August 15, 2005

To: CIT/ E. Stone, Voyager Project Scientist and ACE PI

GSFC/ B. Dennis, RHESSI Project Scientist

GSFC/ D. Fairfield, Geotail Project Scientist

GSFC/ R. Goldberg, TIMED Project Scientist

GSFC/ M. Goldstein, Cluster Project Scientist

GSFC/ J. Gurman, SOHO and TRACE Project Scientist

GSFC/ T. Moore, IMAGE Project Scientist

GSFC/ K. Ogilvie, Wind Project Scientist

GSFC/ R. Pfaff, FAST Project Scientist

GSFC/ T. von Rosenvinge, ACE Project Scientist

GSFC/ J. Sigwarth, Polar Project Scientist

JHU/APL/ J-H. Yee, APL TIMED Project Scientist

JPL/ E. Smith, Ulysses Project Scientist

> LMSAL/ A. Title, TRACE PI

SWRI/ J. Burch, IMAGE PI

UCB/ C. Carlson, FAST PI

UCB/ R. Lin, RHESSI PI

From: NASA HQ/DF/ R. Fisher/ Acting Director Earth-Sun Systems

NASA HQ/DF/ C. Holmes/ Program Officer for the 2005 Senior Review

Subject: Call for Proposals - Senior Review 2005 of the Mission
Operations and Data Analysis Program for the Sun-Solar System Connection
operating missions

NASA's Science Mission Directorate (SMD) periodically conducts
comparative reviews of Mission Operations and Data Analysis (MO&DA)
programs to maximize the scientific return from these programs within
finite resources. The acronym "MO&DA" encompasses operating missions,
data analysis from current and past missions, and supporting science
data processing and archive centers. NASA uses the findings from these
comparative reviews to define an implementation strategy and give
programmatic direction to the missions and projects concerned for the
next two to four fiscal years.

NASA will host the next MO&DA "Senior Review" \-- a comparative science
review of missions traditionally in the Sun-Solar System Connection
(S^3^C) MO&DA program -- during the week of November 14, 2005. This will
be the fifteenth review of its type for SMD but the fifth for the S^3^C
missions. This letter describes the objectives and process for the
review, and contains instructions for the preparation and submission of
proposals and in-person presentations to the review panel.

The 2005 S^3^C Senior Review will assess the science merits and
performance of these thirteen missions (in alphabetical order): ACE,
Cluster II, FAST, Geotail, IMAGE, Polar, RHESSI, SOHO, TIMED TRACE,
Ulysses, Voyager, and Wind. Performance factors are to include
scientific productivity, technical status, budget efficiency and (new)
participation in the "Great S^3^C Observatory".

### The Senior Review:

NASA routinely consults with the scientific community. Working groups
and user groups deal with NASA's science program by focusing on
discipline- or theme-wide, sub-discipline, or mission-specific issues.
The Senior Review, held every two to four years by an ad hoc panel,
complements the standing working groups and other peer reviews by
conducting an independent, comparative evaluation of mission research
programs. This is the highest level of peer review within the SMD. In
order to keep the process manageable, the reviews focus on a specific
sets of missions within scientific discipline areas.

Each mission that is invited to this Senior Review will submit a
proposal outlining how their science investigations over the period for
the review (FY-07 to FY-10) will benefit the research objectives
described in the [S^3^C Science and Technology Roadmap
2005-2035]{.underline}. The proposals will contain descriptions of the
project's proposed science investigations, the project's recent
accomplishments, the technical status relating to the ability of the
project to conduct the proposed science investigation, E/PO activities,
and a high level budget for the proposed investigations.

The Senior Review panel, to be formed by HQ, will evaluate these
proposals at a special meeting of the panel in November 2005. Their
evaluation will be contained in a report to HQ. HQ will use the panel's
findings, rankings and conclusions as input to rebalancing mission
allocations within the S^3^C MO&DA program. The HQ actions could include
authorizing the mission to pass from its prime phase to extended,
maintaining the status quo, significantly restructuring the project, or
deciding to terminate an ongoing science mission. The actions will have
the most impact on the execution of the program for FY-07 and FY-08 and
can chart the program allocations in FY-09 and FY-10. The next S^3^C
Senior Review should be held within that period in order to refresh the
program allocations among the missions.

### Instructions to the Senior Review panel:

NASA HQ will instruct the Senior Review panel to:

(1) In the context of the science goals, objectives and research focus
    areas described in the [S^3^C Science and Technology Roadmap
    2005-2035]{.underline}, rank the scientific merits - on a "science
    per dollar" basis - of the expected returns from the projects
    reviewed during FY-07 and FY-08. The scientific merits include
    relevancy to the S^3^C goals, scientific impact and promise of
    future scientific impact.

