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Chandra      |             CC     XX XX    OO OO          | CXC
Electronic   |            CC       XXX    OO   OO         | Number 53
Bulletin     |             CC     XX XX    OO OO          | September
             |              CCC  XX   XX    OOO           | 2006
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Welcome to the Chandra X-ray Center's Electronic News Bulletin Number 53.

CXC Web site: cxc.harvard.edu

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to let us know.

Please use this website to update your address or email:
          http://cxc.harvard.edu/cdo/udb/userdat.html

Contents:

1.  Corrected HRC-I Gain Map (GMAP) for the first two months of the mission

2.  Education and Public Outreach Supplemental Grants

3.  Chandra Data: Reprocessing III

4.  HEAD Meeting

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Item 1.  Corrected HRC-I Gain Map (GMAP) for the first two months
         of the mission
=================================================================


Corrected HRC-I Gain Map (GMAP) for the first two months of the mission

The HRC-I gain map (GMAP) file in the CalDB applicable for the dates
1998-10-30T00:00:00 through 1999-10-04T12:00:00, which is applicable to
the FIRST two months of the mission, has been found to be in error. The
wrong map is included in filename
$CALDB/data/chandra/hrc/bcf/gain/hrciD1998-10-30gainN0001.fits, which
was released in CalDB 3.2.0, in November of 2005. This is not the gain
file that would have been used in any current or recent processing, and
it has never been used in Reprocessing round 3 (Repro 3). The errant
file has been replaced in CalDB version 3.2.3 as of 10 August 2006, both
in the Standard Processing CalDB, and in the publicly released version.
Any researchers who may have reprocessed HRC-I observations taken before
1999-10-04T12:00:00 UTC with CalDB 3.2.0, 3.2.1, or 3.2.2, would have
selected the errant gain map by default. If you have done this, the
following keyword would have been set in the headers of the resulting
event lists:

GAINCORF =     hrciD1998-10-30gainN0001.fits

Before using the PI column data for any such observations, users must
reprocess with the latest CalDB installed, version 3.2.3. After doing
so, the keyword above will be set as follows:

GAINCORF =     hrciD1998-10-30gainN0002.fits

The PI column is the only portion of the events files that will be
affected by the GMAP. The PI column is useful in quantile color-color
diagrams for the determination of hardness ratios in HRC-I Observations.
For details, refer to the why topic and the HRC-I RMF calibration page.

Users who do not employ the information in the pulse-invariant column in
their analysis are totally unaffected by the errant gain file in any
case.

-- D.E. Graessle
Chandra Calibration Database Manager


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Item 2.  Education and Public Outreach Supplemental Grants
==========================================================

Notifications were sent to all US based PI's whose proposals were accepted
for Chandra Cycle 8 that they are eligible to apply for Education and Public
Outreach Supplemental grants. Please consider applying. The Cycle 8 education
proposal information is accessible from the CXC proposer page. Proposals
are due Oct. 20, 2006.

Kathy Lestition
Education & Outreach Coordinator


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Item 3.  Chandra Data: Reprocessing III
=======================================


  We are currently reprocessing all data from the Chandra mission
  that were obtained prior to 15 November 2005, to make the entire
  archive consistent with the processing software and instrument
  calibrations as they have been used since 15 November 2005.

  Except for a very few observations with data problems, reprocessing
  for the period January 1, 2003 through November 15, 2005 is complete.
  These data products are available now in the archive.

  Currently we are working on the 2002 data and will process backwards in
  time to launch.    We estimate that the reprocessing will be complete
  in 6-12 months.  These remaining data from early in the mission present
  more challenges to processing, making scheduling less certain, so we'll
  keep you posted on our progress.

  A summary of the software and calibration improvements available
  with this reprocessing can be found at:
    http://cxc.harvard.edu/cda/repro3.html

  Reprocessed data can be accessed at:
    http://cda.harvard.edu/chaser

  Reprocessing of specific observations may be checked at:
    http://cxc.harvard.edu/soft/op/op_pst.html

Chandra Data Systems Group


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Item 4.  HEAD Meeting
=====================


The HEAD06 meeting will be held in San Francisco October 4 - 7 , 2006.
The final program is now available and can be found online at :

    http://www.confcon.com/head2006/head06.php

If you are planning to attend and haven't done so, we encourage you to
register online at:

    https://www.confcon.com/head2006/registration.php



Christine Jones


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