Superconducting Submillimeter-Wave
Limb-Emission Sounder on board JEM(JEM/SMILES)

Research Announcement

Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency
May 29, 2009

Contents
1.

Introduction...................................................................................................................................1

2.

Definition of the JEM/SMILES Research Announcement (RA) ..................................................1

3.

4.

5.

6.

2.1.

General Description ..............................................................................................................1

2.2.

Qualification requirements....................................................................................................2

2.3.

Basic Policies ........................................................................................................................2

2.4.

Implementing Organization ..................................................................................................3

Overview of JEM/SMILES...........................................................................................................3
3.1.

Orbit and Attitude of ISS ......................................................................................................3

3.2.

Overview of JEM..................................................................................................................43.3.

Instrumentation of SMILES..................................................................................................43.4.

Ground data processing system.............................................................................................4JEM/SMILES Data .......................................................................................................................54.1.

Basic Policy ..........................................................................................................................54.2.

Data Format and Distribution Media ....................................................................................6Rights and Obligations of the Principal Investigator (PI) .............................................................65.1.

Rights ....................................................................................................................................65.2.

Interim reporting ...................................................................................................................65.3.

Final reporting.......................................................................................................................7Preparation and Submission of Research Proposals .....................................................................76.1.

7.

Notes to the preparation of research proposals .....................................................................7

Selection of Research Proposals ...................................................................................................8
7.1.

Evaluation and Selection Procedure .....................................................................................87.2.

Evaluation Criteria ................................................................................................................87.3.

Cancellation and Postponement of RA .................................................................................88.

Schedule........................................................................................................................................89.

Point of Contact ............................................................................................................................9JEM/SMILES Research Announcement

1. Introduction
Superconducting Submillimeter-Wave Limb-Emission Sounder (SMILES) was designed to beaboard the Japanese Experiment Module (JEM) on the International Space Station (ISS) as acollaboration project of Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) and National Institute ofInformation and Communications Technology (NICT). Mission Objectives are: i) Space
demonstration of super-conductive mixer and 4-K mechanical cooler for the submillimeter
limb-emission sounding, and ii) global observations of atmospheric minor constituents in thestratosphere (O3, HCl, ClO, HO2, HOCl, BrO, O3 isotopes, HNO3, CH3CN, etc), contributing to theatmospheric sciences. It is scheduled to launch in September 2009 by the H-II Transfer Vehicle(HTV).
This Research Announcement (hereinafter referred to as the “RA”) invites researchers who areinterested in calibration, validation, algorithm development, data application, and scientific use of
the SMILES data, on top of the basic researches and developments to be performed by JAXA andNICT, in order to make the SMILES mission more effective. All research teams whose proposals areselected in this RA will be granted a priority in data distribution. Applicants to this RA areencouraged to read the contents of this document carefully. Selection of the proposals will be
performed by the Committee organized under the JEM/SMILES project run by the ISS Science
Project Office of JAXA. The office handling tasks related to this RA (RA Office) is also set in theISS Science Project Office. General information on the SMILES mission can be found in thefollowing.
http://smiles.tksc.jaxa.jp/
Related documents including the Mission Plan can be found down below the above top page.
http://smiles.tksc.jaxa.jp/document/indexe.shtml

2. Definition of the JEM/SMILES Research Announcement (RA)
2.1.

General Description

The purpose of this RA is to provide an opportunity for researchers who are interested in using theSMILES data for calibration, validation, data processing algorithms, and atmospheric sciences witha goal to make more use of the outcomes from the project. The research topics selected by theCommittee and adopted by JAXA will be granted a preferential data distribution. The proposer
should keep in mind, however, that neither JAXA nor NICT is a funding body for the scientificcommunity. This RA seeks to accomplish JEM/SMILES’s goal and to expand new utilization ofJEM/SMILES data.

－1－JEM/SMILES Research Announcement

2.2.

Qualification requirements

JEM/SMILES RA is basically open to all individual researchers in educational organizations,research institutes, and governmental bodies. However, there is restriction for those who live innon-MTCR (Missile Technology Control Regime) countries. For this time, their RAs will not beaccepted. Those who live in MTCR countries and are willing to use the SMILES data for non-profit
purposes are entitled to participate in the RA. Investigators involved in carrying out the research
themes selected in the RA are called “RA Investigators”. A team of RA Investigators working on aresearch theme will be led by one principal investigator (hereafter referred to as “PI”) who will
represent the team. The PI is expected to act as a contact person with JAXA in carrying out the
selected research theme, such as communication, data transfer, and submission of necessary
documents. In principle, the research organization to which PI belongs shall also agree with theparticipation.
2.3.

