period 97 only the band 5 receiver is offered covering 159 to 211 GHz with dual polarization sideband separating mixers The XFFTS backends will cover the full 4 GHz IF bandwidth simultaneously in both sidebands and in both polarizations i e two bandpasses of 4 GHz width each with an 8 GHz gap in between An observing time calculator will be made available on http www apex telescope org heterodyne calculator The Late Breaking News page should be checked for updates on the commissioning as it take place after the release of this document CHAMP this MPIfR PI instrument is not of
37. ew of such proposals Section 6 1 4 10 VLT XMM proposals With the aim of taking full advantage of the complementarity of ground based and space borne observing facilities ESA and ESO have agreed to establish an environment for those scientific programmes that require observations with both the XMM Newton X ray Observatory and the ESO VLT I telescopes to achieve outstanding and competitive results By agreement with the XMM Newton Observatory ESO may award up to 290 ksec 80 hours of XMM Newton observing time Similarly the XMM Newton project may award up to 80 hours of ESO VLT observing time This applies to the duration of an XMM Newton cycle which normally extends over two ESO observing periods However proposers should take the limited availability of some of the VLT I instruments in Periods 97 and 98 into account See Section 1 1 for more details regarding instrument availability during these periods Proposers wishing to make use of this opportunity will have to submit a single proposal in response to either the XMM Newton or the ESO call for proposals proposals for the same programme sub mitted to both observatories will be rejected To submit a proposal to ESO the Normal Programme template must be used Such a proposal will be reviewed exclusively by the OPC A proposal sub mitted to the XMM Newton Observatory will be reviewed exclusively by the XMM Newton OTAC Proposals that request different amounts of observing time on each f
38. eyond 11 00 CEST on the day of the deadline The online receiver will switch off at 12 00 CEST No submissions or amendments to submitted proposals can be accepted after this time In each submitted proposal one single person the Principal Investigator PI must be identified as being principally responsible for that proposal By submitting a proposal the PI agrees that he she and his her collaborators will act according to ESO s policies and regulations including the conditions specified in the present Call for Proposals if observing time is granted Any questions about policies or the practical aspects of proposal preparation should be ad dressed to the ESO Observing Programmes Office opo eso org Enquiries related to the tech nical requirements of the planned observations should be sent to the User Support Department usd help eso org for Paranal and Chajnantor and to lasilla eso org for La Silla Enquiries can also be made through the Ask for help link in the User Portal which is listed under Other Services This document outlines the main news concerning the call provides guidelines on how to prepare an ESO observing proposal and outlines the policies related to ESO programmes All the technical details related to the available facilities telescopes and instruments are available through the ESO webpages Part I of this Call for Proposals provides information on how to complete and submit a Phase 1 proposal to ESO and Part
39. fered in Period 97 because of a planned technical intervention It may be offered again in Period 98 SABOCA is not offered in Period 97 as the same capabilities are offered by ARTEMIS SUPERCAM This PI instrument is no longer offered There are currently no plans to offer it again 1 2 Important reminders e General information ESO User Portal Proposals are submitted via a web upload procedure using the on line tool Web Application for Submitting Proposals WASP This requires users to first log in to the ESO User Portal at http www eso org UserPortal see Section 2 2 Duration of one night Proposers are reminded that one night in Visitor Mode is defined to be 8 hours in even periods and 10 hours in odd periods on all ESO telescopes The information provided in the proposal is binding All observing runs must be executed as described in the proposal Deviations from the proposal either by observing different targets or by using different instrument modes or different constraints may be allowed only under exceptional circumstances and after approval by ESO see Section 6 5 OPC evaluation of proposals Proposers should keep in mind the need for each OPC panel to cover a broad range of scientific areas hence proposals may not fall within the main area of specialisation of any of the panel members Proposers should make sure that the context of their project and its relevance for general astrophysics
40. g and or complex timing links that are very restrictive and time series for observations requiring excellent observing conditions are unlikely to be successfully completed Therefore all such proposals are reviewed for technical feasibility and may be rejected if judged to be too complex Proposers for programmes requiring timing links are strongly encouraged to consider how they may simplify their timing sequences as much as possible as this will minimize the risk that the observations are deemed unfeasible They should also read the Time critical OB execution policy page If a given OB cannot be executed within its intended observability window it will be re moved from the observing queue and will not be attempted again If it was part of a time linked series then the time series observation will continue with the next OB if appropriate ESO will not restart a sequence of linked observations if the pre specified timing constraints cannot be fulfilled More details on how version 3 of the Phase 2 Proposal Preparation P2PP tool can be used to time link group or concatenate various OBs are described in http www eso org sci observing phase2 P2PP3 html e ToO programme execution Successful proposers of ToO runs will have to prepare OBs for their observations well ahead of the beginning of an observing period see Section 5 2 Mostly ToO OBs will have to be dummy OBs with default values for target coordinates integration times etc
41. he respective instrument Web pages Scientific publications that make use of the data or results of Calibration Programmes will have to reference the corresponding proposals Calibration Programme proposals must be submitted using the ESOFORM template for Normal Programmes In Box 7A entitled Scientific rationale the proposers should clearly state the limits of the existing calibration plan and the expected improvement that can result from the proposed observations Moreover the proposal should emphasise the relevance and the overall scientific gain of the calibration techniques and products resulting from these observations Calibration Programmes do not pertain to any of the standard OPC categories A B C or D since in general they are not directly related to a unique scientific area the special subcategory code LO should be used to distinguish them The PIs of Calibration Programmes are required to deliver to ESO the resulting Advanced Data Products within one year of the completion of the corresponding observations 4 7 Director s Discretionary Time Up to 5 of the general available observing time may be used for Director s Discretionary Time DDT proposals in the current period These programmes are generally of short duration lt 5 hours though a longer time request may be granted if justified by a strong science case Only DDT proposals belonging to one of the following categories will be considered e proposals of ToO n
