NYRIA workshop 2016 at CfAI, Durham

Date: July 4 to 5, 2016
Venue: Centre for Advanced Instrumentation, University of Durham, Durham, United Kingdoms
Hosts/organizers: Saavidra and Robert
Attendees: Benjamin, Kalyan, Marcelo, Mark, Martin, Gabriele, Robert, Saavidra, Santiago, Sebastiaan

The meeting was an opportunity to update everyone with how their work was progressing, visit the Centre for Advanced Instrumentation (CfAI) group facilities and welcome new students to this network.

The attendees outside the Rochester Building at Durham University

Following the SPIE conference in Edinburgh attendees of the Durham meeting arrived in Durham on the Sunday before the meeting. They were accommodated at Collingwood College and visited the main sites of Durham city.

On Monday morning the attendees were taken, by mini bus, to the CfAI NETPark Facility in Sedgefield, approximately 30 minutes outside the city. We were greeted by Dr Stephen Rolt and Dr Cyril Bourgenot who gave us a tour of the facilities.

Attendees visiting the diamond machining

Attendees getting ready to go into the clean room

Following the tour we had lunch at the NETPark canteen and went back to Collingwood College where we continued the meeting with an afternoon of talks. These talks were open to all of the CfAI students and staff.

On Tuesday we continued the event with a tour of the astronomical instrumentation labs in the Rochester Building, Department of Physics. Dr Andrew Reeves showed the DRAGON test bench and explained its operation. Following the tour and a quick break we continued with the rest of the talks.

We would like to say a big thank you to CfAI, namely Prof. Richard Myers, for being so encouraging of this meeting and for funding the event, which included accommodation, lunch and coffee as well as travel to NETPark. We would also like to thank Dr Stephen Rolt, Dr Cyril Bourgenot and Dr Andrew Reeves for showing as around the CfAI facilities and Claire Whitehill who organised much of the event, this would not have been possible without her.

Written By: Saavidra Perera