Basic Policies

The RA will be conducted on the basis of the following policies:
1)

JAXA will establish a committee (hereafter referred to as “the Committee”) to select theresearch proposals and to follow their results. Research proposals submitted in response to theRA will be evaluated by the Committee, and they will be selected by JAXA based on theevaluation results by the Committee.

2)

The research period shall be the operational period of JEM/SMILES and its ground system (3years after the launch, in principle). Any long-term research extending beyond the operational
period will be subject to interim reporting to JAXA.

3)This RA will be the first opportunity. Additional RA opportunities to follow will be determinedbased on the status of responses to the first invitation.

4)

The PI of a research team can make multiple research proposals on different themes during themission period.

5)

The PI may not submit observation requests which are specific to the research theme.

6)

The PI may submit requests for distribution of SMILES data free of charge to the extent
designated by the Committee per research theme.

7)

Applications for this RA and research plans shall be submitted by e-mail or conventional mail if
the size of the submission materials is large (see Section 6 in detail).

8)

After the selection the official agreement between JAXA and the research organization to which
PI belongs will be concluded.
－2－JEM/SMILES Research Announcement

9)

The titles and PIs (and their organization) of the research themes selected for the RA will be
disclosed on the Websites run by the RA Office.

10) In general, the outcomes of this RA must be disclosed to the public in the form of papers
published on academic journals and other media and at the same time be reported at the related
meetings.
11) Neither JAXA nor NICT provides any financial assistance to the PIs, in principle, under the RAscheme.
2.4.

Implementing Organization

JAXA will organize an office in charge of the RA within the JEM/SMILES project. The RA Officewill carry out the following tasks:
1)

Prepares the RA procedures and releases them to the public.

2)

Carries out the administrative work as the secretariat of the Committee.

3)

Accepts proposals submitted in response to the RA and requests the Committee for due
evaluation for selecting research themes.

4)

Notifies the selection results to all PIs who submitted research proposals.

5)

Receives the outputs of the research from the PIs.

6)

Organizes the research result report meetings.

See Chapter 9 for the contact address for the RA Office.

3. Overview of JEM/SMILES
Detailed information on the SMILES mission can be found in the Mission Plan as follows.
http://smiles.tksc.jaxa.jp/document/SMILES_MP_ver2.11.pdf
Additional information in relation to the current status after the mission plan is also found in thefollowing.
http://smiles.tksc.jaxa.jp/document/current_status/
In the following subsections brief descriptions will be given.
3.1.

Orbit and Attitude of ISS

The ISS will be a nearly circular orbit at a nominal altitude of approximately 400 km with aninclination of 51.6 degrees to the equator, and will usually maintain a torque equilibrium attitude－3－JEM/SMILES Research Announcement(TEA) during the microgravity mode of its operation. It is predicted that the ISS altitude will vary
between 350 km and 460 km. In order to keep this altitude range, the ISS will be periodicallyreboosted approximately every 10 to 45 days by using onboard thrusters.
3.2.

Overview of JEM

The JEM consists of manned Pressurized Module (PM), Experiment Logistic Module-PressurizedSection (ELM-PS), and Exposed Facility (EF). The JEM-EF, an unpressurized pallet structure
exposed to the space environments, will be located just outside of the JEM-PM placed at theram-port side of the ISS. The SMILES payload will be attached to the ram side of the JEM-EF at thelocation EFU #3.
3.3.

Instrumentation of SMILESThe SMILES payload instrument consists of a number of sections: The Submillimeter Antenna(ANT), Submillimeter Receiver (SRX), Intermediate Frequency Amplification Section (IFA), andRadio Spectrometer (AOS) comprise the main part of the payload. The Star Tracker (STT) has afunction of detection and calibration of the SMILES payload attitude. The SMILES is equipped witha heterodyne superconductor-insulator-superconductor (SIS) receiver to be operated in the625/650-GHz band as a limb-emission sounding radiometer. The SMILES has a mechanicallyscanning elliptical offset-Cassegrain antenna with diameters of 40 cm × 20 cm to achieve an altituderesolution of about 3.5 - 4.1 km at the tangential altitude ranging from upper troposphere (10 km) tolower mesosphere (60 km) from the orbit of the ISS. The atmospheric limb emission collected by theANT is directed to the SRX, where the received submillimeter-wave signal is combined with areference signal (637.32 GHz) from a submillimeter-wave local oscillator (SLO), and is directed toSIS mixers through quasioptics consisting of focusing mirrors, wire-grids, and a sideband separator.
Two SIS mixers, one of which for upper sideband (USB: 649.12 GHz - 650.32 GHz) and the otherfor lower sideband (LSB: 624.32 GHz - 626.32 GHz), are operated for simultaneously
down-converting both sidebands into the intermediate frequency (IF) band ranging between 11 GHz
and 13 GHz. The IF signals are further down-converted and amplified in the IFA, and then analyzed
by two acousto-optical spectrometers in the AOS.
3.4.