42. ing Programmes will be allowed on La Silla telescopes VISTA or VST On the APEX and Paranal telescopes Monitoring Programmes are subject to the same instrument restrictions as Large Programmes see below Large Programmes See Section 4 3 for the detailed definition of a Large Programme and the instruments offered for this programme type As of Period 95 proposers should pay particular attention to changes in Sections 6 and 7 of the ESOFORM template for Large Programmes In particular Large Programme teams are requested to provide a detailed delivery plan for data products and their strategy to ensure data quality Sect 4 3 On the APEX telescope Large Programmes will not be accepted for the PI instruments ARTEMIS FLASH and SEPIA As in previous periods Large Programmes will not be accepted for either VIRCAM or OMEGACAM NTT instruments SOFI and EFOSC2 are not available for Large Programmes due to ongoing Large Programme and Public Survey commitments as well as future activities related to the projects proposed in response to the Call for Ideas for NTT Projects in 2014 The following VLT instruments are also unavailable for Large Programmes NACO XSHOOTER and VIMOS The reasons for the restrictions on these VLT instruments are listed below Note that these restrictions also apply to Monitoring Programmes for the same reasons x NACO the availability of several modes cannot be guaranteed in the coming periods x VIMOS is unavailab
43. ional cases e g moving targets remote observing from Bonn in collaboration with MPIfR can be considered Proposals requesting time from different APEX partners are required to mention the amount of time requested from MPIfR Sweden or Chile in Box 5 Observations will be done for up to 24 hours per day but users should be aware that afternoon condi tions are often significantly worse than the conditions during the night or the morning Observations using high frequency instruments SHFI APEX 3 ARTEMIS should avoid the afternoon APEX users should ensure that their proposal meets the following require ments specify if time is requested from other APEX partners in the macro SpecialRemarks Box 5 specify the requested PWV using the macro Target Box 11 for their project to allow a better distinction between observations requesting a range of atmospheric transparencies either indicate an appropriate off source position or request time to find such a po sition if they wish to observe extended line emitting regions x merge all observations for any APEX instrument into a single run note that this also applies for the different receivers of SHFI For Large Programmes this restriction should be understood as a single run per instrument and per period Separate runs should be specified for observations in different periods 1 3 Foreseen changes in the upcoming periods e CRIRES is being transformed into a cross dispersed echel
44. isitor VisitorInstruments pdf For visitor instruments on APEX http www eso org sci facilities apex instruments apex visitor index html 15 Part II Proposal Types Policies and Procedures 4 Proposal Types For Period 97 the list of proposal types is e Normal Programmes e Monitoring Programmes e Large Programmes e Target of Opportunity e Guaranteed Time Observations e Calibration Programmes e Director s Discretionary Time All proposals except Director s Discretionary Time DDT proposals must be submitted by the current deadline DDT proposals may be submitted at any time Only the Normal and Large Programme template forms should be used for the preparation of proposals An observing programme as described in a single proposal may consist of several runs e g for observations with different instruments or to be executed in different observing modes or at different epochs for Visitor Mode observations Proposals for Visitor Mode observations Section 5 1 must request time in nights proposals for Service Mode observations Section 5 2 must request time in hours Note that any given proposal may request a mix of Visitor Service Mode observations provided that they are split into separate runs The definition of a single run differs for Service Mode and Visitor Mode observations further guidelines are available in Section 2 2 1 Please note All proposers Service and Visitor Mode must include time fo
45. ith many possible configurations and observ ing modes Although the Observatory executes a rigorous calibration plan for each instrument ESO does not have the resources to fully calibrate all potential capabilities of all instruments On the other hand the astronomical community has expressed interest to perform calibrations for certain uncalibrated or poorly calibrated modes or to develop specialized software for certain calibration and data reduction tasks Calibration Programmes allow users to complement the existing calibration of ESO instruments and to fill gaps in the calibration coverage that might exist Up to 3 of all the available observing time may be made available for calibration proposals Calibration Programmes will be evaluated by the OPC with a view to balancing the added calibration value for future science with the more immediate return of the regular science proposals of the current period Calibration Programmes are reviewed by ESO with regards to their technical and operational feasibility Successful proposers will be required to deliver documentation data products and software to ESO to support future observing programmes The procedure to be followed is described at http www eso org sci observing phase3 html The raw calibration data as well as the ad vanced calibration products that are obtained as part of Calibration Programmes are non proprietary and made available to the entire community through the ESO archive and t
46. ive C Telescope Justification D Observing Mode Justification Visitor or Service An additional 2 pages of attachments are permitted Proposers of Large Programmes should keep in mind that the entire OPC hence also non experts in a specific field as well as the specialised OPC panels will be evaluating their proposal and that they should clearly explain the relevance of the proposed programme to general astrophysics 18 If a Large Programme proposal contains runs requesting La Silla telescopes and instruments the duration of each such run must be at least 3 nights Proposers should be aware that the PIs of successful proposals for Large Programmes are required to provide all data products processed images and spectra catalogues to the ESO archive Starting from Period 97 PIs of Large Programmes are asked to take particular care when completing the revised Sections 6 and 7 in the XIX template form They must provide extended information on the data quality assessment and data reduction They should also include the planning for publication of data products both in terms of content and timeline which must be finalised within two years of the completion of the data acquisition for the programme Large Programme proposals must include a precise timeline for the publication of data products in order to comply with ESO s policies Guidelines for the submission of these data products including a description of the required meta data a
