Operations and Maintenance Support for the James Clerk Maxwell Telescope

The James Clerk Maxwell Telescope (JCMT) is the largest submillimetre-wave single dish telescope in the world. It is located at an excellent site in Hawai`i and is equipped with two state-of-the-art submillimetre cameras, a 10,000 pixel dual-band continuum camera (SCUBA-2) as well as a 16 pixel 2000 channel spectroscopic camera (HARP). The mapping capabilities of the JCMT are particularly important for two of the most prominent research topics in astronomy today: tracing the formation and evolution of young galaxies in the early universe, and probing the physical conditions in the dense gas that provides the fuel for star formation both in our own Milky Way and in other galaxies near and far. There is excellent synergy between the JCMT with its wide-field mapping capabilities and new telescopes such as the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA), a powerful new radio array in Chile that began science operations in 2011. Astronomers use the JCMT to find new and interesting objects in the sky and then follow up with high resolution images to study their properties in detail with ALMA. Thus, a relatively small investment in the JCMT enables Canadians to make the best use of our larger investment in ALMA.The JCMT is used fifty percent of the time for large "key programs" with the remaining time used for shorter targeted proposals. Time is awarded on the JCMT on the basis of a competitive, peer-reviewed process and is only available to astronomers in countries that contribute to JCMT operations costs. Astronomers at Canadian universities and their graduate students and postdoctoral fellows are heavily involved in the JCMT large programs as well as making good use of the telescope for targeted proposals, especially to support Ph.D. student theses. Canadian-led research on the JCMT ranges from studying the coupling between a disk and a jet formed by a neutron star binary system to identifying young dusty galaxies in the early universe. These new discoveries advance our understanding of the formation and evolution of stars and galaxies. The JCMT provides a unique opportunity for Canadian graduate students to obtain hands-on training at an internationally competitive telescope.This proposal requests funds to support the operation and maintenance of the JCMT over a two year period (2017-2019). Funding a Canadian contribution to JCMT operations via this proposal will ensure continued access to the JCMT by Canadian researchers and their students, both via individual small proposals and as part of larger international teams. The next two years will be a very exciting period as the results of the JCMT Key Programs begin to appear, including the deepest map of the submillimetre sky ever made and stunning images of star-forming clouds. We will ensure that Canadian researchers can continue to play an important role in the scientific exploitation of the JCMT.