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A world-wide collaboration is presently working on the Auger project: nearly 20 countries, more than 250 physicists and engineers from 40 institutions. Although we want to keep the collaboration as open as possible to all countries or groups, we must keep in mind that our first aim is to design and build a detector exceptional by its size and its performance and with a cost not negligible as far as particle astrophysics projects are concerned.

During its plenary meeting of November 1997 at CERN, the collaboration and its governing body, the Collaboration Board (CB), emphasized the necessity that from then on, and in conformity with the Collaboration by-laws, the acceptance of any new group or institution as a member of the collaboration should be dependent on their contributions - of all sorts - to the advancement of the project. This includes of course intellectual input to the physics aims of the project, but cannot be limited to it. Therefore, the CB wishes to study thoroughly the situation of candidate groups with respect to what they propose as person- and brain-power, commitments to technical developments, contributions in kind to the production of detector components, funding of the project, etc...

As such a new group, you are kindly asked to supply detailed answers to the following list of questions and, if necessary, complete them with any further information you may judge relevant. Your submission will be distributed to the members of the CB and your request will be discussed during the next collaboration meeting (these take place twice a year). For groups strongly motivated by working in and for Auger but not yet supported in any way by their scientific or funding authorities, there is the possibility of applying for "associate membership" of the Collaboration, which is a temporary status for the period that may be needed to clarify the situation in their countries.

To make our work easier, we would appreciate receiving your answers in any form (e-mail, LATEX, Postscript or HTML files, Web pages etc...) easy to distribute through Internet. You can gain a deeper knowledge on Auger and the related issues by visiting the Web pages of many collaborating groups (see: PAO Homepages).

1. Scientific authorities: who is the head of your laboratory, institution, department etc...? If you are subject to several levels of scientific authorities (e.g. for the approval of experimental projects) give an outline of the structure with the names of the corresponding responsible persons. What is the status of Auger as regards these scientific authorities? (A letter from any such authorities at any level would be appreciated.)
2. Funding authorities: give a short description of the funding structures in your institution or country. If these are the same as the previous, indicate at which level the decision of a possible funding of any experimental project is taken. What is the status of Auger as regards these funding authorities? Is there currently any information available concerning the attitude of the funding authorities with respect to Auger (however tentative and unofficial it may be)? If yes, please let us know.
3. What financial support may you expect from your authorities in the short and long terms? Separate the funds which would benefit only your group (travel expenses, fellowships, local equipments) and those which would be devoted to Auger (R&D money, funding for the construction of the detector). Are there indirect funds you could use on this project (international programs, private funds, money from industry)?

1. Name and exact postal address of your institution. Telephone and fax numbers.
2. Full list of names of the members of your group wanting to work in Auger, with e-mail addresses. Please indicate separately the permanent members with their professional status (physicists, engineers), the temporary members (visitors, post-docs, temporary contracts) and students. Indicate also who is the group leader or the contact person for the collaboration.
3. Indicate the expertise or field of activity of each of the members of your group which may contribute to the progress of this project. Indicate the percentage of the time they are intending to spend on Auger and on their other activities. What are these latter?
4. Indicate the global commitments and responsibilities your group wishes to take in this project with a time schedule.
5. Indicate the amount of support (e.g. technicians, computer equipments, CAD possibilities...), if any, you can expect from your institution apart from the activities of the group listed above.
6. Are there contributions in kind and/or manpower that you can envisage from your institution or country which could help bring down the costs presently envisaged for the detector? Would you be ready to organise the setting-up and coordination of such contributions and proceed with the necessary quality tests before delivery to the collaboration?

Updated: November 7, 2007