The ALMA observatory is pleased to announce that it has entered into Joint Proposal agreements with the Space Telescope Science Institute (STScI) for the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST), the European Southern Observatory (ESO) for the Very Large Telescope (VLT), and the National Radio Astronomy Observatory (NRAO) for the Karl G. Jansky Very Large Array (VLA).

ALMA has resumed performing PI science observations following the cyber-attack. The end-to-end data acquisition and processing workflow and software were successfully re-tested prior to the restart. ALMA is currently taking observations in configuration C-3. User services are also now back online, including access to ALMA user profiles, SnooPI, and the Cycle 9 DDT submission server. As previously announced, ALMA's most compact configurations (C-1 and C-2) will not be visited again in Cycle 9.

Some Scheduling Blocks (SBs) requiring configuration C-2 were already observed in the days prior to the cyberattack. Projects with SBs in nominal configurations C-1 and C-2 that can still be observed in configuration C-3 will remain in the observing queue. As per usual ALMA policy, incomplete Cycle 9 Grade A projects will carry over into Cycle 10.

Following the 6th Netherlands ALMA Science Day, on Friday, 9 December Allegro will host an introductory ALMA Data Reduction Training also at Leiden Observatory. Allegro fellows will introduce CASA and ALMA data reduction techniques, share tips & tricks, and offer extensive hands-on training in data imaging and analysis. Students and postdocs are particularly welcome to attend the training, which will cover both basics and more advanced topics. The registration form will remain open until 2 December 2022.

On October 29, 2022, the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA) suffered a cyber-attack on its computer systems, forcing the suspension of astronomical observations and the public website. This event is under investigation by local authorities.The Computing team quickly isolated the Antennas and Correlator systems and the Science Archive data systems. However, communication and other operational clusters were affected, forcing ALMA to stop all observations. Since then, email communication has been restored safely, along with new collaboration tools that enable the staff to continue their regular work.

The Crisis Management Team has developed a full-recovery plan in consultation with cyber security officers from ESO/NAOJ/NRAO. Our highest priority is to work hard to resume observations before the end of the year.

For its ALMA Regional Centre at the Headquarters in Garching near Munich, Germany, ESO is opening the position of:

ALMA Regional Centre Astronomer

The closing date for receipt of applications to be considered for the position is 10 January, 2023. For more information, please see the full vacancy announcement on the ESO Recruitment Portal website.

CASA is the designated science data analysis package for ALMA. An updated reference paper on this software, which is produced jointly by NRAO, ESO, NAOJ, and JIV-ERIC under the guidance of NRAO, was published this month together with a sister paper on the new VLBI processing capabilities of CASA.

Allegro announces the 6th Netherlands ALMA Science Day, that will take place in person at Leiden Observatory on Thursday, 8 December 2022. At the Science Day, we will highlight the latest scientific results obtained with ALMA by the Netherlands astronomical community. The meeting will also allow ample time to discuss user experiences and other ALMA related topics. Registration for contributed talks is now open (registration form, deadline: 25 November 2022) and we welcome contributions in all science areas.  

ESO is pleased to announce the Call for Proposals for development studies for ALMA upgrades, with a deadline for proposal submission on 24 January 2023 at 20:00 CET. Interested parties are encouraged to visit this page to request the proposal submission package. Studies can cover a wide range of topics. Proposals following the scientific priorities outlined in the ALMA 2030 roadmap are particularly encouraged, such as upgrades of the Intermediate Frequency (IF) bandwidth by a factor up to 4 compared to the current system. Proposals for new advanced data products are also solicited in this call.