Town Hall Meetings in 2018: March 16-17, 2018 in Cambridge, MA and April 12-13, 2018 in Amsterdam, Netherlands

A message from the LIGO and Virgo spokespersons

Dear Colleague,

The LIGO-Virgo Collaborations will transition to Open, Public Alerts (OPA) for gravitational-wave (transient) event detections starting with the next observing run of the instruments later in 2018. Such OPAs will enable the entire physics and astronomy community in the pursuit of multi-messenger observations of gravitational-wave sources and maximize the science reach of the gravitational-wave instruments. These OPAs are also in line with what the Collaborations have planned with and communicated to the broader science community over the years:

https://dcc.ligo.org/LIGO-M1000066-v25/public

In anticipation of the OPA era expected to start in late 2018 and with the beginning of the third observing run of LIGO-Virgo, we invite the physics and astronomy community interested in the multi-messenger aspects of the science with gravitational waves to join a new "open forum". Unlike the membership structure based on Memoranda of Understanding (MoU) that has been in place for the past LIGO-Virgo observing runs, the new Open LV-EM forum has no MoU requirements for joining or for participation. It is intended to facilitate the free exchange of information and ideas among gravitational-wave, electromagnetic and other (e.g., neutrino) astronomers. You will find details on how to connect and become involved in this web page:

https://gw-astronomy.org/wiki/OpenLVEM#Get_started

Additionally, we would like to invite the entire community interested in the multi-messenger science enabled by the OPAs provided by LIGO-Virgo to two Town Hall meetings. The first meeting with be in the US and in Cambridge, Massachusetts March 16-17, 2018 and the second one will be in Europe in Amsterdam, Netherlands April 12-13, 2018. An early response to this invitation will help us plan for the number of participants. In these meetings we will share details on how we are preparing for the OPA era, invite input, comments and thoughts from the community and prepare and position all well to commence observations as soon as LIGO-Virgo turn on later in 2018. You will find details on how to connect and become involved in this web page:

https://gw-astronomy.org/wiki/OpenLVEM/TownHallMeetings2018

We look forward to your participation in this new and exciting era of multi-messenger science with gravitational-waves through the forum, Town Hall meetings and ultimately multi-messenger observations!

For immediate questions on the Town Hall meetings and the OpenLVEM forum itself, please reach out to the forum conveners at openlvem-moderators@ligo.org .

David Shoemaker (Spokesperson, LIGO Scientific Collaboration); Laura Cadonati (Deputy Spokesperson)
Jo van den Brand (Spokesperson, Virgo Collaboration)

Details on April 12-13, 2018 in Amsterdam, Netherlands meeting

Amsterdam Town Hall program

• Status of LIGO-Virgo: 9 months outlook; 2 years outlook
• Update of GW event rates
• Policy questions on Open Public Alerts (OPAs): threshold(s) for releasing events, event information, timing, timing for GCN notices, circulars, retractions and updates. What is desired, what is needed, what can be provided?
• Science-driven collaborations/Memoranda of Understanding (MoUs): form sub-groups, meet in parallel, present back to plenary
• Reminder on tools/information/web pages LVC has/will have available to provide low latency information about the instruments

April 12, 09:00-17:30

• 09:00-09:15 Welcome and goals of Town Hall (Jo van den Brand)
• 09:15-09:30 LIGO and Virgo instrument status in preparation for O3 (path to O3, engineering runs, post-O3 plans, target sensitivity outlook) (Nicolas Leroy)Slides
• 09:30-09:45 Q&A, discussion, open mic on LIGO-Virgo instrument status and preparations
• 9:45-10:00 Rates of transient gravitational-wave sources in LIGO-Virgo (Thomas Dent) Slides
• 10:00-10:15 GW data analysis (Ed Porter) Slides
• 10:15-10:30 Q&A, discussion, open mic on LIGO-Virgo rates/GW data analyisis
• 10:30-11:00 Coffee Break
• 11:00-12:30 What constitutes an Open Public Alert (OPA)
  • LIGO-Virgo view (Marica Branchesi) Slides
  • Human Vetting of Alerts (Nicolas Leroy) Slides
  • Q&A, discussion, open mic on OPAs
• 12:30-13:30 Lunch break
• 13:30-14:30 Contributed presentations from participants
  • 13:30-13:35 INTEGRAL (Carlo Ferrigno) Slides
  • 13:35-13:40 Fermi-LAT (Nicolò di Lalla) Slides
  • 13:40-13:45 AGILE (Francesco Verrecchia) Slides
  • 13:45-13:50 Apertif (Joeri van Leeuwen) Slides
  • 13:50-13:55 XMM-Newton (Norbert Schartel) Slides
  • 13:55-14:00 H.E.S.S. + CTA (Fabian Schussler) Slides
  • 14:00-14:05 BlackGEM (Paul Groot) Slides
  • 14:05-14:10 Caucasian Mountain Observatory SAI MSU (Postnov Konstantin) Slides
  • 14:10-14:15 Follow-up and spectroscopy of GW alerts with GTC/OSIRIS, BOOTES and the science case of Intermediate Mass Black Holes (Maria D. Caballero-Garcia) Slides
  • 14:15-14:20 ENGRAVE (Stephen Smartt) Amsterdam-TownHall-ENGRAVE.pdf
  • 14:20-14:25 TOROS (Lucas Macri) Slides
  • 14:25-14:30 Rapid response observations with LOFAR (Antonia Rowlinson) Slides
  • 14:30-14:35 VINROUGE: Near-IR searches with ESO/VISTA (Nial Tanvir) Slides
    