(2) Assess the cost efficiency, data availability and usability,
    vitality of the mission's science team and education/outreach as
    secondary evaluation criteria, after science merit.

(3) Drawing on (1) and (2), provide comments on an implementation
    strategy for the S^3^C MO&DA program for 2007 and 2008 which could
    include a mix of

-   Continuation of projects "as currently baselined";

-   Continuation of projects with either enhancements or reductions to
    the current baseline;

-   Mission extensions beyond the prime mission phase, subject to the
    "Mission Extension Paradigm" described below; or

-   Project terminations.

    (4), (5) and (6): Make preliminary assessments equivalent to (1),
    (2), and (3) for the period 2009 and 2010.

    \(7\) Provide on overall assessment of the strength and ability of
    the S^3^C MO&DA program to meet the expectations of the S^3^C Great
    Observatory as represented in the S^3^C Roadmap during 2007 to 2010.

Note that the panel will not be asked to evaluate or assess the utility
of S^3^C mission data to operational or commercial users.

### Mission Extension Paradigm:

The former Office of Space Science published guidance on the conditions
for mission extensions in January 1994. This document can be found at
<http://explorer.larc.nasa.gov/explorer/OSS_mission_extension.pdf>.
According to these instructions, budgets for mission extensions beyond
the prime mission lifetime will support:

[Bare-bones mission operation and science operations]{.underline}:
Compared to the prime mission phase, a significantly higher risk and
lower data collection efficiency will be accepted during any mission
extension, and this portion of the MO&DA budget for the extended phase
shall have a funding level of roughly one-half of the equivalent portion
during the prime mission phase.

[Bare-bones data handling, including low-level processing and basic
archiving]{.underline}: Compared to the prime mission phase, fewer
services will be offered to Guest Observers and Guest Investigators who
are assumed to have become more knowledgeable during the mission's prime
phase, and this portion of the MO&DA budget for the extended phase shall
also have a funding level of roughly one-half of the equivalent portion
during the prime mission phase.

[Minimal science data analysis]{.underline}: Priority is given to
maintain understanding of the instrument performance, to monitor
progress toward accomplishing the objectives of science observations,
and to involve the science community in formulating the mission
observing program to make the best scientific use of NASA's missions;
however, no funds will be available in this "minimal-science analysis
mode" for detailed analysis, data fitting, modeling, and interpretation.

[Guest observer/investigator and other NASA research
programs]{.underline}: The discipline's research program sponsors
several competitive solicitations that support theory, data analysis and
"guest investigations". These solicitations can provide an alternative
source of support to those investigators who encounter reduced
mission-funding support as a result of general reductions to mission
budgets.

### Funding Environment:

Missions proposing to the S^3^C Senior Review will compete for an
allocation from a pool of funds assembled for the period under review.
The pool is comprised from the budgets for the missions in extended
phase, competitive data analysis programs such as guest
observer/investigator, and unallocated budget wedges that are set aside
for extended phase investigations.

Proposals typically have two tiers: one that follows the NASA budget
guideline for the period under review and an 'optimal' tier which has a
budget greater than the guideline. The HQ budget guidance as developed
by the Earth-Sun System Division (ESSD) in June 2005 will serve as the
budget guideline for the proposals. The HQ Program Officer for this
review will provide to each project its budget guideline. Each proposal
will be permitted to describe the science enhancement that an 'optimal'
budget would bring over the guideline plan. Typically HQ accepts about
one or two of the 'optimal' proposals per review period.

### The Schedule for the 2005 Senior Review:

The following is the schedule for the 2005 Senior Review for the S^3^C
operating missions:

Draft Call for Proposals issued: May 13, 2005

Call for Proposals issued: August 15, 2005

SR Proposals due: October 5, 2005

E/PO panel meets: October 26, 2005

Senior Review panel meets: November 14-18, 2005

Publication of the panel's report,

dissemination of new budget guidelines,

and instructions to the projects: on or about February 6, 2006

### Instructions to Proposers:

The [S^3^C Science and Technology Roadmap 2005-2035]{.underline}
introduces the concept of the S^3^C Great Observatory (GO) as integral
element of strategic plan of the S^3^C science theme and provides
criteria for inclusion as a member of the GO. Your proposal needs to
discuss your mission's potential for performance during FY-07 to FY-10
in each of these areas:

-   relevance to the goals of the S^3^C;

-   impact of scientific results as evidenced by citations, press
    releases, etc.;

-   spacecraft and instrument health;

-   productivity and vitality of the science team (e.g., publishable
    research, training younger scientists, education and public
    outreach);

-   promise of future impact and productivity (due to uniqueness of
    orbit and location, solar cycle phase, etc.);

-   and broad accessibility and usability of the data.

