Current status of science operation at Subaru

摘要

Subaru Telescope has been in operation for open use for six years. As the first-generation instruments became all operational and as minimal engineering time has been spent for the commissioning of the second-generation instrument, science time counts over 80% of the total telescope time since 2002. Downtime is almost minimized thanks to the stability of the telescope and the instruments and to the dedication of the support staff. Due to overwhelming deficiency in national budget of Japan, Subaru Telescope faces more serious budget cut than expected. This paper presents how the observatory is/will be dealing with the reduced budget with minimum impact to the operation that may pose observers any restriction to use the telescope.