Ground data processing system

The SMILES ground data processing system consists of Experiment Operations System (EOS) andData Processing Systems (DPS). The EOS is a facility to receive telemetries and send commands.
The DPS is divided into two main facilities, which are a data processing system for Level 0 andLevel 1b (DPS-L0/L1) and that for Level 2 (DPS-L2). Definition of each level is as follows.

－4－JEM/SMILES Research Announcement

Level 0: Reconstructed, unprocessed mission data at binary packets
Level 1b: Calibrated instrument radiances and related data
Level 2: Derived geophysical variables at the same resolution and location as the Level 1bsource data
Downlinked raw data from the SMILES will be received by the DPS-L0/L1 at User Operation Area(UOA) on Tsukuba Space Center (TKSC).
The DPS-L0/L1 processes the raw data consisting of house-keeping (HK) data and mission data toLevel 1b data in near-real-time. The Level 1b data are periodically transferred via a non-network
media to a data server connected to the Internet.
The DPS-L2 automatically receives the Level 1b data from the data server through the Internet andprocesses the Level 1b data into the Level 2 data. The task of the DPS-L2 is to produce the verticalprofiles of target species and to distribute the Level 2 data to users by a web server. The DPS-L2
consists of three major functions, that is a system operation function, a data analysis function, and adata processing function.

4. JEM/SMILES Data
4.1.

Basic Policy

Each PI is entitled to obtain the SMILES data necessary for his/her respective research theme, freeof charge, from JAXA on the condition that he or she agrees to the following provisions:1)

The use of the data for any other purpose than his/her research theme is prohibited.

2)

Redistribution of the data to any third party is prohibited.

3)

The data obtained within this RA can only be distributed among the PI and RA Investigators.

4)

Any publication of the outcomes obtained through the use of the data must refer to the data
source properly.

In addition to the above item 4, it is recommended to write such a sentence in the acknowledgement
as “JEM/SMILES mission is a joint project of Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) andNational Institute of Information and Communications Technology (NICT).”The data to be distributed will be subject to the operational status of the JEM/SMILES and thephysical restrictions of the sensors. JAXA and NICT shall not be liable for any missing data,
degradation of data quality, delay in data delivery, or any other situation in which the data cannot beprovided, as a result of problems in relation to the spacecraft or the ground facilities.

－5－JEM/SMILES Research Announcement

The ownership of the original data acquired with JEM/SMILES belongs to JAXA and NICT. The“original data” here means the Level 0, Level 1b and Level 2 products prepared by JAXA. Such data
should be distinguished from the data obtained by RA Investigators as an outcome from theirresearch activities.
Basically, Level 1b data product will be closed within the JEM/SMILES project, but may be used
under this RA. If he/she is interested in exploring Level 1b data, prepare for the proposal in responseto this RA.
Level 2 data product contains the species which are classified as the standard products such as O3,HCl, ClO, HO2, HOCl, O3 isotopes (18OOO, 17OOO and O17OO), BrO, HNO3, and CH3CN. The
research products provided by JAXA and NICT are not defined herein this announcement. However,during the RA research term, RA investigators can coordinate with JAXA through the RA Officeabout distribution of the research product.
4.2.

Data Format and Distribution Media

Level 2 products will be provided in the EOS-HDF (EOS Hierarchical Data Format) format, whichis commonly used for distributing earth-observation data. SMILES data will be distributed online via
the Internet, in general. However, other media such as CD-ROM or DVD may be used in case thatthe network environment is not readily established for RA researches. In this case, actual costs (formedia and shipping) should be paid by the researches.

5. Rights and Obligations of the Principal Investigator (PI)
5.1.

RightsThe PI shall be responsible for communicating with JAXA through the RA Office when applying for
the RA and also researching on the research theme, if adopted. The PI shall be entitled to thefollowing rights, if it is appropriate for the research theme:
1)

Requesting a delivery of the standard products, free of charge, before the release to the public.

