Third call for MeerKAT observations now open

BY SARAO

Researchers have until noon UTC on 3 May 2022 to apply for up to 100 hours of observation time on the MeerKAT radio telescope.

Principal investigators with any affiliation, including postdocs and PhD students, can apply for imaging projects only. These may not unduly clash with the specific science goals of ongoing large projects listed on the MeerKAT science dashboard.

Proposals will be evaluated on both the merits of the science case (in a dual-anonymous process), as well as the feasibility of the analysis plan.

“Turning large amounts of MeerKAT data into science can be challenging. A proposal with a compelling science case but an unrealistic or unclear data analysis management plan is unlikely to be ranked highly overall,” SARAO explains in the proposal guide.

Since MeerKAT has particular characteristics that may require adaptation during processing when researchers are only familiar with other radio interferometers, SARAO encourages collaboration between new users and those with prior MeerKAT experience.

All approved projects will be scheduled over a one-year period starting in the last third of 2022. Twelve months after the last observation, the visibilities and automatically-produced data cubes, if any, will become freely available through the MeerKAT data archive interface.

Instructions, documentation, and the tools required to prepare and submit proposals are available on the MeerKAT Knowledge Base: https://skaafrica.atlassian.net/wiki/spaces/ESDKB/pages/1496580202/2022+Call+for+Proposals