Forthcoming Projects Peer Review Panel (PPRP) meeting
6 Jun 2014 04:34 PM
The next meeting of the Projects Peer Review
Panel (PPRP) will take place in Seminar One Lecture Theatre at Cosener’s
House, Abbey Close, Abingdon, Oxfordshire,OX14 3JD on the 15th and 16th July
2014.
The
Panel will be reviewing 4 large project proposals.
Members of the science community should email Tahmina
Aziz or telephone 01793 442058 if they are likely to attend the open
presentation.
The
proposals being reviewed are as follows:
15th July 2014
10.00 – 11.30 – Long Baseline
Neutrino Oscillation Experiments
The
UK neutrino community outlined a proposed strategy for the participation in the
next generation neutrino oscillation experiments focussed on three separate
proposals for LBNE and Hyper-K and a smaller R&D proposal for the CHIPS
concept.
The
LBNE experiment is designed to discover CP violation for neutrinos. A powerful
beam of neutrinos will be fired 1300 km from Fermilab, near Chicago, towards a
huge underground detector in South Dakota. This underground detector will
contain 50,000 tons of liquid argon at a temperature of 87 K (-186 degree
Celsius).
Hyper-Kamiokande (HK), is a next generation,
multi-purpose, underground Water Cherenkov detector that will provide
hyper-sensitivity for the observation of CP-violation as well as extending the
search for proton decays, allowing a detailed study of atmospheric neutrinos
(permitting the measurement of the neutrino mass hierarchy), and studies of
neutrinos from astronomical origins. Precision measurements of solar neutrinos,
observation of solar flares, neutrino geophysics are also included in the
physics portfolio of the experiment. The UK effort is targeting strategic areas
that exploit current expertise and ensure prominent roles within the
experiment.
The
CHIPS (Cherenkov detectors In PitS) concept will provide a way to utilize a
naturally occurring body of water together with a neutrino beam, to provide an
affordable, precision neutrino detector. It will comprise of a light-tight,
water-tight PVC bag, filled with pure water, supported by a simple tubular
frame and submerged in a deep lake. The lake water will provide the necessary
mechanical support and serve as an overburden to shield the detector from
cosmic rays. The Photomultiplier tubes (PMTs) mounted on the inside of the
frame will detect the Cherenkov light.
11.30 – 14.30 - The Panel goes into closed
session.
14.30 – 15.30 - Capitalising on UK
Investment in JCMT by taking a minor partner role in operations post
Sept-2014
This consortium proposes that the UK continue to take a
significant (up to 25%) role in the scientific exploitation of the James Clerk
Maxwell telescope (JCMT) from 2015, when STFC has transferred ownership to the
University of Hawaii and operations are provided by a new consortium, expected
to include institutions from Korea, Taiwan, Japan, China and
Canada.
The
Panel goes into closed session for the rest of the day.
16th July 2014
09.30 – 10.45 – UK Programme
for the European Extremely Large Telescope
The
European Extremely Large Telescope (E-ELT) project aims to provide European
astronomers with the largest optical-infrared telescope in the world. This
proposal contributes to the instrumentation programme for obtaining scientific,
technical and industrial return on this investment.
The
current proposal is for a ten year programme to lead the building of the first
light instrument HARMONI and to take part in the build phase of the third
instrument, METIS, and for a four year programme to pave the way to contribute
to the adaptive optics systems and the next instruments through two further
Phase A studies (MOS and HIRES), continuation of the R&D programme, and
leadership of the coordinated programme through the Project
Office.
10.45 – 13.30 The Panel goes into closed
session.
13.30 – 14.30 – DESI: The Dark
Energy Spectroscopic Instrument.
DESI is an experiment that grew from the merger of the
BigBOSS and DESpec Studies. The Dark Energy Spectroscopic Instrument (DESI) is
a multiplexed fibre-fed spectrograph placed on the Mayall telescope. DESI will
obtain spectra and redshifts for at least 18 million emission-line galaxies, 4
million luminous red galaxies and 3 million quasi-stellar
objects.
The
proponents propose that a core group of UK scientists with relevant technical
and scientific expertise to join the DESI collaboration and take a leading role
in this experiment, using a similar strategy to that adopted to join the Dark
Energy Survey (DES) project. DES will make complementary measurements to DESI,
based on imaging data and photometric redshifts.
The
Panel goes into closed session for the rest of the day.