OPTICON The Optical Infrared Co-ordination Network for Astronomy. Overview and Status Report. John Davies OPTICON Project Scientist. UK Astronomy Technology Centre (UKATC) Royal Observatory, Edinburgh

OPTICON is an Integrated Infrastructure Initiative (I3) funded by the FP6 programme. Networking via working groups similar to the FP5 OPTICON network. Transnational access to Night-time and solar telescopes (combining activities such as COMET and FP5 ENO) Joint Research Projects in Technology

Five year contract for 19,200,000 Euro + substantial national matching funds starting 1 January JRA’s approved (~11 Me + extra national funds) 22 Telescope network approved. (~5.5Me) Most networking activities endorsed after some consolidation (~3 Me incl Management) The Contract

Management OPTICON Board (18 partners) sets overall strategy and priorities at annual meeting. Oversight committee (~9 agencies) make the detailed decisions, especially about finance, ~ 6 monthly. Cambridge (Gerry Gilmore) is co-ordinator and finance office. Project Office (John Davies, UKATC) supports board, runs some networks, attends board, proposes budgets etc Access Office (Jesus Burgos, IAC) runs telescope grants JRA’s and some networks have internal management

Executive Board Chair. Prof Gerry Gilmore Members: ESO, France (INSU), Germany (MPG/MPIA), Italy (INAF), Netherlands (NOVA), UK (PPARC), Spain (IAC), NOTSA. + 2 observers (Presently Switzerland and the European Astronomy Society)

OPTICON I3 Networking N2: Structuring the ENO (ORM + Izana) N3:Structuring European Astronomy (J.Davies). This includes ELT science working group (Hook), AVO/Interoperability (Quinn), HTRA (Spruit), NUVA (Gomez de Castro), Key Technologies (Cunningham), Future Astronomical Software Environments (Grosbol) N4:Fellowships and large projects (J-LPuget/M. Kessler) N5: Interferometry working group (A. Quirrenbach, Andrzej Niedzielski, Romain Petrov, Jean Surdej) N6: Telescope Directors Forum (J.Davies), Access Office, NEON Research Enhancement (M. Dennefeld, IAP) Round tables with Radionet, ALMA, NGST etc_

Networking Events and Plans NUVA meeting in Madrid September Book on future of UV Astronomy to appear late 2005 Key Technology Working Group meeting, Grenoble, 13 October 2004 ELT Meeting in Florence, Nov , ELT science case glossy published Spring Full Science case to be distributed this week.

Telescope Directors Meeting, France, Nov Strategic plan to be developed at Sept 05 meeting Software Environment Meeting, ESO, 4 Dec 2004 and June Specification document for a future software environment being written. Interferometry Network has established EII, Fizeau Exchange visitor programme, 2 calls/year.

Research Enhancement Meeting, Padua, June High Time Resolution Conference to take place in Edinburgh, Spring Site testing, Laser Guide Star Traffic system and outreach at ORM and OT. Many of these meetings are open, travel support is possible. Look on our website for more details

The Telescope Network Anglo Australian Observatory3.5m Telescope Anglo Australian ObservatorySchmidt Telescope Centro Astronomico Hispano Aleman3.5m Telescope Centro Astronomico Hispano Aleman2.2m Telescope Canada France Hawaii Telescope3.5m Telescope La Silla3.6m Telescope La Silla3.5m Telescope La Silla2.2m Telescope Isaac Newton Group4.2m Telescope Isaac Newton Group2.5m Telescope UK Infrared Telescope3.8m Telescope TNG3.5m Telescope Nordic Optical Telescope2.5m Telescope Aristarchos2.5m Telescope Observatoire Haute Provence1.9m Telescope Telescope Bernard Lyot2m Telescope Telescopio Carlos Sancez1.52m Telescope THEMISSolar Telescope Swedish Solar TelescopeSolar Telescope Vacuum Tower TelescopeSolar Telescope Liverpool Telescope2m Telescope Dutch Open TelescopeSolar Telescope

OPTICON and network telescopes will publicise their availability to non-national users. Same peer review committee, same standards (no special OPTICON TAC). Successful qualifying applicants will get travel support. Telescopes receive audited ‘user fee’ Access Programme

Joint Research Projects JRA1: Adaptive Optics. (Norbert Hubin, ESO) : AO for existing 8m such as VLT, GTC, LBT. JRA2: Fast Detectors for AO ( Phillipe Feautrier, F) : Contract placed for detector JRA3: Optical Detectors for HTRA ( henk Spruit, D) : EMCCD’s for practical test bench, APD arrays, PN Sensors

JRA4: Interferometry (Alain Chelli, F): Next generation instruments for VLTI. 8 concepts being refined to a few phase A’s. Parallel meeting here at JENAM. JRA5: Smart Focal Planes (Colin Cunningham, UK): Micropositioners etc. Design concepts to be choosen late 05 to develop prototypes from JRA6:VPH Gratings (Phillipo Zerbi, I): Prototype gratings in production

JRA activities Details of each JRA is linked from the OPTICON web page In general they are not open to new partners as the contract is signed However, several of them have associated network activities to provide science input.

I3 Forum A collaboration of all I3s to provide a common point of view to the commission.

Forwards to FP7. FP7 proposal from the commission larger and longer than FP6. Similar thematic areas to FP6 for top down funding but precise budget and details of instruments still to be defined once EU budget for is clarified. Possible support for large infrastructures.

Conclusion OPTICON has made real progress in co-ordination of Optical/IR astronomy All networks are open to new members A wide range of EU optical-IR-night-solar telescopes are wide open for new users Possibility to use these telescopes for teaching schemes (eg NEON- Dennefeld) The Future for European Collaboration is bright.

Contacts WWW Phone Handouts, ELT brochure, overview paper etc can be downloaded from the web page.