I received my e-copy of Cassiopea yesterday and read with interest your suggestion for a Canadian Center for Experimental Astrophysics. I wanted to express my enthusiastic support for such a long overdue idea.

I was a PhD student with Gordon Walker in the first half of the 1980s when so many interesting developments were emerging in the area of solid state sensors for astronomical spectroscopy and imaging. UBC, and others in Canada, had a real lead in the use of such devices at that time. Many of the ideas that were developed for astronomical purposes have subsequently been used in other fields (eg cooled CCD are extensively used in microscopy, multispectral remote sensing and forensic imaging, adaptic optic techniques are being used for retinal imaging, etc). I would suggest that your proposed center for instrumentation development in astronomy could have much wider impact than just in supporting astronomy. This advantage, I suspect, if organized properly would make the Center more attractive to government funding. I only last week received a call from a Canadian CCD company (DALSA) who were looking for opportunities to partner with universities that could exploit and develop the arrays they fabricate. It was unfortunate they couldn't do that in Canada.

Best of luck with your proposal,

Zoran,     1999-01

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