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Chandra      |             CC     XX XX    OO OO          | CXC
Electronic   |            CC       XXX    OO   OO         | Number 29
Bulletin     |             CC     XX XX    OO OO          | July
             |              CCC  XX   XX    OOO           | 2004
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Welcome to the Chandra X-ray Center's Electronic News Bulletin Number 29.

CXC Web site: cxc.harvard.edu

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to let us know.  

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Contents:

1. ACIS Bakeout Postponed 
   
2. Chandra Cycle 6 EPO Proposals
 
3. Newsworthy Results at the HEAD Meeting?

4. Chandra's 5th Anniversary

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Item 1. ACIS Bakeout Postponed 
        ======================


The Chandra project has decided to postpone indefinitely the bakeout
of the ACIS instrument in September, 2004.  The purpose of the bakeout 
is to remove much or most of the contaminant believed to be present on 
the ACIS optical blocking filter (OBF). The major effect of the contaminant 
is to reduce the ACIS effective area at lower energies. There are two reasons 
for the delay.  The proposed bakeout intended to use additional heaters on
the Science Instrument Module (SIM) to heat the ACIS aperture in the
SIM and the top of the ACIS collimator to improve the effectiveness of
the bakeout.  A safety review of the use of these heaters revealed a 
concern that the heaters may not work as expected and may pose a
threat to the other heaters on that circuit.  The heaters in
question were designed to be used on the first day of the mission in
case the shuttle needed to return to earth with Chandra in the payload
bay.  They  have not been used since the first day of the mission.
But some of the other heaters on the circuit are used during
normal operations.  Second, further analysis of the rate at which the 
contaminant(s) have built up in the centers and edges of the OBFs 
indicates that the contaminant(s) might be less volatile than what 
was assumed in the simulations of the bakeout.  Further analysis is 
planned to investigate this suggestion.

The Chandra project will continue to investigate the feasibility of
a bakeout of the ACIS instrument.  At this time it is impossible to
predict if this effort will result in a decision to bakeout the
instrument.

Paul Plucinsky 

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Item 2. Chandra Cycle 6 EPO Proposals
        =============================


All US PI's who were awarded Chandra research grants as a result of the Cycle 6
Scientific Peer Review have received a letter inviting them to submit a 
supplemental education proposal. We urge all PI's to consider submitting 
an education proposal.

Additional information and proposal submission software can be found at: 
http://chandra.harvard.edu/edu/proposals/epo.html

Kathleen Lestition
CXC EPO Coordinator

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Item 3. NEWSWORTHY RESULTS AT THE HEAD MEETING? 
        =======================================

As is the practice with all major meetings, the Press Office will be
selecting a small number of results to pursue as press releases or press
conferences at the upcoming HEAD meeting in New Orleans.  If you have an
interesting result that perhaps was not spelled out in your abstract,
then please let us know.  There is no guarantee that we can fit your
finding into the limited publicity slots we have available.  However, if
there is sufficient newsworthiness to your results, the Press Office
will work to publicize results at an appropriate future point.  Please
contact Megan Watzke at mwatzke@cfa.harvard.edu or 617-496-7998 as soon
as possible if this applies.

As a reminder, please contact Megan or Peter Edmonds
(pedmonds@cfa.harvard.edu; 617-496-1917) at any point for "big" results to
be considered for a Space Science Update at NASA HQ.  It is best to do
this prior to submission to a journal -- especially when the paper will
go to Science or Nature.

Megan Watzke


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Item 4. Chandra's 5th Anniversary 
        =========================


July 23 was the 5th Anniversary of Chandra's  Launch. What an 
exciting and discovery-filled five years it has been!
The mission, as we know, has been extended for another 5 years and perhaps
beyond that. It is truly a GREAT OBSERVATORY!
Congratulations to the local team and to the whole Chandra community 
who have all made Chandra a great success.                       

Harvey Tananbaum 




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