47. l 12 months in Period 97 please do so using the ProprietaryTime macro in the 4TfX ESOFORM template Raw data of Public Surveys and calibration data are not subject to a proprietary period and become publicly available as soon as they are ingested in the ESO Archive For both Visitor Mode and Service Mode observations the ESO Science Archive Facility http archive eso org is the sole access point to data obtained with ESO telescopes PIs of Service and Visitor Mode programmes and their data delegates have access to their proprietary raw data as soon as the data have been ingested in the ESO Archive which typically happens a few hours after the observation Access to the data is provided through the ESO User Portal credentials The CalSelector archive service for VLT instruments combines the science files with any ancillary files that are needed to process the data e g acquisition images calibrations etc 6 8 Publication of ESO telescope results Publications based on observations collected at ESO telescopes should state this in a footnote to the article s title The corresponding observing proposal should be clearly identified by its ESO ref erence number as shown in the following example Based on observations collected at the European Southern Observatory Chile ESO Programme 097 C 1234 6 9 Press Releases Should you consider that your results are worthy of a press release to the general public please contact the E
48. le for Large Programmes due to operational reasons compounded by the ongoing Public Spectroscopic Surveys XSHOOTER will likely be taken out of operations for several months to install re designed ADC systems in the near future Guaranteed Time Observations GTO will be carried out in Period 97 with ARTEMIS HARPS KMOS MUSE NACO OMEGACAM SINFONI and SPHERE For details about the planned observations please see http www eso org sci observing teles alloc gto 97 html e La Silla Additional information regarding changes affecting La Silla instruments and facilities can be found at the La Silla Paranal Observatory CfP webpage 3 6 m A large fraction 40 of the available science time is committed to ongoing Large Programmes in Period 97 see the Telescope Pressure webpage Large Programmes on the 3 6 m telescope can request time up to Period 100 Proposers are encouraged to submit high quality Normal Programmes on the 3 6 m tele scope The success rates of Normal Programmes suggest that these programmes can be very competitive despite the substantial ongoing Large Programme commitment Please see the article by Aerts Hussain amp Patat in Volume 153 of The ESO Messenger for more information and a comparison of the success rates of 3 6 m Large Programmes and Normal Programmes between Periods 82 92 HARPS x Commissioning of the Laser Frequency Comb took place during April 2015 Additional commissioning a
49. le spectrograph Operations will likely not start before the end of 2017 e XSHOOTER will likely be taken out of operations for several months to install re designed ADC systems in the near future e Activities related to the installation of the Adaptive Optics Facility on UT4 Yepun GALACST the adaptive optics module for MUSE is expected to be installed on Nasmyth B during Period 98 The installation of the Deformable Secondary Mirror and re commissioning of the tele scope is expected to take place in Period 98 as a consequence UT4 will not be available for approximately 3 months The commissioning of the AOF and AOF related systems is expected to require monthly slots of up to 7 days during possibly 2 years e The installation of ESPRESSO the Echelle SPectrograph for Rocky Exoplanet and Stable Spectroscopic Observations is expected to start in Period 98 Its commissioning would then follow in Period 99 e A refurbishment of the Coud trains of the VLTI AT array is expected to take place for in Period 98 This activity would last for a minimum of 2 months during which no VLTI observations with the AT would be possible e Pending successful commissioning during Period 96 and 97 GRAVITY may start operation in Period 98 in spectro imaging mode e The installation of MATISSE the Multi AperTure mid Infrared SpectroScopic Experiment is expected to start in Period 98 e The installation and commissioning of the Ne
50. lity to best match the OB constraints with actual observing conditions OBs for a given run are nor mally scheduled non contiguously Exceptions to this are made for OBs within concatenation scheduling containers also see the Programmes with linked time requirements item below e Multi mode multi configuration OBs are normally not permitted in SM Although multiple configurations within one OB may sometimes reduce overheads scheduling and cal ibrating such OBs is extremely inefficient and can increase the calibration load to an unsus tainable level Examples of such multi configuration OBs are those combining imaging and spectroscopy in a single OB spectroscopy with multiple grisms or central wavelength settings or imaging with a large number of filters although most imagers allow multiple broadband filters in one OB Multi configuration OBs are accepted only if duly justified and authorized by means of a Phase 2 Waiver Request e OB Total Execution Time Proposers should make sure that all overheads including telescope presetting and acquisition overheads have been properly included e OB execution times must be below 1 hour This rule also applies to concatenated OBs in most cases Long OBs and concatenated OBs are more difficult to schedule and execute within the specified constraints because of the unpredictable evolution of the observing conditions OBs taking more than one hour to execute are not normally accepted Proposers are e
51. ll for Letters of Intent to propose new public surveys has been released with a deadline of 15 October 2015 Further details can be found via the Applying for Observing Time webpage OMEGACAM Normal programme proposals are accepted on the VST in Period 97 However in order to ensure the timely progress of the ongoing Public Surveys these are restricted to filler programmes that request poor weather conditions i e either no moon constraints seeing gt 1 4 or thin thick clouds Target of Opportunity proposals requesting a short amount of time will also be considered VLTI x ESO aims to increase the fraction of service mode for VLTI observations PIs re questing visitor mode for VLTI should carefully justify the need for visitor mode Proposers should be aware that there is a minimum time limit of 1n per base line configuration for Visitor Mode runs requiring VLTI AT observations Proposers requiring shorter runs per baseline configuration should specify Service Mode obser vations These restrictions do not apply to the VLTI UT baselines The VLTI laboratory underwent major modifications during Period 95 and reopens for science operations in Period 96 As of Period 96 the available instruments are AMBER with or without FINITO as well as PIONIER MIDI was decommissioned in March 2015 and is therefore not offered any more x PIONIER is a 4 telescope visitor instrument for the VLTI that combines four ATs or four
