WIYN 3.5m Observatory

NEID

NEID Frequently Asked Questions

A set of frequently asked questions is available below. An additional set of FAQs is hosted on a separate Penn State site by the NEID instrument team. More details on instrument capabilities and operational modes available there: https://neid.psu.edu/observers-and-proposers-faq/. Note that the FAQs may be updated in the future to include new questions. You may wish to consult the latest FAQs while preparing your proposal.

Who can I contact if I have unanswered questions about NEID and proposals for using NEID?
- You may send email to neid_info@noirlab.edu. Inquiries will be directed to someone who can answer your questions. Additionally, detailed information from the January 2019 AAS splinter session can be found within the NN-Explore NEID pages at https://exoplanets.nasa.gov/internal_resources/1101/.
Since NEID will only be scheduled on about 50% of nights at WIYN, can you provide me with a semester schedule so that I can plan my program?
- The WIYN schedule is determined only after lists of approved programs are returned from all telescope shareholders. It will be published as soon as possible. Proposers who anticipate needing a restrictive set of nights to complete their programs should provide a list of requested nights with a description justifying the need.
How will a proposal submitted in response to this call be handled if it is intended as the start of a multi-semester NEID observing program at WIYN?
- The importance of long-term observations with NEID is recognized. It is reasonable to envision long-term plans for your NEID science programs, but 2020A NEID proposals are for one semester only and will generally need to be re-proposed to continue in future semesters. The NEID queue will attempt to make semester boundaries as seamless as possible for renewed programs.
If my program is awarded time, how will I be able to control how my allocated time is used once the observing semester is underway?
- During Phase 3 you may set targets to be active or inactive (ie. eligible to be observed or not), assign a specific priority to an observation from priority levels of time you are awarded, alter exposure times, and change the timing constraints for when your observations may be scheduled. The state of observation requests is frozen prior to the beginning of an observing night. You may request adding new targets during the semester. There is a long lead time before a requested target may be added (nominally 10 days).
How do I get my target list (text file) into the NOAO Proposal Form?
- While the NOAO Proposal Form webpages may be navigated many ways as you work on your proposal, here is a step-by-step guide for submitting a NEID Queue target list starting from any of the main proposal form pages:
  You should define an observing run for NEID by clicking on the "Observing Runs" button to go to the observing runs page. There, select one observing run for KPNO-WIYN-3.5m and click the "Continue with Run and Instrument Details" button. Select NEIDQ as the Instrument/Detector. Next, enter the number of hours in your time request by converting your time to a floating point number of nights following the instructions on this page. The other values listed in red font will need to be filled in so that your proposal conforms, but their values are not used by the NEID queue, so don't worry about the values. After saving and verifying any new entries on the observing run page, you can select the "Target Tables" button to go to the target table creation page. Under the "Create a New Target Table" section, select your WIYN/NEIDQ run and click the "Create New Table" button below (ignore the section about "Option 1, Option 2"). This will lead you to a target table entry page. Here you can cut and paste your plain text file target tables into the text box or type in targets following the proper format. Save and verify your entry once you finish. If you plan to include more than one target table, you may enter them together or separately. Once you create a LaTeX, postscript or PDF file, you should find your target tables attached.