2)

Requesting a delivery of the research products free of charge.

Note that the number of such requests will be determined in consideration of the conformity to theresearch purpose.
5.2.

Interim reporting

The PI shall report on the progress of his/her research in the way designated by JAXA at－6－

JEM/SMILES Research Announcement

JEM/SMILES workshops as well as interim report meetings. In addition, if the Committee deems theresearch purpose or data application of the RA Investigators as deviant from the initial research plan
as a result of the examination of the progress reported, JAXA may terminate the agreement.
5.3.

Final reporting

All PIs are required to submit the final reports to JAXA through the RA Office, generally in one year
from the last interim report meeting. The reports shall be prepared in English. Moreover, the PIs areencouraged to present their research results in whole or in part at conferences, symposiums, andworkshops relevant to the SMILES project.

6. Preparation and Submission of Research Proposals
6.1.

Notes to the preparation of research proposals

The documents to be submitted in response to the RA must be prepared in accordance with thefollowing procedures. Those proposals that are prepared in disregard of these conditions may beexcluded from the succeeding evaluation process. In addition, the submitted documents will not be
returned to the proposers for any reason.
1)

Prepare a research proposal in accordance with the procedure for submission defined in thisChapter and the “Contents of Research Proposals and Application Forms” provided asAppendix A. The application forms in Appendix A will be used accordingly.

2)

Submit your research proposal in the WORD or PDF format, in the way that it is ready for
printing in A4 or letter size, together with necessary references via e-mail to the SMILES RA
Office’s e-mail address described in Chapter 9. If the size of the submission materials exceeds
10 MB, prepare those on electric media, such as CD-R, and send it to the RA Office byconventional mail.

3)

Letters on the documents should all be typed in 10- to 12-point size.

4)

The research proposal and accompanying reference documents must all be prepared in English.

5)

The research proposal must be compiled in the most simplified way, focusing on the minimallynecessary contents. The total volume of the proposal, excluding appendices, must be 4 pages orless. See Appendix A for further specific rules.

6)

Submission deadline is set on July 24, 2009. The document must arrive at the RA office by thedeadline even if the document is sent by conventional mail.

－7－JEM/SMILES Research Announcement

7. Selection of Research Proposals7.1.

Evaluation and Selection Procedure

The research proposals submitted in response to the RA will be evaluated by the Committee. JAXA
will make a final decision on the selection of research themes, based on the evaluation results of theCommittee. The applicants may be requested to modify or rectify the contents of the proposed
research plan, in the course of the selection by the Committee, with a view to enriching the expectedscientific results from the proposed research. In addition, the Committee may solicit advice of theSMILES Science Team in the process of evaluation. All applicants will be notified of the selection
results by August 28, 2009.
7.2.

Evaluation Criteria

The submitted research proposals will be examined and selected based on the following evaluation
criteria.
1)

The contents of the proposed research conform to the purpose of the RA.

2)

The methods and approaches adopted in the proposed research are appropriate and theunderlying concept is original and/or innovative.

3)

The RA Investigators, including the PI, are qualified in terms of research capability, experience,
facility/equipment, and skills necessary for accomplishing the purpose of the proposed research.

4)

The proposed research is consistent and relevant with the purpose of the SMILES mission.

5)

The purpose of the proposed research can be accomplished within the research period.

7.3.

Cancellation and Postponement of RA

The JAXA reserves the right to cancel the RA and joint research projects based on the RA by
notifying in writing, and shall not be liable for any delay in the RA schedule or cancellation of theRA program itself or to those who did not receive any notice regarding such delay or cancellation.

8. Schedule
Release of RA

May 29, 2009

Deadline for submission of proposals

July 24, 2009

Notification of the selection results

August 28, 2009

stThe 1 PI meeting

Scheduled around the beginning of 2010

Launch of JEM/SMILES

September, 2009－8－JEM/SMILES Research Announcement

9. Point of Contact
Takuki SANO (Mr.)
JEM/SMILES RA Office

Postal address:
ISS Science Project Office, ISAS, JAXA
3-1-1 Yoshinodai, Sagamihara, Kanagawa, 229-8510 JAPAN
Tel.: +81-42-759-8657 (Japanese / English)
Fax.: +81-42-759-8664
E-mail: smiles_ra@smiles.tksc.jaxa.jp[Notice: Telephone and facimile number are subject to change with relocation of RA office in thissummer. An e-mail contact is appreciated.]

Appendix:Contents of Research Proposal and Application Form－9－