52. nd formats can be found on the Phase 3 page proposers are invited to write an email to usd helpOeso org for further information The Phase 3 page can be found at http www eso org sci observing phase3 html During the period of execution of a Large Programme and upon its completion the PI is expected to report regularly to the OPC on the programme s progress He she may also be asked to outline the progress and or outcome of the programme at an ESO Large Programme workshop similar to those of May 19 21 2003 and October 13 15 2008 Large Programme Pls for the past few years are participating in the upcoming ESO Workshop entitled Rainbows on the Southern sky science and legacy value of the ESO public surveys More details are available here via the workshop webpage 4 4 Target of Opportunity Normally up to 5 of the available ESO general observing time may be used for Target of Opportunity ToO proposals For events with exceptional characteristics ESO will also consider overriding Visitor Mode observations ESO recognises two categories of Targets of Opportunity 1 Unpredictable ToOs are those concerning unpredictable astronomical events that require immediate observations The occurrence of such events cannot be anticipated on a sufficient timeframe to allow them to be the subject of a proposal prepared by the regular proposal submission deadline They qualify for allocation of Director Discretionary Time Corresp
53. ng run through the change request form as described in Section 5 1 The ESO Science Data Products Forum This is a platform that enables users of ESO instruments to share ideas methods software and data to assist with the preparation of science data products from ESO telescopes Users are encouraged to contribute on any topic related to the reduction calibration and analysis of science data from ESO instruments e Paranal Observing mode on the VLT Departures from the observing mode requested by the proposers may be implemented by ESO so as to achieve a balanced distribution between Service Mode and Visitor Mode Proposers should request Service Mode for observations that benefit from the short term scheduling flexibility allowed by this mode Proposers may identify runs that lend themselves for observations in either Service or Visitor Mode by specifying one of the modes using the alternative run feature in Box 3 of the ESOFORM Phase 1 proposal form Please note that if a certain instrument mode is offered exclusively in either Service Mode or Visitor Mode then this overrides these scheduling considerations Service Mode OBs Service Mode Observation Blocks OBs including all overheads can last up to a maximum of 1 hour This rule also applies to concatenated OBs in most cases Users are encouraged to read the Service Mode rules for more details Longer OBs have to be specifically requested and justified at Phase 2 via a waiver
54. nual 19 ToO runs are defined as runs for which the target and or observation epoch cannot be known more than one week before the observation needs to be executed Within this time window three different types of ToO runs are defined e Rapid Response Mode RRM for observations to be triggered via the automated Rapid Response Mode system within 4 hours after an event e Hard ToO runs for manually triggered observations that must be carried out as soon as possible or at most within 48 hours of receipt of the trigger by the Observatory or that involve a strict time constraint i e that must be executed during a specific night e Soft ToO runs for manually triggered observations for which the Observatory can receive notification more than 48 hours before execution and which can be scheduled for execution with a flexibility of at least 1 day For all ToO runs generic Observing Blocks OBs must be submitted by the PI at Phase 2 Section 4 4 1 further describes RRM runs OBs for Hard and Soft ToO runs will be scheduled for execution following the acceptance by ESO of an activation trigger This activation trigger must in partic ular contain the missing information such as target coordinates observing time etc that the observatory staff need to insert for a successful execution Users submitting a ToO programme will need to indicate the number of targets per run and the requested number of triggers per target using the appro
55. ollowing instrument modes UVES echelle UVES slicer X Shooter echelle HARPS and FLAMES GIRAFFE in MEDUSA mode They are generated at ESO by running the corresponding data reduction pipelines in automatic mode and are subject to the same proprietary restrictions as the corresponding raw data they originate from i e for the duration of the proprietary period access is restricted to PIs and their data delegates More information on the science data products and links to the query forms for the data access and download can be found here http www eso org sci observing phase3 data_releases html The ESO Science Archive Facility http archive eso org The science archive facility is also the repository of all raw data collected at the La Silla Paranal Observatory After the expiration of the proprietary period of typically one year during which the data are only accessible by the respective PIs and delegates data become generally accessible without any further restriction In addition to raw data the ESO Science Archive Facility provides access to a wealth of science data products e g as generated by Public Survey and Large Programme Teams as well as resulting from automatic processing at ESO of raw data with the corresponding instrument pipelines Duplications Proposers are strongly advised to use the Science Archive Facility to check if observations equivalent to the proposed ones have been performed already Proposers must che
56. on and the proposers will be encouraged to resubmit their proposals for the next appropriate OPC submission deadline As a general rule proposals originally submitted to the OPC that were not allocated time must not be submitted as DDT proposals DDT proposals may be submitted at any time They must be prepared using the special ESOFORM DDT template Proposers must upload the DDT ESOFORM template and submit their DDT proposals by registering and logging into the ESO User Portal You can find more details at http www eso org sci observing phasel esoform html DDT proposals are reviewed and approved by the Director General Urgent requests must be clearly identified in Box 5 Special Remarks of the application form 4 8 Host State Proposals Qualifying proposals whose PI is affiliated with an institute of the Host State Chile are counted as Host State Proposals The designation as Host State Proposal is independent of the fraction of non member state Chile s participation is regulated by the Interpretative Supplementary and Amending Agreement to the 1963 Convention Sect 6 1 4 9 Non Member State Proposals A Non Member State Proposal is a proposal where 2 3 or more of the proposers are not affiliated to ESO member state institutes independently of the nationality of the proposers and of the affiliation of the PI Non member state proposals are submitted in the usual way but a separate set of criteria are used for the revi
