FOXSI Telecon Summary
By Steven Christe | August 20, 2008
Here is a summary of our last telecon as well as an update about the optics from Brian Ramsey.
-] Ishikawa-san will be visiting SSL/Berkeley next week starting on Monday for the week. An ASIC and interface board will be delivered to SSL and design and testing will begin.
-] A meeting between the Berkeley FOXSI team and Takahashi-san and Tajima-san is organized for the afternoon of Sept 15th at Stanford in order to further discuss detector work.
-] A summary of the FOXSI MIC meeting at Wallops was presented. We’ve found that the FOXSI payload is a fairly simple payload compared to most and there should be little to no problems accommodating our needs. A pdf of the FOXSI MIC presentation is online.
Some concern about the optics versus launch vibrations was expressed by the Wallops team. Testing of the optics is therefore advisable. Vibration loads specifications will be sent to us by the Wallops team. It was also found out that the weight of the optics may not be an issue due to the dynamics of the rocket. It may be best to maintain their current weight though reducing the weight is certainly necessary for a future space-based mission so this problem should not be forgotten.
The Wallops rocket team will now work with us to prepare a rocket plan which will be presented through telecon in about 45 days (around Sept. 29th).
-] We’ve created a google calendar to keep track of the FOXSI schedule. Here is an html link to access it in a browser. To import it into your favorite calendar program use the following links, ICAL or OTHER.
The next FOXSI telecon will take place in about a month. We will send out an email to schedule it.
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An update on the optics from Brian Ramsey:
We are waiting for completion of the mandrel blanks. They are coming back here from a local machine shop for a special stress-relieving heat treatment then go back for a final cut. After that we send them out to another shop in central Alabama for an electroless nickel coating, then back here for diamond turning. All the fixturing for the diamond turning machine is being made at the same time. We had a design review on this fixturing a week ago and the models show us that we shouldn’t have a sag problem which could lead to vibrations in the turned part. We’ve also done some more tests on the machine to check that the head and tail stock are perfectly aligned (we don’t normally turn long, thin parts —- the HERO ones were all ground as they only had straight cone figures — so we had to configure a tail stock specifically for the FOXSI parts). So,this all looks good. Our prescription modeling is nearly finished. Ron has been constructing a global optimization for all 7 shells. He said he will have the data for us next week.
Topics: Work, FOXSI | No Comments »
MIC Meeting Completed!
By Steven Christe | August 19, 2008
The meeting went well! Our powerpoint presentation can be found here. I’ve also put some pictures online.
Topics: Work, FOXSI | No Comments »
FOXSI Telecon
By Steven Christe | July 27, 2008
Here is a summary of our last telecon.
-] The SSL FOXSI team and the Nihon FOXSI team will meet at SLAC the week of the Sept. 15th. Old ASIC boards (as well as detectors?) will be delivered for testing with SSLs prototype FPGA. Interface will remain the same between old and new ASIC.
-] Drawings for optics mandrels have been completed. Modeling of polynomial prescription for optics is ongoing. Results should be sent out soon. Final mandrel prescription must be decided on end of August.
-] Test of new optics alignment system will take place in early september.
-] The next telecon will take place on 18th of August (19th Japan time).
Topics: Work, FOXSI | No Comments »
Clay Shirky: Institutions vs. collaboration
By Steven Christe | July 13, 2008
Interesting TED talk about the new long tail of…collaboration.
Topics: Personal, News | No Comments »
Castle Crag
By Steven Christe | June 23, 2008
Topics: Personal | No Comments »
11-Jun-08 FOXSI Conference Call Summary
By Steven Christe | June 23, 2008
Here is a summary of items which were discussed in this meeting.
1] Terada-san (Yukikatsu) was designated as the main FOXSI-Japan contact (terada at phy.saitama-u.ac.jp).
2] Tajima-san, Hiro (htajima at slac.stanford.edu) & Watanabe-san, Shin (watanabe at astro.isas.jaxa.jp) were designated as the main DSSD ASIC contacts.
3] The project schedule needs to be updated to include a more detailed description of the detector development including but not limited to trips to Berkeley (July or August?) and Japan (???), and final ASIC delivery (Jan 2008?).
4] Descriptions of all available detectors (Si & CdTl) including but not limited to pitch sizes, thickness, energy resolution, number of pixels, power requirements, and test results were requested by the Berkeley team.
5] Preliminary ASIC output specifications were also requested by the Berkeley team so that initial FPGA programming can begin as soon as possible.
6] A Mission Initiation Conference (MIC) has been organized with the NASA Sounding Rocket Team in Wallops, Virginia, on August 15th. The Berkeley team and MSFC team will be attending.
7] FOXSI conference calls will occur approximately once a month (more if needed). Details for the next conference call will be sent out soon.
Topics: Work, FOXSI | No Comments »
New method to access microflare database
By Steven Christe | May 9, 2008
Sam Freeland was kind enough to write a great user-friendly IDL function to access my RHESSI microflare list. It is now part of the SSW library and therefore just a few key presses away for all of us. The function is called ssw_getrhessi_schriste_uflares.pro. No longer is it necessary to “install” the list locally as this function will automatically download whatever it needs through a network connection. The documentation follows.
function ssw_getrhessi_schriste_uflares, t0, t1, refresh=refresh
;
;+
; Name: ssw_getrhessi_schriste_uflares
;
; Purpose: ssw client access to RHESSI microflare dbase by Steven Christe
;
; Description and Credit:
; This microflare list was created by Steven Christe through a
; search of the 6-12 keV count rate. This list is NOT related to
; the official RHESSI flare list (as available in the RHESSI GUI). Please
; see http://sprg.ssl.berkeley.edu/~schriste/?page_id=37 for more
; information.'
;
; Input Parameters:
; t0, t1 - optional time or time range - default=full list
;
; Output:
; function returns structure vector, 1 per event
;
; Calling Examples:
; IDL> uf=ssw_getrhessi_schriste_uflares() ; full list
; IDL> uf=ssw_getrhessi_schriste_uflares(time0, time1) ; all in range
;
; History:
; 16-apr-2008 - S.L.Freeland
; 17-apr-2008 - S.L.Freeland - documentaion/name mods per Steven
Thank you Sam!
Topics: Work, Microflares | No Comments »
Huzzah! Paper Accepted.
By Steven Christe | May 9, 2008
Recently received this email for ApJ:
“Dear Dr. Christe,
I am pleased to tell you that your paper, ApJL # 22648:
Title: Hard X-Rays Associated with Type III Radio Bursts
Authors: S. Christe, S. Krucker, and R. P. Lin
has been accepted for publication in THE ASTROPHYSICAL JOURNAL LETTERS and is being sent to the University of Chicago Press where it will be immediately copyedited and set in page form ready to be published.
Good news indeed.
Topics: Work, Publication | No Comments »
New Nugget: Solar Cycle 24 at hand!
By Steven Christe | May 6, 2008
by Hugh Hudson
The new solar cycle is coming fast and so are the solar conferences! Link
Topics: Work, RHESSI Science Nuggets | No Comments »
New Nugget: Anisotropy of RHESSI hard X-ray emission
By Steven Christe | April 21, 2008
by Jana Kasparova
Should we consider new models for solar flares? A study of emission anisotropy may provide the answer.
Link
Topics: Work, RHESSI Science Nuggets | No Comments »
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