Program News and Announcements

26 September 2017

XARM Participating Scientists ROSES Deadline October 24th

NASA and JAXA have jointly agreed to participate in the X-ray Astronomy Recovery Mission (XARM), in order to restore the soft X-ray spectroscopic capability lost with the Hitomi mission in March 2016. The key scientific objective of XARM is to "Pioneer a new horizon of the Universe with unprecedented high-resolution X-ray spectroscopy."

In order to optimize the scientific utilization of the mission, NASA, JAXA, and ESA will appoint a XARM Science Team. This team primarily consists of scientists involved in the development of, plus a small number of external Participating Scientists, the US members of which are solicited in this new ROSES element. A major objective of the XARM science team is to maximize the scientific use of XARM, particularly during the Performance Verification (PV) phase of the mission. The key tasks of the XARM Science Team are to:

• Make recommendations regarding scientific aspects of the mission to the XARM Project Manager.
• Communicate and coordinate with the astronomical community regarding the science capabilities of XARM.
• Specify, oversee the development of, and beta test XARM simulation, data analysis, and user tools, including preparatory laboratory astrophysics activities.
• Demonstrate the performance of XARM and its instruments by planning, performing, and publishing the results from the PV phase observations.
• Ensure the scientific instruments are well calibrated and their operation is understood.

As full members of the XARM Science Team, Participating Scientists will have access to all PV phase data. Participating Scientists will be appointed to the XARM Science Team in early 2018 and will serve a five-year term. This term is based upon the anticipated start of NASA mission implementation (Phase C) and ends with the anticipated publication of the PV phase data. Proposals from individuals at all career stages, from postdoctoral researchers to senior scientists, are encouraged.

This program element uses a two-step proposal submission process via the NSPIRES system in which the notice of intent is replaced by a required Step-1 proposal. Mandatory Step-1 proposals are due October 24, 2017, and Step-2 proposals are due December 13, 2017.

The full text of the solicitation may be found here: NASA Research Announcement: X-ray Astronomy Recovery Mission (XARM) Participating Scientists.

For more information, please contact Dr. Daniel Evans, the XARM Program Scientist (daniel.a.evans@nasa.gov).