57. onal natural visibility period Class B and C runs will not be carried over Monitoring programme and ToO runs are by definition Class A regarding priority in execution but they will not be carried over to the following periods regardless of their completion status As Monitoring Programmes span multiple periods for the purposes of monitoring individual targets fields this removes the necessity for the creation of carryover runs Proposers are particularly encouraged to consider their observing strategy and how they can simplify any time constraints are much as possible to increase chances of being scheduled Guidelines on the handling of time critical OBs are available at the Time critical OB execution policy page 6 5 Phase 2 Service Mode policy constraints and targets are binding To optimize the use of ESO telescopes in Service Mode a proper mix of runs requiring various observing conditions and with targets spread over the entire range of RAs for a given period is necessary For this reason proposers are requested in their Phase 1 proposal to specify not only the targets with accurate coordinates but also the needed observing conditions lunar phase seeing sky transparency Due to their essential role in determining the long term scheduling of Service Mode time the constraints specified at Phase 1 are binding Successful proposers will not be allowed to change the instrument set ups target lists and or times per target that were requeste
58. onding applications for observing time should therefore be submitted as DDT pro posals Section 4 7 The TOO type could be selected if executions of observations must be triggered by the PI as decribed below 2 Predictable ToOs are those concerning predictable events in a generic sense only These are typically but not limited to known transient phenomena and follow up or coordinated observations of targets of special interest Proposals aimed at studying such events are in the ESO proposal terminology ToO proposals ToO proposals must be submitted using the Normal Programme ESOFORM template Proposals should be for generic targets and or times However if accepted by the OPC the programme will not be executed until the PI or his her delegate contacts ESO to request its activation after the predicted event has occurred The observing strategy must be the one approved by the OPC and the triggers may not exceed the allocated time and number of triggers granted The observations will be conducted in Service Mode and in exceptional cases ongoing programmes may be interrupted Read more on ToO policy As ToO programmes may require a mixture of ToO runs and normal runs proposers are requested to specify the type of runs TOO or normal in the tenth final field of the ObservingRun macro of the ESOFORM IXAT X template A more detailed description of types of ToO runs with accompanying examples can be found in the ESOFORM package User Ma
59. ph for INtegral Field Observations in the Near Infrared Service Mode programme Spectro Polarimetric High contrast Exoplanet REsearch SPectrometer for Infrared Faint Field Imaging Star Separator System Target of Opportunity ser Support Department nit Telescope 1 Antu nit Telescope 2 Kueyen nit Telescope 3 Melipal nit Telescope 4 Yepun ltra Violet V Visual Echelle Spectrograph Visible MultiObject Spectrograph VISTA InfraRed CAMera VLT Imager and Spectrometer for mid Infra Red Visible and Infrared Survey Telescope for Astronomy Very Large Telescope Very Large Telescope Interferometer Visitor Mode programme VLT Survey Telescope UV Visual NIR medium resolution echelle spectrograph Redshift z and Early Universe Spectrometer Zurich IMaging POLarimeter ie ENEE NENE end of document
60. priate macros in the ATX template A trigger is defined as the request for execution of one Observation Block with a given instrument at a given epoch Similar observations to be executed with the same instrument at different epochs count as different triggers as do observations with different instruments at the same epoch Any observing request by other groups at the time an event occurs e g a DDT proposal with exactly the same scientific goal and aiming at observing the same object will be rejected by ESO ToO runs are not carried over to the following periods ToO proposers should bear in mind that ToO proposals are ranked across OPC categories by the whole OPC hence including non experts in their specific field They should therefore clearly explain the relevance of the proposed programme to general astrophysics It is important to note that e Eventual follow up observations of a ToO target must make use of a normal non ToO run possibly with specific time constraints if the observations must take place more than one week after reception of the trigger by ESO e Targets that are unknown at Phase 1 proposal submission time but can be observed with or without specific predictable time constraints more than one week after they have been identified should be observed as part of normal non ToO runs In both of these cases the related OBs should be defined or updated by the PI once the target is known The OBs should be stored in th
61. r all overheads tele scope instrument in their proposals see the Overheads webpage Table 1 Available Instruments for Normal Programmes Telescope Instrument keywords UT1 FORS2 KMOS NACO UT2 FLAMES UVES XSHOOTER UT3 SPHERE VIMOS VISIR UT4 HAWK I MUSE SINFONI VLTI AMBER PIONIER VISTA VIRCAM VST OMEGACAM APEX FLASH ARTEMIS LABOCA SEPIA SHFI SpecialAPEX NTT SOFI EFOSC2 SpecialNTT 3 6 HARPS Special3 6 1 OMEGACAM is only available for Normal programmes that request poor weather conditions TOO proposals will also be considered 2 FLASH is an APEX Pl instrument in order to propose its use the instrument PI must be contacted at least two weeks prior to submitting the proposal see Section 1 1 16 4 1 Normal Programmes Most of the observing time on ESO telescopes will be allocated to Normal Programmes in Period 97 Proposers must use the standard ATEX template Section 2 2 The scientific case of the programme may take up to two pages including attachments figures or tables The scientific description contains two sections A Scientific Rationale B Immediate Objective Attachments such as figures are optional and are restricted to the second page of the scientific description though the respective fraction of the occupied by the scientific description and by the figures is left to the discretion of the proposer If the proposal contains runs requesting La Silla telescopes and instr
