Future of Canadian Radio Astronomy

May 6 - 8, 2019

We are pleased to invite you to the Dominion Radio Astrophysical Observatory near Penticton, British Columbia, Canada, for the Workshop "Future of Canadian Radio Astronomy" to discuss the future of radio astronomy in Canada, in the context of the new Long Range Plan (LRP2020).

Canadian Radio Astronomy: The Next Decade

Radio astronomy is currently undergoing a renaissance, with new technologies opening up wonderful new opportunities, and long-planned facilities finally seeing the light of day. ASKAP, MWA, and MeerKAT are beginning to fulfill their promise, while the signing of the SKA treaty is a major milestone on that decades-long path. The VLA Sky Survey has begun to illustrate the challenges of automated data analysis. ALMA continues to deliver incredible science, while the US NRAO is developing a major proposal to bridge the frequency coverage gap between ALMA and SKA1. Within Canada, CHIME has begun its five-year cosmological mission, papers pour out of CHIME/FRB, and CHIME/pulsar is ramping up for daily observations of all the pulsars in the northern sky. And these are only a sampling of the existing or proposed cm/mm instruments* which will revolutionize astronomy over the next decade.

With such an embarrassment of riches, we must carefully consider our priorities.

  • What is the most exciting science on our horizon? What instruments and resources are needed to get that science done?
  • How can we best leverage our scientific and technical expertise and resources?
  • What is the right balance between international commitment and local experimentation? What should we expect from our investments, in terms of Canadian access to major new instruments?
  • How does this all interact with the LRP process?

We invite you to Penticton this May to discuss these and related issues, and to help plan the future of Canadian radio astronomy.

*For concreteness, this meeting will cover frequencies up to ~120 GHz, to allow discussion of the overlap between and science allowed by SKA and ngVLA at their high end, and ALMA at its low end.

Topics:

  • Time Domain & Non-Imaging Science
    • Fast radio bursts (FRBs)
    • Pulsars
    • Gravitational wave events and direct detection
    • Explosive events
  • Imaging Science
    • Star & planetary system formation
    • Interstellar medium
    • Magnetism
    • Galaxy evolution
    • Active galactic nuclei & compact objects
  • Cosmology
    • CMB
    • Dark energy
    • Reionization
  • Infrastructure & policy issues
    • Data archiving & processing
    • Short- and long-term priorities

Scientific Organizing Committee:

  • Michael Rupen (Chair)
  • Matt Dobbs
  • Bryan Gaensler
  • Gary Hinshaw
  • Samar Safi-Harb
  • Kristine Spekkens
  • Ingrid Stairs

Deadlines:

  • Registration Deadline: April 14, 2019 (or when capacity of 50 is reached). Extended to April 22, 2019.
  • Abstract Submission Deadline: April 14, 2019. The deadline has been extended to April 22, 2019.
  • Hotel Deadline for Conference Rate: April 15, 2019

Registration:

There is no registration fee. This workshop is sponsored by the National Research Council Canada and the Association of Canadian Universities for Research in Astronomy (ACURA).

The registration form is available here.

Abstract Submission:

Please, submit your abstracts by April 14, 2019 here. The deadline has been extended to April 22, 2019.

Local information and Logistics can be found here.

!Attention!

We have been made aware that some of the registrants of our workshop on the future of Canadian radio astronomy have been approached by people claiming to be travel agents who will assist people with making their hotel bookings and flight reservations for this event. This seems to be a common theme for astronomy conferences lately. Those approaches have in some cases been made by email and in others by telephone. Please be advised that this is not a legitimate activity, but appears to be a scam designed to extract your credit card details. Please do not engage with such attempts. I can reassure you that we are not posting any contact details that would facilitate this type of abuse, however, we did have a participants list, which contained names and institutions. I took this page down for now.