Tohban
From RHESSI Wiki
Tohban - (org.) japanese (def.) operator; duty officer
Duties
The job of the tohban is to help the spacecraft operators at the the Mission Operation Center (MOC), located in the north end of the second floor of the SSL Addition Building, to optimize the science quality of the observations, and maintain the working order of RHESSI's scientific instruments. Tasks include the following.
Daily
- Monitor solar activity as described here. Then look at the respective data gap files, and check for gaps coincident with the flare times. If such gaps exist, contact an operator and ask to replay the data.
- Record attenuator state changes and decimation state changes, which can be seen in the metadata plots. For obtaining more exact times via IDL, refer to the Tohban Useful Routines page. This is also very useful for imaging spectroscopy. Ideally, each major flare would be mentioned along with any changes in attenuator state or decimation state during that time though this is not required.
- Monitor the SSR fill level. Consult with the RHESSI operator about memory management (possible use of decimation if SSR fill level is too high (>50%).) At times of high activity, it is sometimes necessary to delete data by moving the SSR pointers. Please try to avoid deleting day-before and day-after intervals used for gamma-ray background corrections if this becomes necessary.
- Confirm that the decimation program is appropriate to solar and magnetospheric conditions. The decimation pages give full information about this.
- Communicate if necessary with ground-based observers (e.g. via Max Millennium) with regard to observing campaign activities.
- Keep David Smith informed of shutter program changes.
- Update the Data Gaps log if a pointer adjustment was made.
Weekly
- Survey the mission-long parameter plots to check for interesting trends.
- Run the flare-counting software hsi_tohban_flare_counter as a nucleus of information for the weekly report.
- Write, file, and e-mail the weekly report (see previous Tohban Reports). The e-mail should be addressed to tohban@ssl.berkeley.edu