LOFAR community readies for sixth Data School

The Netherlands Institute for Radio Astronomy (ASTRON) is gearing up to host the sixth LOFAR Data School as a fully virtual event on 22-26 March 2021.

The aim of the School is to introduce the LOFAR system to new members of the LOFAR community, and present the analysis techniques for processing both interferometric and high time resolution beamformed LOFAR data. While registration is now closed, the slides from the lectures and tutorials will be made available on the School website a couple of weeks after the event, so watch out for them (https://www.astron.nl/lofarschool2021/)!

The programme will comprise lectures and demos covering the many aspects of the LOFAR system, from the capabilities of the basic station hardware to the software pipelines and their science-ready products. These will be presented by members of the LOFAR project team and by staff from the many institutions involved in the collaboration. Attendees will be able to do some hands-on data processing, too.

Around 100 students, postdocs and staff from all over the world will be joining us for the virtual event, but with a large proportion from International LOFAR Telescope (ILT) member countries. As has become the norm for many events now, lectures and demos will take place via Zoom, and Slack will be used as a forum for interaction and networking between the participants and lecturers. The participants will also have the chance to learn about future developments of LOFAR and how the scientific capabilities of the instrument will complement those of SKA-Low in the coming decade.

By Marco Iacobelli (ASTRON)