STAR Logo

STAR Newsletter #78

February 2001
Star Home Page
Editor: Howard Matis

Contents

  1. Spokesman's Column
  2. STAR Operations
  3. Detectors and Subsystems
  4. Period Coordinators Report
  5. Physics Working Groups (protected area)
  6. People: Comings and Goings
  7. Announcements
  8. Employment Opportunities

Spokesman's Column (John Harris)

I wish to thank the STAR group at UT-Austin for hosting the recent STAR Collaboration Meeting. I have only heard good comments about the logistics surrounding the meeting. I would also like to say that it was a pleasure to finally have a STAR collaboration meeting which was dominated by discussion of the data and physics from STAR. There was so much activity and discussion that it seemed that there just was not enough time for everything.

I would like to propose that we have a STAR Physics Analysis Meeting in April right after (as part of) MDC4. The plans for this meeting will be finalized in the next few weeks. I expect that it will be either the week of April 23 or April 30, probably at BNL. I will send an email to the STAR mailing list once the dates are fixed.

As I have stated to the collaboration in electronic mail, the Quark Matter Conference was extremely exciting, and the STAR data and presentations were a central part of that excitement. I again wish to congratulate everyone in STAR for there contributions to all the various, necessary aspects of STAR which have made our successful presentation of data possible.

Now that we have completed our long push to finalize data for presentation at Quark Matter, we must now turn to writing up the data for journal publication and for the Quark Matter Proceedings. In the optimal case, both would go hand-in-hand. However, I expect that the Quark Matter Proceedings submission will be forced upon us prior to our readiness for separate journal submission of the various sets of data. With this in mind, I have discussed with most of the Physics Working Group Convenors plans for developing papers for journal publication. Further detailed discussion of our march to publication is/should be presently taking place in the PWG Meetings.

On Thursday at the end of the Collaboration Meeting in Austin, the STAR Council met for business. A summary of actions is listed below:

  1. The Council accepted the Long Range Plan Report that was developed by the Long Range Plan Task Force. To obtain this report go to the web.

  2. The Council voted to accept the Graduate Student Thesis Committee Report, which can be found on the web. Associated with this is the development and maintenance of a graduate student list. This list is being placed on the web and should be available soon under "graduate students" from the Table of Contents. Information on graduate students active in STAR is the responsibility of graduate student thesis advisors. All graduate students are advised to check the information on the list and notify your advisor of any information which requires updating. Liz Mogavero maintains the list and expects updates from thesis advisors.

  3. The Council discussed the STAR publication process as detailed in the STAR Publication Policies (on web) and as experienced thus far with two publications submitted for publication. The general feeling in the Council is that the process is working. There was also some discussion of the RHIC notification policy, which is presently in flux. The present proposal from BNL is that, as a statement of intention to publish, a collaboration must submit a title and abstract to BNL and the other RHIC Collaborations one week prior to journal submission.

  4. The Council discussed STAR authorship policies, as stated in the STAR Publication Policies. There was some discussion on the one year active participation in STAR as a requirement for being on a publication, especially for those members in temporary positions. This issue is presently being considered and discussed in the Council.

  5. The Talks Committee Chair, Jack Sandweiss, presented the experience thus far in the Talks Committee. A primary issue of concern is the paucity of feedback to requests for speakers' names. As a solution, the Talks Committee will solicit from both the Council and Physics Working Group Convenors the names of potential speakers for consideration. There were comments by junior members of the Council that the Junior Members were pleased with their representation in the talks at Quark Matter.

  6. A request to join STAR by the Indian groups involved in the Photon Multiplicity Detector (PMD) Proposal was discussed. The next step is for STAR to submit the revised PMD proposal, received just after the Council meeting, to BNL for final approval. In the meantime, the Council will consider the request to join STAR.

  7. No Junior Member issues were raised for discussion in the Council.

  8. A status report was presented by Barbara Erazmus regarding progress on the Silicon Strip Detector. The SSD project has undergone a high level review in France. The review committee has found that the SSD Project is progressing well, that all technical hurdles have been met, and that the project is ready to enter into production. It was also pointed out that a source for the final $300K necessary to complete the SSD in STAR must be identified quickly so as to avoid disruption of the production schedule.

  9. The need for collaboration involvement on STAR software and especially the tracking to integrate the SVT was discussed. With respect to a plan for developing a new approach and new code for integrated tracking, the question of the cost vs benefit was raised and will be investigated.

  10. The spokesperson pointed out the fact that Ultra-Peripheral Collision Physics is an active part of the STAR Physics Program, and that there are opportunities for new involvement (including graduate student theses) in this undermanned group.

  11. The Council stated that it was favorable toward having a STAR Collaboration Meeting in Nantes, France, prior to the next Quark Matter Conference which will be held in Nantes in July 2002.

  12. There was a discussion about the formal process of appointment of the spokesperson and how the bylaws might be changed to define a policy for this process. S. Vigdor has agreed to chair a Council sub-committee to make a recommendation on how to proceed.

