Chandra Users’ Committee
CXC Manager’s Status Report
For the period October 2010 – September 2011
Edward Mattison
CXC Deputy Manager
13 October 2011
Topics
• Program Management
• Mission Operations
– Spacecraft
– Science Instruments and Calibration
– Mission Planning
– Operations Control Center
• Science Operations
– CXC Data Systems
– Calibration
– Data Processing
• Chandra Director’s Office
– GO Program
– Einstein Program
• Education and Public Outreach
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Top Level Summary
• Spacecraft and instruments are performing superbly
– Safemode in July resulted from increased gravitational torques combined
with timing of spacecraft commands; no hardware problems; fully
recovered
– There are no known spacecraft limitations due to degradation, aging or
consumables that would prevent our meeting Level 1 requirements over
the course of a 20-year mission
• NASA 2012 Senior Review
– Proposal due 1/18/12; in preparation
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Program Management
MSFC Space Systems Programs & Projects Office
Hefner (Prog Mgr)
Baggett (Deputy Prog Mgr)
Chandra X-ray Center Program Office
Tananbaum (Director)
Canizares (MIT)
Brissenden (Mgr) Juda (Flt Dir)
Education & Outreach
Lestition
Director's Office
Wilkes
Grants Award Section
Sozanski
Flight Operations Team
Hurley
Online Operations
Mission Planning & Testing
Spacecraft Engineering
Flight Software
Factory Support Team
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OCC Operations
Eagan
Science
Tananbaum
Facility Systems Team
Integration & Ground
S/W Maintenance
Ground Ops Team
Ops. Science Support
Calibration
Mission Planning
Sci. Data Sys. Planning
IPI Teams
CXC Status Report/CUC
Science Data System
Fabbiano
Systems Engineering
Holmes
Hardware & Systems
Software Development
Test
Archive Operations
Data Processing Operations
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Program Management
• Budget
– CXC is funded through 11/30/11; reduces impact of potential Federal
continuing resolutions
– The CXC’s budget and staffing are consistent with the current NASA
budget plan
– The plan cuts the overall Chandra program 6.8% from FY11–12; affects
entire program; requires for the first time a decrease (5.7%) in the grants
program in FY13, with level funding thereafter (step function decrease)
• Contract
– Provides for baseline period to 9/30/13 with two three-year options to
9/30/16 and 9/30/19
– Expect MSFC to inform us in May 2012 of intent to exercise Option 1
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Program Management
• NASA 2012 Senior Review of operating missions
– Includes Chandra, Hubble, Fermi, Kepler, Planck, Spitzer, Suzaku, Swift,
XMM-Newton
– Call for Proposals issued 8/10/11; proposal due 1/18/12; EPO proposal
due 12/15/11
– Proposal in preparation; Red Team draft planned for early November
• CXC-organized Conferences and Reviews
–
–
–
–
–
–
–
–
10/13/11
Einstein Fellowship Symposium (10/19-20/10)
Chandra Users’ Committee (10/25/10)
ADASS Boston (11/7-10/11)
12 Years of Science with Chandra [Boston AAS meeting] (5/23-25/11)
Peer Review of Chandra proposals (6/21-24/11)
Workshop: Structure in Clusters and Galaxy Groups (7/12-14/11)
X-ray Astronomy School (8/1-5/11)
CIAO workshop (8/6/11)
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Mission Operations
• Spacecraft
– Continues to operate extremely well
– Nominal passages through eclipse seasons
– Safe mode on 7/6/11: First safemode in ~11 years. No hardware problems.
Caused by a combination of increased gravity gradient torques at the
spacecraft’s lower perigee altitudes and timing of scheduled mission
events in the vicinity of perigee. Full recovery to nominal operating
configuration by 7/11/11
• Science Instruments
– Instruments are operating extremely well
– Preparing to uplink ACIS software patch to enable ACIS to automatically
recognize certain kinds of harmful radiation events
– Aspect camera heating during safemode serendipitously annealed some
warm pixels in aspect camera CCD, reducing the number of warm pixels
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Mission Operations
Operations Control Center
– Smooth operations
– Supported safemode recovery with 24/7 operations
– Installed new interface servers and software to adapt to new JPL data
formats and protocols for transmitting DSN data to the OCC
– Upgrading OCC air conditioning system to accommodate increasing heat
loads and equipment aging
• Mission Planning
– 7 load-interrupting TOOs during this period
– Observing efficiency has been increasing due to orbit evolution
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Mission Operations
Observing Efficiency
Observing time has increased due to evolving
orbit
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Mission Operations – Consumables
Momentum Unloading & Propulsion System (MUPS) Fuel Usage
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Mission Operations – Consumables
MUPS Thruster Warm Starts
