March 10, 2011

Call for Observing Proposals: Semester 2011B (Jul. 2011 — Dec. 2011)
Observing proposals for the 188 cm reﬂector∗1 at Okayama Astrophysical Observatory (OAO) areinvited∗2 for the observing season from late July 2011 to late December 2011 (the semester 2011B).
The proposal deadline is 10:00(JST) Apr. 12, 2011.
How to prepare and submit your proposal
There are three categories of observations, namely, “Normal”, “Project” and “Student”. Foreignobservers can apply to only “Normal” observations as principal investigators.
We ask applicants to ﬁll out the application form of three pages and to attach scientiﬁc justiﬁcation.
The scientiﬁc justiﬁcation including ﬁgures, tables and references should not be more than two pages
in length. A template application form and LATEXstyle ﬁle can be downloaded from the English web
page of our observatory (http://www.oao.nao.ac.jp/en/).
A graduate student can be a PI, but the supervisor or the equivalent who is responsible for thestudent should come together for observations.
Since observers are requested to perform their observations mostly by themselves, we ask applicants
who do not speak Japanese and are not familiar with the telescope and instruments, to have a Japanesecollaborator who is familiar with them. When a foreign applicant ﬁnds diﬃculties in ﬁnding a Japanesecollaborator, please contact the observatory (cfp-consult@oao.nao.ac.jp).
The submission of a proposal should be made via e-mail. Please send both of (1) a TEX text
ﬁle of the application form and (2) a PDF ﬁle of the scientiﬁc justiﬁcation (within two pages) toproposal@oao.nao.ac.jp as e-mail attachment ﬁles. We notify you of receiving your proposal via
e-mail (to the e-mail address written in the application form) within two working days. If you
do not receive any response from us for more than two working days, please contact us via e-mail(proposal@oao.nao.ac.jp), telephone or fax (see the numbers below).
∗1: The 188cm reﬂector of the Okayama Astrophysical Observatory is operated by National AstronomicalObservatory of Japan (NAOJ) as a national facility. The telescope is located at 133 350 3800 (E), +34 340 3700 (N)and at an altitude of 372m. The observing sec Z range of the telescope is between 3 and 1. Objects withdeclination < −35.5◦ will never be observed.
∗2: The applicants need to be completely free to publish the whole observational results.

Hideyuki Izumiura
Director
Okayama Astrophysical Observatory,
National Astronomical Observatory of Japan
Contact address:
Okayama Astrophysical Observatory, NAOJ, NINS
3037-5 Honjo, Kamogata, Asakuchi,
Okayama 719-0232, Japan
phone +81-865-44-2155
fax +81-865-44-2360
e-mail: cfp-consult@oao.nao.ac.jp