The proposal shall contain a science section, a technical/budget
section, and an education/public outreach (E/PO) section. The scientific
plus the technical/budget sections should be no more than 30 pages of
writing and graphics. The E/PO section should be no longer than 4 pages
of writing and graphics. All pages are to be formatted as 8.5 X 11 inch
paper, with character (font) size not less than 10 points. Not included
in the page limits are the budget spreadsheet and the list of acronyms.
The proposal will be submitted in .pdf format (see below). If your
institution requires signatures, please place them on a separate
submittal letter and send to the NASA Program Officer for this review.
Copies of this submittal letter will not be used in the peer review but
will be retained within ESSD. The project name and names of key writers
or presenters at the top of the first page will suffice for review
purposes. Typical proposals to previous senior reviews split the science
and technical sections approximately 2 to 1. Letters of endorsement
count against the page limits and are not needed for the Senior Review.
So do not include them. Many successful proposals have been submitted
with fewer pages than the limits!

### Instructions for the Science Section:

In the science section of a proposal, describe the science merits of
your full program, and the specific contributions of the instruments
within your mission. The emphasis of the science section should be how
the proposed science program will discover and communicate new
scientific knowledge in line with the S^3^C Science Research strategic
goals, objectives, and research focus areas as stated in the S^3^C
Roadmap. The science proposal should list the current science objectives
for the mission and a summary of what has been accomplished in past two
to three years. (For missions in extended phase it is all right not to
cite the mission's original science objectives).

The scientific merit of the program is the chief criterion used to
determine ranking.

### Instructions for the Technical/Budget Section:

This section should begin with a discussion of the overall technical
status of the components of the mission. These should include the
spacecraft, instruments, and ground system including spacecraft control
center and science center(s). The discussion should summarize the health
of the components and point out limitations as a result of degradation,
aging, use of consumables, obsolescence, etc.

The second part of this section should discuss the proposed budgets. You
are to provide your budgets in 'full-cost' form.

Show, in an appropriate summary manner, anticipated 'in kind' support
from [NASA-funded]{.underline} sources other than the project's MO&DA
budget. These 'in kind' sources include tracking support from the NASA
tracking networks and support from the multimission infrastructure
projects at GSFC, JPL, and elsewhere. Representations of direct or
in-kind funding from non-NASA sources such as international partners,
other US Government agencies, etc., [should not]{.underline} be
provided.

Labor, major equipment, and other expenses for both the in-guideline
scenario and the requested/optimal scenario must be explained in
sufficient detail to determine the incremental cost of each proposed
task. The budget must include any project-specific costs including
mission services performed by the SSMO at GSFC, at JPL, or by NASA's
networks such as the Deep Space Nework (DSN), the Ground Network (GN),
the Space Network (SN) or the NASA Integrated Network Services (NISN).

The attachment to this letter contains instructions and the mandatory
form for the budget portion of each proposal. This form will serve as a
standard budget summary for all proposals; it is assumed that each
proposal will contain further details in a format as determined by each
project. For the period under consideration in this Senior Review, FY-07
-- FY-10, two scenarios should be summarized in the mandatory form and
described in the technical/budget proposal: an "In-Guideline" Scenario
and a "Requested/Optimal" Scenario.

For the "In-Guideline" Scenario: If the current budget guideline for
your project (part of the current NASA operating plan) for any of the
fiscal years is larger than zero, then describe a plan which meets that
guideline. If the project believes that the current budget guideline is
sub-minimal, the project should identify the impact of the current
in-guideline budget on the science return for the mission. If the
current budget guideline for your project for any of the fiscal years is
zero, and you propose to carry on the investigations during that year,
then describe a minimal program at an acceptable risk level. This
minimal scenario should indicate the minimum viable funding level for
your project to the Senior Review and to NASA. By identifying the
minimum acceptable funding level, you are indicating that any lower
funding level is untenable, and that the project should be terminated
rather than funded at a sub-minimal level.