62. re insufficiently justified conflicting with any other approved programmes or imply significant changes in the overall distribution of scheduled targets in the sky Observations of targets for which no authorization has been obtained are not allowed at the telescope 6 4 1 Service Mode run execution The runs to be conducted in Service Mode will be subdivided into the following classes for operational reasons e Class A All possible efforts will be made to execute all OBs corresponding to the runs in the requested observing period Approximately the first half according to the OPC ranking of the total amount of Service Mode time scheduled on each telescope falls in this class e Class B These runs will be executed in the requested observing period on a best effort basis Approximately the second half according to the OPC ranking of the total amount of Service Mode time scheduled on each telescope falls in this class e Class C Filler runs OBs will only be executed if the observing conditions do not permit observations for runs within classes A and B The any weather proposals mentioned in Section 1 1 would fall under this category For Class A runs that are not completed by the end of Period 97 ESO will decide whether they can be declared substantially complete or have to be carried over to the next period provided that this is technically feasible In general a class A run will not be carried over for more than one additi
63. rmation can be found in the articles on Service Mode scheduling in the September 2001 issue and the article Fifteen Years of Service Mode Operations in the December 2014 issue As part of the Phase 1 proposal investigators are requested to specify which mode they desire While every effort will be made to follow the proposed observing mode ESO does reserve the right to allocate time in a mode that is different from the one requested Note especially the restrictions of available modes detailed in Sects 5 1 and 5 2 including Designated Visitor Mode as well as the policy in Section 6 3 The telescope as well as the instruments will be operated by observatory staff only The astronomer interfaces with the telescope instruments via Observation Blocks OBs produced using the Phase 2 Proposal Preparation P2PP tool Observers use the latest P2PP 2 13 version for La Silla observations and P2PP v3 for Paranal observations 5 1 Visitor Mode In Visitor Mode VM the astronomer is physically present at the observatory during the obser vations Each approved VM run will be allocated specific calendar nights One of the programme investigators will travel to the Observatory and execute the observations Visitor Mode is not offered on VST VISTA or APEX For all ESO instruments data acquisition will be done by executing Observation Blocks OBs i e observing sequences specified by the astronomer that are based on templates provided b
64. rvations assuming no backup pro gramme is in place and that Service Mode observations are allowed on that telescope Raw data are available for download shortly after acquisition Please note that VM proposers must include overheads for all science exposures Guidelines are provided in the Overheads page Though it is very rare the Observatory may interrupt Visitor Mode observation to allow Service Mode observations In general the observatory does not compensate for weather or technical losses of observing time However the Director of the Observatory may decide to compensate losses of observing time under exceptional circumstances 5 1 1 ToO programme execution during VM observations VM observations may be interrupted by time critical DDT or ToO programmes As far as possible the execution of observations for such programmes will be confined to scheduled Service Mode periods Under exceptional circumstances the Director of the Observatory may decide to interrupt VM runs to allow ToO observations ToO runs in the Rapid Response Mode RRM may also interrupt VM observations see Section 4 4 1 5 1 2 Designated Visitor Mode ESO reserves the right to allocate telescope time in Designated Visitor Mode DVM instead of regular Visitor Mode VM for any runs with a justified need for VM observations and whose duration is smaller than one night The final decision will be based on the technical feasibility reports and the Principal Investig
65. s before the proposal deadline leading to delays in response time that occasionally exceeded 1 hour Try to submit proposals at least one day before the deadline and avoid last minute stress At the end of the submission procedure an acknowledgment page is displayed with the Proposal ID Please save this for your records The PI of the proposal and the submitter will also receive a confirmation ticket via email but the acknowledgment page is the official receipt If you are not sure if your proposal has successfully entered the system do not re submit it but rather contact ESO at esoform eso org Neither proposals nor corrections to proposals that are submitted after the deadline will be consid ered 3 Visitor Instruments Visitor instruments can be mounted at the NTT the 3 6 m and APEX telescopes in order to permit innovative observations by teams with their stand alone instruments or to test new instrumental concepts for the development of new facility instruments No foci are available for visitor instruments on the VLT or VLTI in Period 97 The requirements for visitor instruments are substantially reduced compared to the requirements for fully integrated facility instruments A set of guidelines on how to propose a visitor instrument and technical information is available through the links below Technical information on the interface to the NTT and 3 6 m telescope is at http www eso org sci facilities lasilla instruments v
66. specially encouraged to plan for OBs substantially shorter than one hour if the execution conditions are particularly demanding as the fulfillment of all the constraints during the entire execution time becomes more unlikely as the OB becomes longer Please see the Service Mode OBs item in Section 1 2 for more information e Fulfillment of Phase 2 constraints ESO will consider an OB as successfully executed if all the conditions in the constraint set are fulfilled OBs executed under conditions marginally outside constraints by no more than 10 of the specified value will not be scheduled for re execution Please note that OBs executed marginally outside specified LST constraints by no more than 20 minutes will not be scheduled for re execution Adaptive Optics assisted 26 observations with NACO or SINFONI within 50 of the requested Strehl ratio will not be repeated assuming that other constraints are suitably met VLTI OBs executed marginally outside the specified LST intervals by no more than 30 min will not be scheduled for re execution e Programmes with linked time requirements SM is also intended to support programmes with special timing requirements However proposers planning such programmes should keep in mind that at most 60 of both bright and dark time is allocated to SM on Paranal and that observing conditions cannot be predicted when a time series is started This means that timing sequences that are extremely lon
