Telescope Proposals

Standard Telescope Time Application for 2025A

To apply for telescope time on the Optical/IR telescopes in the normal scheduling cycle, potential observers must submit a proposal to the Steward Observatory Telescope Allocation Committee (TAC), which then provides recommendations for scheduling to the Director who approves a final schedule. Programs are scheduled on a semester timescale, roughly from February through July, and August through January. Proposals for time on the ARO radio telescopes are submitted to the ARO TAC for recommendations to the Director. 

We currently accept applications led by faculty, postdocs, graduate and undergraduate students at UA, ASU, and NAU.  

Deadlines for Optical/IR Telescopes

The deadline for 2025A proposals is noon MST (Arizona) on Tuesday, October 1^st,  2024.  Generally, deadlines are always close to Oct. 1 and Apr. 1 for the following term's observations, unless these days fall on weekends. The proposal submission site will open on Sept. 20, 2024.

The call for proposals for 2025A will be sent out in September 2024  by email to the list az_astro_observer@list.arizona.edu  (contact Eiichi Egami (eegami@as.arizona.edu) to be added). 

Telescope Proposal Forms

For news and instructions please visit HERE.

Deadlines for Proposals for Time on ARO Telescopes

For more information on how to observe with ARO telescopes, as well as upcoming deadlines, please visit the new ARO website.

How To Propose: Optical/IR Telescopes

To apply for observing time on Arizona's Optical/IR telescopes for the first semester in 2025, ie, 2025A,  submit proposals (electronically only) by noon on TUESDAY, October 1, 2024. (GTO proposals are due October 22)  Electronic submission is required and involves filling out the web page and uploading the processed pdf to this Web page .  The proposal website will open on Sept. 20, 2024.

The available telescopes include LBT, Magellan I and II, MMT, 90", VATT, 61", and 60". NEWS information about available instruments is available here.

Make sure to download the current LaTeX2e proposal template  soprop.tex and class file soprop.cls (we updated/upgraded them on March 3, 2020, not since then). These are required to produce the pdf file that is uploaded for the electronic submission. Using an older version of the templates will result in your proposal not being processed by the automated account.

The macro psfig.sty can be obtained at arxiv.org/macros/psfig.sty

Additional Guidelines for Submission:

- do not use commas in any coverpage entry field in soprop.tex;

- no line breaks in the proposal title (make sure the closing parenthesis is on the same line);

- use approved telescope names (as listed in soprop.tex);

- use only one PI-Name and only one (matching) PI-email address;

- name your files using your first initial and last name (e.g., jdoe.tex and jdoe.pdf). If you submit multiple different proposals use numbers to differentiate (e.g., jdoe1.tex, jdoe2.tex). Keep names to less than 30 characters and do not use special characters or spaces in the filenames;

- revised proposals are accepted up until the deadline. Use the revision option on the submission page to update your proposal.

Target of Opportunity Proposals

Target of Opportunity (ToO) proposals are encouraged for any of our telescopes. However, proposers should be aware that the scheduling flexibility depends on instrument availability and capability, access to queue scheduling, and program requirements. As such, it becomes increasingly difficult, but not impossible, to accommodate ToO programs in telescopes where we have a minority share, or are not queue scheduled.  We do not, at this time, allow for the interruption of observing time outside that available to Steward Observatory. Our scheduling of observing time attempts to follow the TAC proposal rankings as closely as possible, as such, proposers of either classical or ToO observations that require specific conditions are encouraged to write the strongest proposal possible. 

For LBT, those ToO proposals ranked in Band B will not be able to interrupt programs ranked in Band A.

For the MMT, ToO can only take place with queue-scheduled instruments (not the Blue Channel).

For Magellan,  ToO can only take place with facility instruments in UA time only.

Requesting TBS time

On the occasions when some time remains unscheduled, members of Steward Observatory may apply for TBS (To Be Scheduled) nights on the Steward Observatory 90", 61", and 60" telescopes, or UAOTBS nights on the MMT. Please send TBS requests to Dr. Dennis Zaritsky (dfz@arizona.edu) Requests should contain a brief scientific justification. Please also note that TBS requests requiring instrument changes may not be accepted depending on the work load of the Mountain Operations staff during the relevant time period.  TBS requests made within the 21-day limit that require an instrument change or any sizable intervention by Mtn. Ops. staff are highly discouraged. Exceptions to this policy may be made in the event of important transitory astrophysical events and handled at the Director/Associate Director level with the consultation of the Mtn. Ops. group. 

To clarify the TBS deadline system: Requests are due 21 days before the first night of a TBS block if there are multiple contiguous nights available on a telescope.  TBS nights will not be granted to observers who are not certified on the telescope/instrument unless the request identifies a certified observer who will be present at the telescope during the entire period requested.  In other words, proof of certification must come before a observer even submits a request for TBS time unless a certified observer who will actually handle the observations is identified. 

Optical /IR TAC Membership

Each member grades every proposal. Therefore, almost every proposal is read and graded by non-experts. It is essential that proposers present the scientific motivation for their proposal in language that astronomers outside their specific field can easily understand.

This year's TAC members, their institutional affiliations, and research areas are:

Optical/IR TAC Procedures

Steward Observatory schedules its telescopes in semesters.

Before each meeting, TAC members read and grade every proposal except in cases of a conflict of interest. Telescope schedulers provide the TAC a list of available time (bright, gray, dark). For each telescope, proposals are then ranked according to their average grade. TAC members generally base their grades on overall scientific merit and feasibility and demonstrated productivity using Arizona facilities such as refereed publications, conference proceedings, and prompt analysis of data. The final rankings are provided to the schedulers who generate a preliminary schedule for all telescopes for approval by the Director. A final schedule is posted online about one month prior to the start of the next semester.