Letters announcing the results of the competition for new Fiscal Year (FY) 1995 awards from the Suborbital Program in Magnetospheric, Ionospheric, Thermospheric, and Mesospheric Physics were mailed to investigators on February 17, 1995. These awards were made on the basis of proposals submitted in response to NASA Research Announcement (NRA) 94-OSS-08. Proposals describing twenty-nine investigations were reviewed in the competition for Fiscal Year (FY) 1995 funding from the MITM program. Seven of these were rated Excellent or Excellent/Very Good in a peer review of their scientific merit, 11 were rated Very Good or Very Good/Good, and 11 were rated Good.
The assignment of ratings was based on requirements set out in the NRA and followed carefully the NASA definitions of Excellent, Very Good, Good, and Poor which were provided to proposers. Specifically, in order for a proposal to have been rated Very Good or Excellent it had to have (1) presented a clear scientific question to be answered, (2) outlined an appropriate and feasible method of approaching this question and (3) provided confidence that if the proposed effort were carried out, then definitive progress in understanding the phenomenon in question would likely result. A proposal was classified as Excellent if, and only if, having met these necessary but not sufficient conditions, it also targeted a compelling question whose timely solution was important to advancement of the field.
The total Fiscal Year (FY) 1995 funding requested was $6.1 M and the funding available for competition was approximately $1.0 M. The FY 1995 funding requested by the proposals rated E or E/VG totaled $1.6 M.
All of the proposals in the Excellent and Excellent/Very Good categories were considered to be within the competitive range for this selection. Selection from among these proposals was based on (1) the relative merit of similar proposals within the competitive range, (2) the attempt to maintain a balanced program, and (3) cost and operational constraints. Consideration of these criteria led to recommendations for selection of 5 of the 7 investigation proposals in the competitive range.
The next opportunity to propose for ITM SR&T funding will be in response to the 1995 Space Physics Division NRA for the Supporting Research and Technology Program, which will be released this coming spring.
Kane/Penn State Coordinated rocket and ground-based studies of high-latitude fine-scale structure in ion-sodium sporadic layering events Kelley/Cornell An experiment to study sporadic atom layers in the Earth's mesosphere and lower thermosphere Larsen/Clemson Sounding rocket investigations of eddy and molecular diffusivities in the mesosphere/lower thermosphere Parks/Washington A rocket experiment to study pulsating aurora Torbert/New Hampshire Auroral Turbulence II The Total MITM PRogram for FY 1995 includes: Arnoldy/New Hampshire Auroral Microphysics and Ion Conics: Investigation of Space and Time - AMICIST Barth/Colorado Rocket investigations of the role of nitric oxide in the lower thermosphere Broadfoot/Arizona Plasma imaging: He+ in the earth's plasmasphere Carlson/Berkeley Auroral sounding rocket experiments Christensen/Aerospace Coordinated study of magnetospheric/thermospheric coupling and dynamics in the diffuse aurora Espy/Utah An investigation of the effects of mesospheric aerosols on the odd-oxygen chemistry and distribution Goldberg/GSFC Coordinated studies of equatorial mesospheric and lower thermospheric dynamics by rocket and CADRE Kane/Penn State Coordinated rocket and ground-based studies of high-latitude fine-scale structure in ion-sodium sporadic layering events Kelley/Cornell A study of the electromagnetic pulse from lightning and its interaction with the ionosphere Kelley/Cornell An experiment to study sporadic atom layers in the Earth's mesosphere and lower thermosphere Kintner/Cornell Sounding of the Cleft Ion Fountain Energization Region - SCIFER Larsen/Clemson Sounding rocket investigations of eddy and molecular diffusivities in the mesosphere/lower thermosphere Parks/Washington A rocket experiment to study pulsating aurora Torbert/New Hampshire Auroral Turbulence II Wescott/Alaska Shaped charge injection of field aligned Ba and Ca plasma to investigate the physics of mass dependent ion acceleration Woods/Colorado Solar irradiance and thermospheric airglow rocket experiments Zipf/Pittsburgh Studies of the physics and chemistry of the terrestrial atmosphere