Minutes of SHUG Executive Committee Meeting of March 21, 2003
The Executive Committee convened by conference call at 1:00 PM EDT on March 21, 2003. 9 of the 11 members were present. The members in attendance were:
- Paul Butler
- Takeshi Egami (Chair)
- Christina Hoffmann
- Joanna Krueger
- Scott Misture
- Paul Sokol
- John Tranquada
- David Vaknin
- Angus Wilkinson
Takeshi began the meeting by bringing up two informational points. The first item was that because there are no real users of SNS (and with HFIR down not any current users of that either), the membership definition has been pretty broad to include anyone who is interested in neutron scattering. Thus the SNS mailing list is used as the SHUG membership “roster.” This mailing list was originally put together from several neutron scattering mailing lists and is continually updated by SNS staff by adding everyone who attends any SNS or JINS meetings or who otherwise identify themselves as being interested. That list has currently over a thousand names. However, 208 people voted in the last SHUG election and the list of those people has been kept as well. Presumably this represents a core group of “users” with a more active interest. It is not clear if and when use of such a restricted list would be appropriate, but if such a use does become obvious the committee should be aware of its existence. Next Takeshi mentioned that from the point of view of the bylaws the only distinction between “regular” committee members and the postdoctoral member is the length of tenure. Thus, the postdoctoral member is a full member with all rights and obligations and should participate actively at all levels. In particular they should be encouraged to participate fully in discussions. The current postdoc member not being present Takeshi indicated he would talk to her separately.
Next, Takeshi informed the new members that in the past minutes have been circulated via email and after a two week comment period were deemed accepted. He suggested the practice continue unless someone had strong objections. There being none, acceptance of the minutes will continue in this manner.
At this point Jim Roberto and Herb Mook from ORNL/HFIR joined the call to discuss the state of HFIR with the committee. Jim began by stating that HFIR was still in shut down status. While he is not happy with the delays he pointed out that the impact on the user program has thankfully been minimal due to the gradual approach to implementing the user program (only 2 instruments are currently available).
The shutdown occurred after a scheduled outage during which substantial maintenance and repair work took place. On startup the reactor power began dropping so, according to procedure, the reactor was shut down. The problem was traced to an improperly wired servo motor. While this error never posed any danger to personnel or the reactor, in the spirit of putting safety first, an extensive review of all work performed during the outage was undertaken in order to ascertain that no other errors existed. That is mostly complete. The good news is that nothing else has been found and the hope is to restart the reactor by early next week. The outage has unfortunately had some schedule impact on a variety of other parts of the upgrade. Thus it will now be summer before the first HB-2 instruments are ready and fall before the powder machine is ready. On the cold instrument side, the window for guide installation has been missed (CILAS, the manufacturer has other obligations) and the cold source project has also been set back. The bottom line is that the cold source is now scheduled for installation in late 2004. Asked whether that was conservative or optimistic estimate, Jim declined to answer until having time to further study how that schedule was arrived at as he had only been briefed on it the day before. Asked about how this would impact the next call for proposals, Herb Mook indicated he didn’t think it would have any effect as HFIR’s available instrument time would be ramping up and the backlog from the current cycle could be accommodated in that extra time.
Next the committee discussed the Fast Access proposal draft submitted by Angus following the last meeting. It quickly became evident that there was some confusion about what type of need was being addressed in this document (i.e short duration experiments such as sample characterization and feasibility measurements, rather than “hot topic” experiments). Another issue was the wording about how to handle the review process to which there was some objection. It was also pointed out that not all instruments would benefit from such a program and those that did might not all benefit equally. For example powder diffraction would benefit strongly from both the characterization and the feasibility aspects of the proposal while SANS would probably benefit mostly from the feasibility aspect. The suggestion was then made that Angus revise the draft to incorporate a better distinction at the front end of what need is being addressed (not “hot topic”), a mention of the fact that this proposal would not necessarily be appropriate for all instruments, and a softening of the wording about how the proposal is reviewed. Finally the point that the process (even if implemented beyond the test stage of this proposal) should be periodically reviewed to ensure it remains a productive use of the time was unanimously recognized to be key to any implementation. How the metrics should be defined was unclear but it was agreed that for the purposes of this proposal it was not necessary to completely define them.
In other business, Paul Butler brought up the need to complete the special committees and elect a chair for the SNS special committee. Paul noted that historically the idea (and practice) was that every member of the committee would serve on at least one of the two special committees of HFIR and SNS. However on re-reading the bylaws, there does not seem to be such a requirement spelled out. Nonetheless, the full membership of the committees should be posted on the website soon and it would be nice to know for sure who will be on what committee. Paul noted that 3 people had yet to voice an opinion: Zema, Christina, and Paul Sokol. Paul Sokol offered to serve on the SNS committee, while Christina offered to serve on both. Paul Sokol and Angus accepted to stand for chair of the special committee and given the time it was agreed that votes would be sent to Paul Butler for later announcement.
Finally in other business, Paul Butler brought up the fact that originally the committee had agreed to publish the accepted minutes on the SHUG website. A few of the early minutes were posted, but the site has not been updated since. Paul suggested he’d like to restart that practice and asked for comments. Angus pointed out that the minutes should be a matter of public record. There being no objections it was agreed that the minutes would be so posted.
There being no further business, the meeting adjourned at 2:00PM EDT
Respectfully submitted,
Paul Butler
SHUG Secretary
Note 1: Angus distributed a revised copy of the writeup for a proposed “short duration” fast access to the group via email after the meeting.
Note 2: HFIR re-started up on March 30th, 2003
Note 3: Following the meeting, Zema Chowdhuri offered to serve on the HFIR special committee, while Angus Wilkinson was voted as chair of the SNS special committee Thus the committees stand as follows:
SNS
- Paul Butler
- Takeshi Egami
- Christina Hoffmann
- Scott Misture
- Paul Sokol
- John Tranquada
- Angus Wilkinson (Chair)
HFIR
- Paul Butler
- Zema Chowdhuri
- Takeshi Egami
- Christina Hoffmann
- Joanna Krueger
- Nancy Ross
- David Vaknin (Chair)