For the Requested/Optimal Scenario you may describe a funding level that
leads to a higher science return from the project, but still recognizes
the very tight fiscal constraints that NASA faces. In other words, the
requested/optimal scenario should be a carefully considered request, not
a maximal request. The technical/science description of this scenario
should address the added scope and expected benefits compared to the
in-guideline scenario. The added science return from the
requested/optimal scenario over the in-guideline scenario should be
clearly identified. The added science return should be clearly connected
to the additional budget required (over the current budget guideline).

The budget spreadsheet also provides tables for 'in kind' support and
for instrument team budgets. The format for the tables for the
'In-Guideline', 'Requested/Optimal', and the 'in-kind' budgets follow
the 5-way breakdown described in the Attachment. The format for
'instrument-breakdown' table does not follow the 5-way breakdown. The FY
totals for the instrument breakdown representation should equal the FY
total for the Guideline program.

### Instructions for the Education/Public Outreach Section:

All of the S^3^C flight missions have education and public outreach
(E/PO) activities to various degrees. SMD is committed to continuing
support for education and public outreach.

In preparing the E/PO Section, you should familiarize yourselves with
the SMD education and outreach plans. Two elements should be included in
the E/PO section. First, summarize what has been accomplished in
previous years. Second, describe your plans for the period covered by
this proposal. Characterize your planned activities against the
evaluation criteria described in the following paragraph for E/PO
programs within SMD. Include a detailed budget breakout using the table
below. Tie your E/PO budget to those plans and provide a detailed budget
narrative including details on the level of effort, travel, and
equipment requested. Summarize the capabilities of key team members and
partners. An expenditure of 1-2% of the total budget request (or
\$15,000 per year, whichever is higher) is considered reasonable;
however, variation from this guideline is allowed but must be justified.

The E/PO evaluation criteria include 1) Intrinsic Merit (Quality and
Feasibility, Customer Focus, Partnerships/ Leverage/ Sustainability, and
Evaluation), 2) Relevance to NASA's Education Objectives (Content,
Pipeline, and Diversity), and 3) Cost (Resource Utilization). They are
of approximately equal weight. A more detailed description of indicators
of alignment may be found at

> <http://science.hq.nasa.gov/research/guidelines.html#evaluation> or
>
> <http://research.hq.nasa.gov/code_y/nra/current/NNH04ZYO006N/main.html#V>.

+------------------------------+--------+---------+---------+---------+
|                              | #      | FY-08   | FY-09   | FY-10   |
|                              |  FY-07 |         |         |         |
+------------------------------+--------+---------+---------+---------+
| 1\. Direct Labor (salaries,  |        |         |         |         |
| wages, and fringe benefits)  |        |         |         |         |
+------------------------------+--------+---------+---------+---------+
| 2\. Other Direct Costs:      |        |         |         |         |
+------------------------------+--------+---------+---------+---------+
| a\. Subcontracts             |        |         |         |         |
+------------------------------+--------+---------+---------+---------+
| b\. Consultants              |        |         |         |         |
+------------------------------+--------+---------+---------+---------+
| c\. Equipment                |        |         |         |         |
+------------------------------+--------+---------+---------+---------+
| d\. Supplies                 |        |         |         |         |
+------------------------------+--------+---------+---------+---------+
| e\. Travel                   |        |         |         |         |
+------------------------------+--------+---------+---------+---------+
| f\. Other                    |        |         |         |         |
+------------------------------+--------+---------+---------+---------+
| 3\. Facilities and           |        |         |         |         |
| Administrative Costs         |        |         |         |         |
+------------------------------+--------+---------+---------+---------+
| 4\. Other Applicable Costs   |        |         |         |         |
+------------------------------+--------+---------+---------+---------+
| 5\. Subtotal\--Estimated     |        |         |         |         |
| Costs                        |        |         |         |         |
+------------------------------+--------+---------+---------+---------+
| 6\. Less Proposed Cost       |        |         |         |         |
| Sharing (if any)             |        |         |         |         |
+------------------------------+--------+---------+---------+---------+
| 7\. **Total E/PO Estimated   |        |         |         |         |
| Costs**                      |        |         |         |         |
+------------------------------+--------+---------+---------+---------+

Line 7 in the detailed E/PO budget breakout should match Line 5 in Table
II of your overall budget spreadsheet.

### Required Appendices

Two appendices are required and do not count against the page limit:

-   Standard budget in a specified format. The attachment to this letter
    describes the mandatory format for your budget request and supplies
    a spreadsheet template; use it. \[The completed budget spreadsheet
    must be e-mailed to
    [Charles.P.Holmes@nasa.gov](mailto:Charles.P.Holmestbd@nasa.gov) on
    the due date.\]

-   Acronym list. Include a full list of all acronyms with their
    designations spelled out.

