Assigned ID: 112 ----- Attempting Submission 1 (Wed Feb 24 22:55:49 GMT 2010) ----- HST Phase I Proposal 112 (m87prop.apt) successfully submitted. ----- Attempting Submission 1 (Thu Jul 08 18:13:37 GMT 2010) ----- The only warning is "pattern position outside aperture". Our program involves spectral mapping with 5 parallel positions of the STIS slit, and a "stis-along-slit" pattern at each position, where the perpendicular positions are set using a pos-targ offset. I don't think that these warnings are important in this case, but please inform me if there is anything that needs to be clarified. M87 contains the most massive black hole that has been detected dynamically in any nearby galaxy, and it provides a crucial anchor for the uppermost end of the correlations between black hole mass and host galaxy properties. However, the best current measurements of the black hole mass from stellar dynamics and from the dynamics of the circumnuclear ionized gas disk disagree by a factor of 2, and the discrepancy is significant at the 3-sigma level. Since M87 provides crucial information on the top of the M-sigma relation, it is important to determine the cause of this disagreement and to resolve this discrepancy. Our goal is to improve the gas-dynamical measurement of the central mass of M87. This work will improve on the past measurements by (a) fully mapping out the kinematic structure of the nuclear emission-line disk, and (b) carrying out comprehensive dynamical modeling, including the possible effects of pressure support or asymmetric drift, which were not considered in past measurements for M87. To accomplish this, we propose to obtain new STIS G750M spectra with the 52X0.1 slit, at five parallel and contiguous positions covering the inner portion of the nuclear disk. Our kinematic measurements and dynamical modeling will provide one of the best comparison tests between gas and stellar dynamical measurements of black hole masses, and an important new constraint on the upper end of the M-sigma relation.

Our goal is to map out the kinematic structure of the nuclear disk in M87 using 5 parallel slit positions with STIS. We will use the 52X0.1E1 aperture, and the G750M grating with wavelength setting 6581 to cover the H-alpha and [NII] emission lines. In order to have the slit PA close to the disk's kinematic major axis at PA=38deg (within + or - 15deg of this PA), we require the ORIENT parameter for our visit to be between 68-98deg or between 248-278deg. We will do a standard point source acquisition and peakup, since the central AGN in M87 is very compact and pointlike. Using the previous STIS acquisition image from program GO-8666 as a reference, we find that 10 sec is a good exposure time for the acquisition image, and we will use 15 sec for the peakup exposure time in the 0.1 arcsec slit. We aim to obtain approximately 1 orbit of exposure time at each of the 5 parallel slit positions, and at each position we will use a STIS-ALONG-SLIT pattern to dither for cosmic-ray and bad pixel cleaning. Following the peakup in the first orbit, we will obtain 3 dithered exposures with the slit at the nucleus, and then in orbit 2 we will obtain 2 additional dithered exposures at the nuclear position in order to improve the S/N at the important central slit position covering the nucleus. After that, during orbit 2 we will then offset by +0.2 arcsec in x using a POS-TARG move and obtain 3 exposures at the +0.2 offset position. For orbits 3, 4, and 5, we will begin each orbit with a POS-TARG offset to move to a new slit position (+0.1, -0.1, and -0.2 arcsec in x), and then use a 4-point STIS-ALONG-SLIT dither pattern at each offset position, obtaining a full orbit of integration at each of these 3 positions. Each orbit will include an auto-wavecal. AGN/QUASARS 12 false 0.0 0.0 false false false false false false SUPPORTED GALAXY ELLIPTICAL LINER NLR NUCLEUS RADIO GALAXY This object was generated by the targetselector and retrieved from the SIMBAD database. Coordinates confirmed with 2MASS image. J2000 12 30 49.4234 +12 23 28.04 J2000 STIS/CCD Spectroscopic No No G750M 6581 POS-TARG DITHER 0.15 LINE false false 3 90.0 STIS-ALONG-SLIT 1 false POS-TARG DITHER 0.15 LINE false false 2 90.0 STIS-ALONG-SLIT 2 false POS-TARG DITHER 0.15 LINE false false 4 90.0 STIS-ALONG-SLIT 3 false /tmp/OPVisit15642.xml 1278611965208 The scheduling data was generated by CASM 18.3.1. CASM was run in Phase II mode. (Tic-Visit :proposal-id 12162 :visit-id "01" :proposal-version -1 :trans-version "20100505" :date "08-Jul-2010 10:59:23.0" :trans-errors '(:WARNINGS 4 :ERRORS 0 :HEALTH-AND-SAFETY 0 :FATAL-ERRORS 0 :CONTINUABLE-FATALS 0) :number-of-orbits 5 :saa-model "24" :si-bright-earth-limb-angle 20.0 :data-volume 460528 :tdrss-contact-duration 0 :coron NIL ) (Tic-Obset :proposal-id 12162 :visit-id "01" :obset-id "01" :pcs-mode "FGS" ) (Tic-Orbit :proposal-id 12162 :visit-id "01" :orbit-number 1 :pcs-time 333 :si-vis-utilization 2911 :al-overhead-at-end 0 :internal-dur-at-end 0 :dark-offset NIL :dark-utilization 0 :max-dark-utilization 1920 :low-sky "N" :pcs-visibility 3245 :pcs-gap 0 ) (Tic-Orbit :proposal-id 12162 :visit-id "01" :orbit-number 2 :pcs-time 222 :si-vis-utilization 3023 :al-overhead-at-end 0 :internal-dur-at-end 0 :dark-offset NIL :dark-utilization 0 :max-dark-utilization 1920 :low-sky "N" :pcs-visibility 3245 :pcs-gap 0 ) (Tic-Orbit :proposal-id 12162 :visit-id "01" :orbit-number 3 :pcs-time 222 :si-vis-utilization 3020 :al-overhead-at-end 0 :internal-dur-at-end 0 :dark-offset NIL :dark-utilization 0 :max-dark-utilization 1920 :low-sky "N" :pcs-visibility 3245 :pcs-gap 0 ) (Tic-Orbit :proposal-id 12162 :visit-id "01" :orbit-number 4 :pcs-time 222 :si-vis-utilization 3020 :al-overhead-at-end 0 :internal-dur-at-end 0 :dark-offset NIL :dark-utilization 0 :max-dark-utilization 1920 :low-sky "N" :pcs-visibility 3245 :pcs-gap 0 ) (Tic-Orbit :proposal-id 12162 :visit-id "01" :orbit-number 5 :pcs-time 222 :si-vis-utilization 3023 :al-overhead-at-end 0 :internal-dur-at-end 441 :dark-offset NIL :dark-utilization 0 :max-dark-utilization 1920 :low-sky "N" :pcs-visibility 3245 :pcs-gap 0 ) true 5 0