Paper
13 December 2020 The Gemini Observatory International Time Allocation Committee (ITAC) process
M. Lemoine-Busserolle, J. Miller, A. J. Adamson, B. Cooper
Author Affiliations +
Abstract
The Gemini Observatory, a program of NSF’s NOIRLab, provides the astronomical communities in five participant countries with state-of-the-art astronomical facilities that allocate observing time in proportion to each country's contribution. In this paper we present an overview of the Gemini International Time Allocation Committee (ITAC) process whose purpose is to merge the successful proposals to create a single combined list of programs for execution on the two Gemini telescopes. The process of merging the successful programs from the National Time Allocation Committee (NTAC) is a complex process with many variables and considerations. This paper describes in detail the how-to (at the time of writing) of the main goals of the process, which are fairness and efficiency; ensuring that the telescopes are being used efficiently, and are never sitting idle when they could be executing a program of interest for one of the participants, as well as the users from the communities are not wasting time writing filler proposals that will never get executed. The success of this process is measured in executing the maximum number of highly ranked scientific programs within these constraints.
© (2020) COPYRIGHT Society of Photo-Optical Instrumentation Engineers (SPIE). Downloading of the abstract is permitted for personal use only.
M. Lemoine-Busserolle, J. Miller, A. J. Adamson, and B. Cooper "The Gemini Observatory International Time Allocation Committee (ITAC) process", Proc. SPIE 11449, Observatory Operations: Strategies, Processes, and Systems VIII, 114491A (13 December 2020); https://doi.org/10.1117/12.2563221
Advertisement
Advertisement
RIGHTS & PERMISSIONS
Get copyright permission  Get copyright permission on Copyright Marketplace
KEYWORDS
Gemini Observatory

Telescopes

Observatories

Planets

RELATED CONTENT

UKIRT under new management: status and plans
Proceedings of SPIE (July 06 2018)
GPI 2.0: upgrading the Gemini Planet Imager
Proceedings of SPIE (December 13 2020)
A low cost high frequency DIMM platform for the Hobby...
Proceedings of SPIE (September 28 2004)
Extending the Echidna concept a proposal for a 2000+...
Proceedings of SPIE (December 24 2002)

Back to Top