Science:

NSF proposal: Stuart discussed various ways we could show some of the
images we have from BIMA SONG.  One option was to overlay moment0 on
top of optical emission - need to redo many of the moment0 from the
tenerife conference b/c the variable clipping level was not
implemented.

Another option discussed was to re-do the moment1 maps on optical/NIR
images.

Finally, a third option was to try and show the 3-d version of the
images - kind that Mike showed at Tucson - maybe show 3 or 4
perspectives.

Stuart would write up something to be sent to everyone for comments
over the weekend.

Even though many of the results are generally accepted
the uniqueness of the survey could be emphasized to make many things
more and more concrete for example:

1) Where do massive stars form ?  Although we know the answer to this
question in the Milky Way and in other Local Group galaxies - what is
the answer in nearby galaxies ?  Since we have \Ha for many of these
guys, could we not look at this question systematically ?

2) Ensemble of galaxies - common properties

3) Is most of the flux recovered in interferometer maps ?  If so what
does this say about the organization of CO? M51 and IC342 spectra look
the same in SD and interferometer - there may be relative flux
calibration offsets that need to be worked upon

4) CO - dust correlation.

Some discussion and debate about the usefulness of azimuthal
averaging.  Stuart will check with Jean to see if we could get a SD
IC342 map.  In the meanwhile we should convolve our IC342 map to a
13-15 arcsec beam to bring up the low lying stuff in the channel maps
 

AAS
----

Tam requested comments on how best to organize all of the simulation
work she has done so far - see her email for details of her results.
Some debate about whether to present this stuff at the AAS or not and
in what detail and in at what level of comparison to IRAM and OVRO.
 

MOSMEM
------

About half the teleconference was spent discussing the effectiveness
or rather the ineffectiveness of the MOSMEM algorithm - Some of us
were surprised at Mike and Michele's simulations which showed how the
addition of SD made the maps so much worse - it has not been true in
experiments with real data such as for M51.  The interferometer maps
were not destroyed! as they seem to be in these simulations.

It was generally agreed that MOSMEM works well the more information
you give it.  It is still quite a black box with lots of knobs and
fine tuners what we don't understand.  Suggestion was made and
generally agreed upon that we use MOSSDI also to deconvovle our data
and if the two (opposing) methods agree we can be more confident of
our results - otherwise we will have to take a much more careful look
at the deconvolution algorithms.

M51 data request
----------------

Remo Tilanus requested the data at 14-15" resolution for a comparison
with SCUBA.  Many on the team are interested in the SCUBA results and
the notion of an exchange was brought up but we also are unsure of the
precedent we are setting since we have turned down other requests for
data.  Stuart will be drafting a proposal for a fair exchange and a
directed use of the data and will pass it to the team for comments and
approval.

Misc
----

Tam asked if there were any suggestions for changes in the upcoming
12m run since the SD usefulness is being challenged by our conclusion
that we are recovering most of the flux in the interferometer maps.

Douglas was curious to know whether the Ekers and Rots prediction
could be tested with our interferometer and SD datasets.
 

Any opinions, findings and conclusions or recomendations expressed in this material are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the views of the National Science Foundation (NSF).