STAR Operations (Ralph Brown)

I am pleased to report that we are meeting the goals of our shutdown schedule to-date despite the cold and snowy weather here in the Northeast. As of this report (January 12), we have 5 BEMC modules remaining for fiber bundle installation. This should be completed, as per schedule, on Friday 1/19. This will conclude for this shutdown the installation, with fiber, of 24 BEMC modules. We now await the delivery, for installation, of BEMC PMT boxes, SMD electronics, and FEE electronics. On Monday 1/22 we will remove the BEMC installation fixture from the west side of the detector and re-install the cable trays and cables on the upper west side, which should be completed by Wednesday 1/24.

On Thursday 1/25 we will erect the WEST side FTPC installation platform and remove and store the West FTPC by EOB on Friday 1/26.

The SVT installation of RDO boxes and cables will take place the week of 1/29; and the start of SVT installation, with the removal of the cone, will begin on Monday 2/5, as per schedule.

For the EEMC, we have received the drill fixture and await plans for incorporating mounting holes in the face of the West Pole Tip. This needs to be completed before the detector rolls into the WAH in early March.

For the PMD, we will be installing on the WAH East wall the mounting plates that will support the PMD and its support structure. This work begins next week on Wednesday 1/17 and should be completed by mid-February.

For the TOF, we will begin next week the task of installing two new electronics racks on the South platform along with all service utilities. We hope to have these racks available to Bill Llope when he arrives at STAR with the TOF detector in late January.

We will be completing the installation of additional phones along with power, voice/data to the Shift leader console in the STAR Control Room before the end of February. This will complete the upgrade to the control room and allow time for subsystems to bring their control systems online.

Lastly, we are in the midst of upgrading the STSG server and have had problems over the last two weeks keeping our web site running. I apologize to all that have been inconvenienced by this and I hope along with you that this frustration will soon end. In the near term if you need to access any documentation from us please contact Penka Novakova for assistance.

Detectors and Subsystems

  • FTPC (from Volker Eckardt)

    • The system test with the first FTPC inside the STAR detector was successfully completed. After identifying the last little leaks in the gas lines an oxygen content of < 10 ppm at a gas flow of 50 l/h in purge mode was obtained and with proper grounding the electronic noise is < 1 ADC count. Anode and drift voltages were controlled and monitored by Slow Control. Using the laser system, trigger and the complete DAQ all 15 laser tracks were recorded and could be seen on the pad monitor. Now the chamber is removed to allow the SVT installation. The testing of the second FTPC in the tent is still under way. The laser distribution system is installed and beams are adjusted. The needed gas quality (< 10 ppm O2) is reached and after RDO board installation the final testing with laser beams can commence.

  • EMC Endcap (from Will Jacobs)

    • Initial fiber material has arrived, the custom EEMC connector molds have been built, and production style connectors are currently being fibered with mirrored WLS at MSU for tests. Production megatile scintillator from Kuraray will be shipped in 2 weeks. Fabrication of other components for the megatile production line, e.g., aluminum "envelopes" (Dubna) and "leaky" fibers (IUCF) is underway. The first bulk shipments of tower tubes has arrived from ETL for burn-in and characterization.

    Intensive engineering efforts have continued and final drawings produced for the radiator stainless steel (intricate patterns out for bid) and lead pieces (under negotiation with Vulcan Lead). These components and other structural stainless steel pieces will be assembled and laminated on a precision gluing table and jig presently going out for bid. A final drawing review for the large Endcap backplate and hub structural pieces should take place in March, all final FEA calculations and details now being under control.

    A full scale mechanical assembly of a Shower Maximum Detector module, made from the triangularly shaped production mode extruded scintillator strips, is being laminated at ANL; final active assemblies will be constructed and tested for pre-production review in March.

    The EEMC prototype detector, with production style SMD strips, Bicron preshower scintillator layers with two fiber readout, and final ETL tower tubes with pre-production high voltage CW base system, was successfully tested in beam at SLAC (January, 2001) with few particle/burst of 5-20 GeV electrons.

    Last week Ralph announced that work has begun on drilling the holes in the STAR west poletip to be used in the Endcap mounting scheme.

  • EMC (Jose Riso)

    • On January 19, the clear fiber connections for modules 1 through 9 and for modules 47 through 60 have been completed on schedule. I want to emphasize that the success has been possible thanks to the high efficiency of the routing team and the excellent support of Ralph and his team. The plan for the near future the installation of 6 PMT's boxes, following with a period of connection and testing.

    All six PMT's boxes has been tested at STAR to verify the survival of the PMT's after transportation. As there was no damage, the boxes were mounted to the flux return bars. As of February 5, almost all the bundles coming from the towers have been connected to the PMT's. The post mounting test is in progress.

    Period Coordinator Reports

    Physics Working Groups

    This section contains summaries of the status of the physics working groups. These articles are in a protected area for STAR collaboration members only. This link uses the standard STAR account and password for physics results. If you do not have this information, please contact your council representative.

    People

    Announcements

    I have assembled all of the talks and most of the posters to Quark Matter 2001. You can find them by going to the STAR conference page or going directly to the listing of all of the talks.

    Employment Opportunities

    Return to the Newsletter Index - Last Modified: Tuesday, February 6, 2001