Status Report for Common User Observations (July 2011 — December 2011)
Okayama Astrophysical Observatory, NAOJ
As of Mar. 10, 2011
∗HIDES (HIgh Dispersion Echelle Spectrograph, observatory instrument):
HIDES is a cross-dispersed echelle spectrograph, placed at the Coude focus of the 188cm reﬂector.
It works at optical wavelengths from 3600Å to 9000Å. The detector is a mosaic of 3 identical CCDs fromEEV with 2048x4100 pixels each(# 1). Read out noises are about 5e− and the gains are 2.5–3 e− /ADUfor the three CCDs. Total read out time is about 40 seconds. Instantaneous wavelength coverages are3750Å and 2340Å with the Red and Blue cross-disperser gratings, respectively. The maximum spectral
resolution (λ/∆λ) of 110,000 is achieved when the slit width is 0.38 arcsec. Details of the mosaic CCD
camera can be found at http://www.oao.nao.ac.jp/~hides/wiki/index.php?Mosaic_CCD_en .
Three optional functions are available for HIDES: iodine cell, image rotator, and oﬀset guider(# 2).
Observers who plan to use these functions should give a description about the usage in the item 16,(16. Requests Concerning Instruments:) of the application form. Note that the iodine cell and theimage rotator cannot be used at the same time. Please feel free to send any questions on HIDES toizumiura@oao.nao.ac.jp.
In addition to the above, we open tentatively the ﬁber-link system that has been developed atOAO for HIDES as a PI-type instrument on a shared-risk basis in this semester. The optical ﬁberlink system for HIDES sends the incident light from the object at the Cassegrain focus of the 188cm
reﬂector through an optical ﬁber to the entrance slit of HIDES. For typical seeing condition observers
can expect 1 magnitude better sensitivity with this system than that with the Coude optical train
hitherto found (# 3). An iodine cell is also available that is prepared for the ﬁber-link system. However,neither an image rotator nor an oﬀset guider is available. Applicants who wish to use the ﬁber-link
system must consult with the PI, Dr. Eiji Kambe (kambe@oao.nao.ac.jp) about their observingplans prior to the submission of the proposals, at least 1 week earlier to the application deadline.
Applications without the PI’s consent will be declined automatically. Also, a description about theuse of the ﬁber-link system should be given in the item 16 (16. Requests Concerning Instruments:) ofthe application form. We also note that any observing time with the ﬁber-link system will be switchedto that with the Coude optical train, if the PI considers it inappropriate to provide the system to theobserving for technical reasons at the observing. Those observers are kindly requested to comply with
the PI’s decision.
# 1: The mosaiced CCD camera was developed under a collaboration between Dr. H. Nakaya (NAOJ)
and OAO.
# 2: The wide-ﬁeld acquisition scope which has been used since semester 2009B does not have any
oﬀset guiding function. The function is available only at the slit viewer.
# 3: The mode we open tentatively for the observing in this semester is the one with a spectral resolving
power (λ/∆λ) of 50,000. With this mode an improved sensitivity of 1 magnitude can be expected in
the wavelength range from 4400 to 7500 Å compared to the one with the Coude optical train hitherto
found. However, there are two known limitations by the current system. One is that the highest
achievable S/N would be around 1500. The other is that the improving factor in the bluer regionis smaller than in the redder region. More information on the ﬁber-link system will be found in thefollowing URL: http://www.oao.nao.ac.jp/~hides/wiki/.
∗ISLE (near-infrared camera and low-dispersion spectrograph, observatory instrument):
ISLE is a near-infrared (1.0−2.5µm) imager and spectrograph for the Cassegrain focus (f/18) of
the 1.88 m telescope at Okayama Astrophysical Observatory (http://www.oao.nao.ac.jp/ isle/). The
detector is a HAWAII Array (HgCdTe 1K × 1K), which covers 4.2 × 4.2 arcmin2 ﬁeld of view witha pixel scale of 0.25 arcsec/pixel. ISLE also provides low to medium resolution (∆λ/λ = 300−4000)
long-slit (4 arcmin long) spectroscopic capabilities using refection gratings. Both imaging mode andspectroscpoy mode are avilable in the semester 2011B.
ISLE is fully open for common-use observations from 2011B. Applicants are no longer requested

to ask for permission by K. Yanagisawa, P.I. of the instrument. All questions related to observations
and proposal preparation should be addressed to yanagi@oao.nao.ac.jp.
∗KOOLS(Kyoto-Okayama Optical Low-dispersion Spectrograph, PI-type instrument):
KOOLS oﬀers two basic observing modes, namely, imaging and long-slit spectroscopy, in optical
wavelength for the OAO 188cm telescope. From 2008A the instrument has been open to common use
as a PI-type instrument on a shared-risk basis. Applicants who want to use the instrument shouldcontact Dr. I. Iwata (ikuru.iwata@nao.ac.jp) prior to the submission of the proposal, at least one
week earlier to the deadline. His admittance is madatory for the proposal submission; any proposal
without his admittance will be declined. Speciﬁcations of the instrument and results of past test
observations are available on the instrument web page (http://www.oao.nao.ac.jp/~kools/).
∗HBS (low-dispersion spectro-polarimeter, PI-type instrument):
HBS is a grating-dispersed spectro-polarimeter (Kawabata et al.1999, PASP, 111, 898) equipped witha commercially available CCD camera, used at the Cassegrain focus of the 188cm reﬂector. It works at3600Å–9000Å. A speciﬁc reduction software for the polarimetric data has been developed by the HBS
instrument group. HBS is available for common user observations as a PI-type instrument. Namely,
if you would like to make observations with HBS, you ﬁrst need to contact the PI of HBS, Dr. Akira
Okazaki (okazaki@edu.gunma-u.ac.jp), prior to the submission of your proposal (at least one weekearlier to the deadline), to make sure you can get supports from the HBS instrument group at theobservations. Their admittance is mandatory for the proposal submission. Any proposals without
their admittance are unacceptable.
Please also see the home page of the observatory for more details of the 188cm reﬂector and theinstruments (http://www.oao.nao.ac.jp/en/).