### Proposal Submission:

The proposals are to be submitted in .pdf format to NASA Research &
Education Support Services (NRESS) and must be received by 4:00 PM EDT
on the due date, Wednesday, October 5, 2005. Instructions for submitting
your proposals will be supplied at later date. The NRESS
point-of-contact for this review is:

Sharon Smallwood

NASA Research and Education Support Services

Suite 200

500 E Street, SW

Washington, DC 20024

Telephone: (202) 479-9030 x259

Email: ssmallwood@nasaprs.com

### Further Information Required for the Senior Review Deliberations:

After submission of proposals, members of the Senior Review panel may
have further questions or requests for clarification. If that is the
case, then identical requests for further information will be sent to
all missions/projects prior to the in-person panel review.

As part of a proposal submission, a project should consider providing an
on-line bibliography of recent publications. The proposal should contain
the URL/web address to this bibliography. A recommendation is that the
bibliography should be listed in sequence with the most recent refereed
publications first. The bibliography should contain as a minimum the
most recent papers over the past two or three years. It is all right to
list papers to AGU meetings, conferences, workshops, PhD theses, etc,
but these should be listed separately from the listing of the refereed
papers.

### Data availability/usability:

Another source of the information that we will provide to the reviewers
will be summaries of the availability/usability of mission data. As was
done in the 2003 Senior Review, there will be an independent survey of
mission and instrument data availability/usability.

### The E/PO panel:

The SMD E/PO officers will organize a special panel to review the E/PO
sections of the proposals. These are reviewed in the context of the
science proposals. The E/PO panels findings and recommendations will be
submitted to the HQ Program Officer for this Senior Review and made
available to the Senior Review panel.

### The meeting of the Senior Review Panel meeting:

The Senior Review panel will meet for four days and follow this agenda:

Day 1:

Morning: Instructions, MO&DA program background, logistics (writing
assignments, etc.), comparisons, and

discussion of conflicts of interest and procedures to minimize their
impacts.

Rest of day: Project presentations plus questions and answers (time
assignments TBD)

Day 2: Complete project presentations;

Day 3: The Senior Review panel begins instructed tasks (1) through (6)

Day 4: The Senior Review panel completes tasks (1) through (6) and
performs task (7).

### Presentations to the Senior Review panel:

Each proposing project will be allotted \~30 minutes for an oral
presentation to the senior review panel. To minimize the burden on
projects, no more than a total of three persons may represent any one of
the projects. During each project presentation, the project
representatives should plan on using one-half of the allocated time for
their prepared presentation, and reserving one-half for questions and
answers.

-   The primary purpose of the oral presentations is to provide a forum
    for questions from panelists and answers from the projects.

-   Secondarily, this is an opportunity for projects to provide any
    significant updates, e.g. science results obtained since proposal
    submission.

-   Lastly, and with lowest priority, it is an opportunity to repeat
    highlights of the proposals, which have, of course, been read by all
    panelists.

### After the meeting of the Senior Review panel:

At the end of the meeting of the Senior Review panel, there should be a
good first draft of the panel's report. The key findings and conclusions
should be well drafted and reviewed prior to dismissing the panel. The
panel will outbrief their report to the ESSD Director and staff. The
panel will then take about two to six weeks to complete and submit their
report. The report will be posted to a public NASA HQ web site. \[See
for example: <http://science.hq.nasa.gov/earth-sun/index.html> and
<http://science.hq.nasa.gov/universe/docs.html> \]

Simultaneously, HQ will contact each of the proposing missions/projects
and relay the new ESSD decisions resulting from the Senior Review. The
decisions will include new budget guidelines and other specific
instructions resulting from the Senior Review process possibly including
notices of intent to terminate. Each of the projects will then submit
back to HQ their plan for complying with the new guidance and
instructions.

The HQ program scientists will ensure that key officials in
participating international space agencies or other U.S. government
agencies that are partners in a proposing mission are contacted and
apprised of NASA's decisions resulting from the Senior Review.

### Further Information

For further information, you may contact me via e-mail at
<Charles.P.Holmes@nasa.gov>.

Dr. Charles P Holmes

Mail Suite 3Q39

Earth-Sun System Division

Science Mission Directorate

NASA Headquarters

Washington DC 20546-0001

Telephone: (202) 358-2224

FAX: (202) 358-3987

One attachment: MS Excel spreadsheet: S^3^C_SR_06-10_Std_Spreadsheet