67. sted during the ESO runs Large Programmes with APEX using poor PWV conditions In order to make the best use of the time where the PWV is high PWV gt 2 mm ESO invites Large Programmes for those conditions Poor PWV large programmes must be clearly identified as such in Boxes 5 and 8 of the Large Programme proposal form Ideally a Poor PWV LP Programme therefore consists of a large sample of targets covering a wide RA range The proposal must demonstrate that the scientific goals can be reached with only a significant subset of the observations completed Poor PWV LPs may cover up to 4 consecutive semesters ARTEMIS This new 350 um camera is offered conditional to its successful commission ing in November 2015 ARTEMIS will cover a field of view of 4 x2 at 350 um Parallel observations at 450 um may be available but cannot be guaranteed Sensitivity estima tions for 450 um will not be available before the deadline and the science case should not depend on this band If the commissioning is delayed ESO may execute ARTEMIS programmes with SABOCA instead A new observing time calculator is available at http www apex telescope org bolometer artemis obscalc SHETI x APEX 1 Large proposals for PWV gt 2mm conditions are encouraged APEX T2 the 1 3 THz receiver has been de commissioned FLASH This PI instrument is offered to the ESO community on a collaborative basis with MPIfR Large programm
68. t modes and or configurations are covered to the same level of detail by the current calibration plans Service Mode runs The calibrations specified in the respective Calibration Plans are obtained systematically by the Observatory and do not need to be requested by the proposers Proposals for Service Mode runs should only request the time needed for their science observations and if applicable night time calibrations including all operational overheads beyond those listed in the published Calibration Plans x Visitor Mode runs Night time calibrations are the responsibility of the visiting observer with the following exception up to approximately 30 minutes per night will be used by the observatory staff to obtain standard ESO calibrations The ESO obtained data will be used to monitor instrument performance and to assure a baseline calibration accuracy within the ESO Science Archive Facility ESO does not guarantee that these standard calibration data will be sufficient to calibrate the Visitor Mode science observations to the accuracy desired by the observer Proposers should plan accordingly for Visitor Mode runs Data Reduction software In collaboration with the various instrument consortia ESO has undertaken to implement data reduction pipelines for the most commonly used VLT VLTI instrument modes The ESO pipelines including downloads and user manu als can be found on the instrument pipeline page VLT VLTI Pipelines page
69. tation can be obtained by running the Phase 2 Preparation Tool P2PP in tutorial mode The definitions of the observing conditions for Phase 1 and Phase 2 can be found on the Observing Conditions webpage which also shows the probability of the combined sky trans parency and seeing values being realised throughout the year at Paranal The following sections give some additional information and references that should be useful to proposers 2 1 Exposure Time Calculators Exposure Time Calculators ETCs for ESO instruments are accessible directly on the ESO Web For La Silla and Paranal instrumentation http www eso org observing etc Proposers of VLTI observations should check the feasibility of their proposed observations with the visibility calculator VisCalc available from the ETC page At Phase 2 users are also encouraged to select a suitable calibrator star for their planned observations using the CalVin tool which is also available from the above link For APEX instrumentation please go to http www apex telescope org instruments Links to useful proposal preparation software tools e g the Object Observability Calculator Airmass Calculator Digitized Sky Survey can be found at http www eso org sci observing tools html Information on standard stars and sky characteristics as well as additional tools are available at http www eso org sci facilities paranal sciops tools html The par
70. ts during the first half of Period 96 and will continue during Period 97 during this time the VLTI will not be available for regular operations for approximately 2 weeks every 2 months The number of baseline configurations for the ATs may also be restricted during the second half of the period due to these commissioning activities In addition to the instrument itself the 4 units of the GRAVITY Coud Infrared Adaptive Optics CIAO system for the VLT Interferometer are successively installed on each of the 4 UTs during Period 96 and 97 during which the respective UT will not be available for VLTI operation for about 10 days Their commissioning will take place during Period 97 x VLTI Visitor Instrument No VLTT Visitor focus is available in Period 97 e Chajnantor Observing with APEX Information on the available APEX instruments and ca pabilities can be found on the Observing with APEX page Additional informa tion regarding changes affecting APEX instruments and facilities can be found at the La Silla Paranal Observatory CfP webpage APEX For a detailed description of the APEX instrument capabilities and links to observing time calculators see the APEX instrumentation page During Period 97 the ESO time slots are expected to be scheduled in April June and August The exact distribution of the observing time between the APEX partners can be found on the APEX webpages Time critical observations should only be reque
71. uding overheads Proposers are especially encouraged to request Service Mode on Paranal if their programme in volves Target of Opportunity events or synoptic observing or if they require the best observing conditions which occur at unpredictable intervals Further information on SM observing may be found in the Service Mode Guidelines 5 2 1 Service Mode policies To ensure the efficiency of Service Mode SM observing ESO has implemented a number of rules for procedures and limitations on SM runs They need to be carefully considered at the time of preparing an application for SM observations and are summarized here Please note that these items have important consequences on the way that execution overheads must be taken into account Please consult the Phase 2 webpages for the latest information on SM policies and SM OB rules Proposers should note that Phase 1 constraints are binding see Section 6 5 e Some observing strategies cannot be supported in Service Mode in particular real time decisions about complex OB sequencing or decisions based on the outcome of previously executed OBs like adjustment of integration times or execution of some OBs instead of others e Observation Blocks OBs execution OBs are usually executed non contiguously it is thus not possible to reduce acquisition overheads by requiring the sequential execution of OBs with the same target field Since efficient SM operations require continuous flexibi