Notes on the OAO Proposal Application FormThe OAO observing proposal application form is based on LATEX. Please see the observatory webpage (http://www.oao.nao.ac.jp/en/) for general information on open use observations. A proposal
which does not follow the guidelines below may not be considered. If you encounter problems, pleasecontact cfp-consult@oao.nao.ac.jp.
General Instructions:• Download both (1) style ﬁle (oaoprop11a.sty) and (2) template LATEXﬁle (template.tex) fromthe observatory web page .
• Three pages of cover sheet and maximum two pages of scientiﬁc justiﬁcation (including ﬁgures,tables and the reference list) are required for normal program.
• Check if all things in your application form fall within the form. Font size must be larger than
10 pt.
• Do not include ﬁgures or tables from page 1 to 4.
• Send both of (1) a TEX text ﬁle of the application form and (2) a PDF ﬁle of the scientiﬁcjustiﬁcation (within two pages) to proposal@oao.nao.ac.jp as e-mail attachment ﬁles. We will
notify you of receiving your proposal via e-mail (to the e-mail address written in the applicationform) within two working days. If you don’t receive any response from the observatory for morethan two working days after the submission, please contact the observatory (via either e-mail,fax or phone).
• The subject of the e-mail and the ﬁles should be named using the family name of PI and thesemester, e.g.,
einstein_2011b.tex, einstein_2011b_sj.pdf, subject: einstein_2011b.
When you submit two or more proposals, the names of the ﬁles should be like einstein_2011b_1,
einstein_2011b_2, and so on.
• Proposals are reviewed by Time Allocation Committee (TAC) of the observatory (which consists of about six Japanese astronomers outside of the observatory and a few observatory staﬀmembers), based on assessment by anonymous referees.
important: Write the title of your observing program at the beginning of the SJ. On the other
hand, because the names of PIs are concealed from the referees, you should not write
the PI’s name in the Scientific Justification(SJ). You may cite publications by PI or CoIs
in the SJ, if required.
• In SJ you may include colored ﬁgures and tables if necessary. Figures and tables must be clear
and be easy to read for everyone: check whether numbers and axis labels are clear and large
enough. Also, please check the application form and SJ can be correctly printable.
Instructions for ﬁlling out the application form:• 1. Category: Specify “N”(normal) which is the only category allowed for foreign investigators.
• 2. Principal Investigator: Write “Yes” if your proposed observation is planned to be a partof your thesis.
• 5. Collaborators: Write all of your co-investigators’ names, institutions and positions.
• 6. Past Observations: List previous use of the OAO 188cm telescope, if any.
• 8. Supervisor: If PI is a graduate student, the supervisor should ﬁll out entries in section 8.
Also, if the program is accepted, the supervisor must visit observatory along with PI.
• 12. List of Objects: If you have 13 or more target objects, please attach a separate target list
along with the scientiﬁc justiﬁcation.

• 14. Preferred Dates: Please indicate your preferred dates for observations. Three parenthesesin each month indicate ﬁrst, second and last parts of the month, respectively. ’U’s indicate those
periods are unavailable.
Example. Early October and late November are preferred:\PreferredDatesA{\submonth{U}{U}{--}} %Jul{\submonth{--}{--}{--}} % Aug{\submonth{--}{U}{--}} % Sep{\submonth{X}{--}{--}} % Oct{\submonth{--}{--}{X}} % Nov{\submonth{--}{--}{--}} % Dec
Indicate whether you accept shared night observation using Yes / No.
• 15. Requests concerning scheduling: Enter your requests for scheduling, including moonphases.
• 16. Requests concerning instruments: If your observation plan needs special instrument
setting, describe details of the setting and the items to be prepared before the observation dates.
If you need special assistance of the observatory staﬀ, please contact the observatory in advance.
• 17. Technical Description: Describe clearly the technical feasibility (on observations anddata analyses) of your proposed plan.