To all astrophysicists at Oxford

Oxford has the chance to become involved in a European Commission
Framework Programme (FP6) for radio astronomy. Our interest will probably
centre on scientific simulations as part of design studies for next-generation
radio telescopes such as LOFAR (see http://www.lofar.org/) and the
SKA (see http://www.ras.ucalgary.ca/SKA/). Just to whet your appetite:
HI surveys with the SKA will measure redshifts and virial masses for
>10^7 L* galaxies with z~0 to z~3 per year!

We will be attending a meeting concerning FP6 proposals for radio
astronomy early next week at Jodrell Bank.

The purpose of this email is to gather names of those potentially interested
in participating in this programme in Oxford. It should be noted
that next-generation
radio telescopes will have a dramatic impact on areas of astrophysics which
have traditionally been
dominated by shorter-wavelength observational facilities.

No work is required at this stage, but if we join in this 
programme then we will be expected to contribute significantly to a
proposal to be submitted in mid 2003.

Our initial idea is to push for support (at the level of 
1-2 PDRAs and 1-2 students) for a programme of 
simulating the sky as seen by LOFAR and the SKA. We have a lot of the
necessary expertise here to do this. If you have specific suggestions
as to how you might want to contribute to this programme, or would 
like to suggest other areas in which we might participate, then please 
let us know as soon as possible. 

Steve Rawlings
Robert Laing