72. uments the duration of each such run must be at least 3 nights except for runs using Visitor Instruments or for combinations of contiguous EFOSC2 and SOFT runs totalling at least 3 nights 4 2 Monitoring Programmes Monitoring Programmes MPs are only accepted on some instruments see Table 2 Section 1 1 explains the reasons for these restrictions Table 2 Available Instruments for Monitoring Programmes Telescope Instrument keywords UT1 FORS2 KMOS UT2 FLAMES UVES UT3 SPHERE VISIR UT4 HAWK I MUSE SINFONI VLTI AMBER PIONIER APEX LABOCA SHFI 1 Monitoring Programmes for VISIR are restricted to normal imaging low and high resolution spectroscopy 2 Monitoring programmes for UT4 instruments must be compatible with constraints imposed by the UTA activities and to a lesser extent CIAO installation and commissioning activities described in Section 1 3 taking into account that the schedule described is provisional 3 Monitoring programmes on the VLTI must be compatible with the VLTI and if relevant UT4 activities described in Sections 1 1 and 1 3 taking into account that the schedule described is provi sional 4 APEX observations for approved MPs can only be carried out in the ESO time slots An ESO Monitoring Programme is defined by the criteria listed below e A programme requiring less than 100 hours of ESO telescope time For ESO telescopes one night in Visitor Mode is defined to be 8 hours in ev
73. w Adaptive Optics Module for Interferometry NAOMI the low order adaptive optics system for the ATs is expected to start in 2018 The schedule currently foresees the installation of one unit every 3 months during which the corresponding AT will not be available for regular operation for approximately two weeks 12 e ZEUS 2 Pending successful commissioning the redshift z and Early Universe Spectrometer ZEUS 2 may be offered as a PI instrument during future periods ZEUS 2 is a broad band spectrograph covering 7 telluric windows covering 200 to 850um For details see Ferkinhoff et al 2010 e ARTEMIS In future periods parallel observations at 450um 4 x 2 may be offered 2 Getting Started Observing proposals must contain a scientific case a summary of the proposed observing programme a list of desired instrument modes and configurations a target list and a precise definition of required observing conditions seeing in V band at zenith atmospheric transparency lunar illumination etc In addition a calculation of the number of hours nights of observing time needed to accomplish the scientific goals must be carried out and summarized in the proposal It is therefore important that proposers consult technical documentation or instrument experts regarding the instrument capabilities and sensitivities The overheads webpage provides a summary table of all the over heads that should be accounted for A more detailed compu
74. y ESO VM investigators will be encouraged to construct their OBs before arriving on the site using P2PP At the telescope OBs can be created or further modified in real time with the exception of VIMOS MOS and FORS2 MXU mode VM investigators will be required to arrive on Paranal before the start of their observing run as follows 24 hours for UVES and 48 hours for all other instruments On La Silla Visiting Astronomers shall arrive 1 to 2 days before the start of the observations and may leave the site up to 1 to 2 days after the end of their observing run according to the transportation schedule see the La Silla Science Operations page Observers should note that twilight during visitor mode runs is used by the observatory to acquire calibrations and will be given to observers on a best effort basis Note that programmes must be executed as specified and approved at Phase 1 The proposer should prepare a backup alternative programme to be executed in place of the primary programme if the ob serving conditions are not ideal The original science case and goals should be followed Such backup programmes must be approved by ESO prior to the observing run The corresponding requests must be submitted via the web based form available at the Target Instrument Setup Change Request webpage If the conditions prevent the Visiting Astronomer s primary programme to be executed 24 the telescope will be used for the execution of Service Mode obse
75. y scheduled in blocks including several contiguous runs the length of these combined blocks is typically greater than 3 nights 2 On the NTT users can apply for combined runs using both EFOSC2 and SOFI The total duration of each of these runs must be at least three nights The combined runs must be requested using the instrument name SOFOSC Details are also available in the ESOFORM User Manual 3 There is no minimum duration for runs of Calibration Programmes Note that the minimum duration requirement for La Silla is applicable to each individual run of a proposal involving a La Silla instrument see Section 4 for more information about the definition of programme and run More generally proposals for long runs are strongly encouraged on the La Silla telescopes Splitting of runs in half nights e g a 3 night run spread over 6 half nights should be avoided as much as possible as it may be impossible to schedule Pre imaging Pre imaging frames for EFOSC2 will have to be obtained at the beginning of the spectroscopic run The resulting lower efficiency should be taken into account in the computation of the required execution time for the run In some cases pre imaging might be carried out during technical nights by the Observatory technical staff Please contact to check the feasibility of such observations for your pro gram 11 e Chajnantor APEX This telescope is offered in Service Mode only In except
76. yne Fibre Large Array Multi Element Spectrograph First Light Apex Sub millimeter Heterodyne Focal Reducer low dispersion Spectrograph 2 Guaranteed Time Observations High Accuracy Radial velocity Planet Searcher High Acuity Wide field K band Imager Integral Field Spectrograph Infra Red Infra Red Dual Band Imager and Spectrograph Infrared Spectrometer And Array Camera K band Multi Object Spectrograph LArge BOlometer CAmera Laser Guide Star Low Resolution Spectroscopy Long Slit Spectroscopy Local Sidereal Time Multi AperTure mid Infrared SpectroScopic Experiment MID infrared Interferometric instrument Multi Object Spectroscopy Max Planck Institut fiir Radioastronomie Medium Resolution Spectroscopy Multi Unit Spectroscopic Explorer NAOS CONICA New Adaptive Optics Module for Interferometry Nasmyth Adaptive Optics System Natural Guide Star Observation Block Wide Field Imager for the VST at Paranal Observing Programmes Committee Observing Programmes Office P2PP PI PIONIER PWV RA RRM SABOCA SEPIA SHFI SINFONI SM SPHERE SPIFFI STS ToO SD Tl T2 XSHOOTER ZEUS 2 ZIMPOL 31 Phase 2 Proposal Preparation software tool Principal Investigator Precision Integrated Optics Near infrared Imaging ExpeRiment Precipitable Water Vapour Right Ascension Rapid Response Mode Submillimetre APEX BOlometer CAmera Swedish ESO PI receiver for APEX Swedish Heterodyne Facility Instrument Spectrogra

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