• 14:30-15:30 Opportunities for science-driven collaboration
  • LIGO-Virgo view (Marie Anne Bizouard) Slides
  • Gravitational-wave cosmology: present and future (Archisman Ghosh) lSlides
  • Q&A, discussion, open mic on science-driven opportunities
• 15:30-16:00 Coffee break
• 16:00-17:30 Break-out sessions
  • 16:00-17:30 Cosmology/Hubble constant
  • 16:00-17:30 NS physics/EM broadband modeling and interpretation
  • 16:00-17:30 Fundamental physics/GRB (prompt HE emission)
  • 16:00-17:30 other possible parallel meetings: SN/FRB/neutrinos

April 13, 9:00-13:00

• 09:00-10:00 Rapporteur presentations from break out sessions Some notes
• 10:00-11:00 Open mic/discussion on science-driven collaborations, and presentation on possible MOU structure
• 11:00-11:30 Coffee Break
• 11:30-12:00 Summary of the Town Hall meeting and next steps (David Shoemaker) TownHallSummaryApr2018.pdf
• 12:00 = adjourn =

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Details on March 16-17, 2018 in Cambridge, MA meeting

Friday, March 16, 09:00-17:30

• 09:00-09:05 Welcome and general organization of the meeting (Erik Katsavounidis) slides
• 09:05-09:15 Goals of the meeting (David Shoemaker) slides
• 09:15-09:30 LIGO and Virgo instrument status in preparation for O3 (path to O3, engineering runs, post-O3 plans, target sensitivity outlook) (Brian O'Reilly) slides
• 09:30-10:00 Q&A, discussion, open mic on LIGO-Virgo instrument status and preparations
• 10:00-10:15 Rates of transient gravitational-wave sources in LIGO-Virgo (Chris Pankow) slides
• 10:15-10:30 Q&A, discussion, open mic on LIGO-Virgo rates
• 10:30-11:00 Coffee Break
• 11:00-12:30 What constitutes an Open Public Alert (OPA)
  • LIGO-Virgo view (Leo Singer) slides
  • Human Vetting of Alerts (Brian O'Reilly) slides
  • Q&A, discussion, open mic on OPAs
• 12:30-13:30 Lunch break (on your own)
• 13:30-14:30 Contributed presentations from participants (must pre-register)
  • 13:30-13:40 Precision standard siren cosmology; Hsin-Yu Chen (Harvard U) slides
  • 13:40-13:50 Joint GW-GRB Localizations with Fermi GBM; Adam Goldstein (STI/USRA) slides
    
  • 13:50-14:00 Gravitational Wave Follow-up with the Full Suite of Steward Observatory Facilities; Dave Sand (U Arizona) slides
  • 14:00-14:10 Observational implications of lowering the LIGO-Virgo alert threshold; Ryan Lynch (MIT) slides
  • 14:10-14:20 The Importance of Early Optical and Ultraviolet Observations for Constraining Kilonova Physics; Iair Arcavi (UCSB / Las Cumbres Observatory) slides
    
  • 14:20-14:30 The Astrophysical Multimessenger Observatory Network in the LIGO-Virgo era; Hugo Ayala (Penn State) slides
    
• 14:30-15:30 Opportunities for science-driven collaboration
  • LIGO-Virgo view (Erik Katsavounidis) slides
  • Q&A, discussion, open mic on science-driven opportunities
• 15:30-16:00 Coffee break
• 16:00-17:30 Break-out sessions in building 37 at 70 Vassar Str; this is a 5 minutes walk from Kresge
  • 16:00-17:30 Cosmology/Hubble constant in Marlar Lounge (2nd floor)
  • 16:00-17:30 NS physics/EM broadband modeling and interpretation, room 187 (1st floor)
  • 16:00-17:30 Fundamental physics/GRB (prompt HE emission), room 212 (2nd floor)
  • 16:00-17:30 other possible parallel meetings: SN/FRB/neutrinos, 6th floor conference room

Saturday, March 17, 8:30-13:00

• 08:30-09:30 Rapporteur presentations from break out sessions (4x15')
  • Cosmology/Hubble constant slides
  • NS physics/EM broadband modeling and interpretation slides
  • Fundamental physics/GRB (prompt HE emission) slides
• 09:30-10:30 Open mic/discussion on science-driven collaborations, and presentation on possible MOU structure
• 10:30-11:00 Coffee Break
• 11:00-11:30 Responses to possible homework assignments
• 11:30-12:00 Summary of the Town Hall meeting and next steps (Peter Shawhan)
• 12:00 = adjourn =

Photos

Some pictures of the visit to the LIGO MIT Lab (feel free to add your own)