NASA vs. PRIVATE FUNDING OF SPACE ASTROPHYSICS & PLANETARY SCIENCE

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1 NASA vs. PRIVATE FUNDING OF SPACE ASTROPHYSICS & PLANETARY SCIENCE Example: NEOCam vs. Sentinel Judy Pipher, Bill Forrest, Craig McMurtry University of Rochester (UR)

2 GROUND BASED ASTRONOMY EXAMPLES OF PRIVATE FUNDING Privately funded large aperture telescopes - successful BUT Private funding does not define the telescope design or the instrument/detector designs Telescope design is science driven Private funding does not define science observations Scientific TACs define science observations to be obtained

3 CRUCIAL ELEMENTS of NASA FUNDING Rigorous TRL (Technical Readiness Level) standards Well-developed infrastructure to manage space missions, including technical PDRs and CDRs by competent, relevant engineers and scientists (NASA selects scientists who are independent of the PI team) Scientific Peer Review of proposals by competent relevant scientists to select missions (NASA performs selection by independent scientists) Well established working relationships among university scientists and NASA labs such as JPL, industrial partners such as Ball Aerospace, all under proven NASA HQ program management

4 EXAMPLE: NEOCam a proposed NASA Discovery Mission Addresses congressional mandate to find PHOs potentially hazardous objects - and as well asteroid exploration, BUT mission is science driven 50-cm IR PASSIVELY COOLED cryogenic telescope with 5 mm and 10 mm channels (heritage) Orbit near Earth Sun L1 point close to Earth s orbit, within 45 o of the Sun, where NEOs (Near Earth Objects) found. PI, Amy Mainzer, JPL NEOWISE PI her experienced scientific team is also working on NEOCam. To date >53 published NEOWISE papers in respected peer-reviewed journals with more in progress.

5 WHY INFRARED WHY TWO BANDS? Can observe near the Sun NEOs close to Earth, T ~ 300K; thermal emission at 10 mm of low and high albedo objects Two IR bands give robust estimate of T, hence D T and D important for NEOCam science - conditions for solar system formation & evolution Could be equally bright at visible l ALBEDOS 0.04 BLACK, RED, 0.52 GREEN

6 NEOCam RECEIVED NASA TECHNOLOGY FUNDING TO RAISE ALL ELEMENTS TO APPROPRIATE TRL A PRIMARY REQUIREMENT IS TO BE PASSIVELY COOLED (SAVES WEIGHT, COMPLEXITY, HENCE COST) NASA FUNDED Long Wave DETECTOR ARRAY DEVELOPMENT AT U. ROCHESTER NEOCam TEAM: > 25 VERY EXPERIENCED ASTEROID SCIENTISTS PI AMY MAINZER, JPL PI OF NEOWISE Mission tradeoffs, including observation cadence, orbit, determined by SCIENCE DEVELOPING 10 mm ARRAYS TO NASA TRL REQUIREMENTS (ARRAYS DID NOT EXIST FOR PASSIVELY COOLED TEMPERATURE - 40K FOCAL PLANES) Peer reviewed detector paper in Optical Engineering in September 2013 VERY FAR ALONG IN DEVELOPMENT UR DEVELOPED SUCCESSFUL ARRAYS FOR SPITZER SPACE TELESCOPE AS WELL

7 B612 FOUNDATION SENTINEL MISSION PRIVATELY SPONSORED SEEKING PRIVATE FUNDING PR TEAM MAKES UNSUBSTANTIATED CLAIMS SENTINEL STANDING REVIEW TEAM HAS MANY DISTINGUISHED SCIENTISTS, BUT ON THEIR REVIEW TEAM NO IR TECHNOLOGISTS NO NEO SCIENTISTS (EXCEPT 1 STRATEGIC ADVISOR) NO NEO SCIENTISTS ON THEIR CORE TEAM ORBIT* (Venus-like elliptical orbit) CLAIM most capable NEO detection system in operation could not detect Chelyabinsk One paper on mission in a new online journal New Space NO SCIENCE MENTIONED Detector array being developed and in test (one 5-10 mm channel rather than 2 bands) Ran out of $$ before 2 nd detector run at Raytheon NASA Space Act agreement agreement to provide communications, tracking, technical support RENEWABLE IF PASS NASA GATE REVIEWS * Post Chelyabinsk, published paper in Russian journal on virtue of using L1 orbit for SentineL1

8 ADVANTAGES and DISADVANTAGES of PRIVATE FUNDING example Sentinel Spacecraft by experienced industrial partner Ball Aerospace, who devised the mission concept (NASA missions like NEOCam contract industry, but PI team author the concept, and NASA manages the contract) Management internal to B612 Foundation (ex-astronauts, retired Ball engineers, ex-spitzer manager) is both an advantage and disadvantage Define internal reviews and review team composition Define criteria for success PDR and CDR for instrumentation defined by NASA (Gate reviews) Independent of governmental funding vagaries and procurement regulations Sentinel Space Act states data set delivered to NASA to pursue science (but mission design is not science driven/optimized)

9 ARE THERE COMPROMISE POSITIONS? PRIVATE INVESTMENT PROVIDES SOME CLEAR ADVANTAGES BUT WITHOUT NASA DISCIPLINE AND OVERSIGHT, THE OUTCOMES MAY NOT BE AS SCIENTIFICALLY USEFUL OR CREDIBLE, OR REQUIRE UNUSUAL CALIBRATION I ADVOCATE JOINT PRIVATE/GOVERNMENT FUNDING SO THAT NASA SAFEGUARDS IN PLACE TO ENSURE EXCELLENT SCIENCE AND MISSIONS SCIENCE-DRIVEN, BUT BENEFITS OF PRIVATE FUNDING AND PROCUREMENT ARE REALIZED