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Science Operations
• CXC Data System Releases
Version
Date
Main contents
DS 8.3.3
DS 8.3.4
DS 8.3.4.1
DS 8.3.5
DMZ
DS 8.4
DS 8.4.0.1
10/15/10
12/15/10
03/22/11
04/19/11
Operations upgrades
CfP 13 Proposal Planning Support
Support new XVP in Proposal Panel GUI
Proposal web reports update: complete migration to
06/28/11
09/20/11
Annual DS release; add ACIS subpixel to L1 pipeline
ACIS offset patch
• Chandra Source Catalog Releases
Version
Date
Main contents
CAT 3.2.6
10/15/10
CSCview Crossmatch release
CAT 3.2.6.1
02/07/11
Limiting Sensitivity Web Security patch
CSCGoogleEarth 1.2 2/14/11 Relocate images on system disk - syshelp request
CAT 3.2.7
06/28/11
Server upgrade to Sybase 15.5
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Science Operations
• Calibration
– QE loss with LETG/HRC-S at some wavelengths was traced to slowly
decreasing detector gain; plan to raise HRC-S voltage and recalibrate
– Updated LETG higher order diffraction efficiencies (m=2-10) and
LETG/HRC-S effective area
– 7 calibration database (CalDB) releases in the reporting period
• Data Processing
– Automatic processing is current; mean time from end of observation to
delivery to user remains at about one day
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Science Operations
Data Delivery
As of middle of following month
Number
Month of Obs
Sep-10
Oct-10
Nov-10
Dec-10
Jan-11
Feb-11
Mar-11
Apr-11
May-11
Jun-11
Jul-11
Aug-11
67
78
85
60
78
74
70
74
46
64
46
51
Days to Data
Delivery
Min Avg Max
0
1
8
0
1
12
0
1
9
0
1
7
0
1
4
0
1
4
0
1
10
0
1
6
0
1
10
0
1
12
0
1
12
0
1
15
As of 9/13/11
Number Number Number
Number
Deliv Outstanding Deliv Outstanding
67
78
85
60
78
74
70
74
46
64
46
51
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
67
78
85
60
78
74
70
74
46
64
46
51
Comments
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
Avg data delivery ~1 day from observation
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Chandra Director’s Office
• General Observer Program – Cycle 13
– Proposal deadline 3/15/11; 664 proposals received; 5.4x time oversubscription
– Includes X-ray Visionary Projects (major programs, 1–6 Msec, up to 3 cycles)
– Peer review 6/20-24/11; 664 proposals submitted, 199 approved for 26 Msec,
including 4 XVP projects totaling 8 Msec
– ~6 Msec more observing time than earlier in mission, due to orbit evolution
– Target list posted 7/15; early observations began in July
• Einstein Fellowship Program
– 2010 Einstein Fellowship Symposium held at CfA, Oct 2010
– 178 applicants for 2011 Einstein Fellowship competition; 10 selected to
start this fall
– 2011 Fellowship Symposium to be held at GSFC, 10/25-26/11
– 2012 application deadline 11/3/11; expect to award 11 fellowships
– Considering abolishing the one-Fellow-per-host institution limit
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Chandra Director’s Office
Grant Awards
Month of
Data
Delivery
SAO Grants (2)
Federal
Grants
(1,3)
As of middl e of following month
Oct-10
Nov-10
1
0
Non-Federal
Grants (3)
13
20
Dec-10
Jan-11
Feb-11
Mar-11
Apr-11
May-11
Jun-11
Jul-11
Aug-11
0
17
0
1
1
1
0
1
2
21
53
16
15
8
15
14
7
8
(1)
(2)
(3)
(4)
(5)
No. Gra nts
Awarded
12
20
16
41
9
12
7
13
13
7
7
No.
Outstanding
1
0
5
12
7
3
1
2
1
0
1
As of 9/14/11
Avg days to
award (4)
42
54
20
33
14
14
18
8
11
16
21
No. Gra nts
Awarded
13
20
21
53
16
15
8
15
14
7
8
No.
Outstanding Awards
Outstanding
Proposal no, Comments
0
See note (5)
0
See note (5)
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
0
Grants awarded to scientists at Federal institutions as interagency transfers through MSFC.
Grants awarded to scientists at non-Federal institutions through SAO Contracts and Grants Department.
Number of gr ants eligible for award, for which data were delivered to the observer in the month.
Average days from data delivery to grant award to observer.
In October and November 2010, the average days to award is high because cycle 12 awards were being issued as funds became available.
Grants are typically awarded within ~2-3 weeks of observation
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Education and Public Outreach
Highlights
•
Press
– 2 televised NASA News Conferences (SN1979c; Chandra Deep Field S)
– 15 science press releases, 16 image releases, 2 non-science releases
•
Web, Digital, Social Media
– Added Smartphone apps and Twitter feeds to social media presence
– 3 presentations at AstroViz workshop on astronomical visualization, 3 at ADASS
•
Public Outreach
– Participated in NYC World Science Fair, Astronomy Night on the Mall, NASA’s
Music Under the Stars (Tanglewood, Newport)
– Received 2 grants ($600k, 2 yrs) for public outreach projects from NASA’s
“Education and Public Outreach for Earth and Space Science” program
•
Education
– 17 events at National Science Teachers Association meetings
– Invited talk at American Association of Physics Teachers meeting, 3 at
Astronomical Society of the Pacific meeting
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