Supporting Research and Data Analysis in NASA's Science Programs: Engines for Innovation and Synthesis (1998)

Chapter 1 affirms the central role given science by NASA's charter, by top-level reviews of its mission,¹ and by policy statements from the White House.² The task group also introduces the theme of this report in Chapter 1—that vigor and quality in NASA's science enterprise require healthy R&DA programs as well as numerous flight projects; this theme is illustrated in Chapter 2. This chapter discusses critical science questions as one of the foundations of R&DA, differences and commonalities in R&DA across the agency, the importance of linking R&DA to NASA's strategic plans, and how R&DA is responding to a changing environment—for example, the impact that policies to streamline and shorten missions can have on both the expectations and the resource requirements for R&DA activities.

NASA's science is organized under three enterprises: (1) the space science enterprise managed by the Office of Space Science (OSS); (2) the Earth science enterprise managed by the Office of Earth Science (OES); and (3) the human exploration and development of space enterprise managed by the Office of Life and Microgravity Science and Applications (OLMSA) and the Office of Spaceflight (OSF). (See Appendix B for a diagram of NASA's organizational structure.) Each office has developed or is developing a strategic plan that includes its priorities in science. These priorities can be cast as critical science questions and used to guide the agency's science programs. Summaries of current sets of critical questions appear in the following sections.

The space science enterprise encompasses the traditional scientific disciplines of astronomy and astrophysics, space and solar physics, and planetary science. Through investigations in these areas, NASA seeks to answer fundamental scientific questions, some of which are as old as the human race (Box 3.1). These questions have significance well beyond the scientific community; they lie at the heart of humanity's attempt to understand its place in the universe. OSS also investigates fundamental physical and biological laws using space environments as natural laboratories that cannot be duplicated on Earth.

The tools of the space science enterprise are extraordinarily broad and varied. They include deep-space probes; Earth-orbiting astrophysical observatories; aircraft-, balloon-, rocket-, and ground-based observatories; and laboratory and theoretical investigations. These tools, used in concert, have facilitated understanding of complex questions about the universe and the solar system.

The Earth science enterprise consists of one program—Earth science—whose primary objective is to understand the interactions among Earth's land, oceans, and atmosphere that influence weather, climate, Earth's ecosystems, agriculture, and hazards to populations. This cross-cutting approach to Earth studies has come to be known as Earth system science. Critical science questions from NASA's earth science strategic plan are listed in Box 3.2.

A sense of urgency emerged in the Earth sciences as investigators began to identify the strong linkages between phenomena as diverse as the depletion of stratospheric ozone and the terrestrial use of chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs); severe storms and the El Niño-Southern Oscillation; and the growth of infrared-active gases in the atmosphere and potential climate changes that will affect human health, economic decisions, fishery yields, and agricultural productivity. Progress in Earth system science is sensitively tied to the research strategy selected to attack these problems.³

Unlike the space and Earth science enterprises, the human exploration and development of space (HEDS) enterprise encompasses much that lies beyond concerns usually attributable to science. These range from issues as grand as the expansion of human life beyond Earth to issues as practical as the commercialization of access to space. OLMSA manages the HEDS research program, which spans biology, medicine, materials science, fluid and combustion physics, and biotechnology.

Critical questions within the life sciences largely concern the effects of gravity (or the absence of gravity) on plant, animal, and human physiological systems. For example, a primary question is, How do humans adapt to the space environment and readapt on return to Earth?

This question is related to physiological changes facing astronauts during extended space travel. Even relatively short spaceflights produce physiological alterations that include bone demineralization, cardiovascular deconditioning, muscular atrophy, immune dysfunction, and postflight vestibular disruptions. Although apparent in many astronauts during short space flights, these changes have generally remained below the level of a clinical problem. With increasingly longer exposures to a microgravity environment, such changes may become clinically pronounced. There are also issues of limiting exposure to ionizing radiation and the maintenance of mental health during long missions. Critical science questions for the life sciences are listed in Box 3.3.

Microgravity research focuses on understanding physical and chemical processes in the reduced-gravity environment. Not only are these processes central to the successful exploration and development of space, but the removal of gravitational constraints may also open new avenues for progress in science and technology. The specific systems and processes of interest span fluid dynamics and transport phenomena, materials science, combustion science, biotechnology, and low-temperature physics. Critical science questions are listed in Box 3.4.

The role of R&DA programs—their relationship to other components of a science program—is obscured by the differing definitions and content of R&DA across NASA program offices (Box 3.5). Although these differences are explained, in part, by variations in the character of the science among science disciplines, some of the differences are clearly arbitrary. Similarly, the budget categories for R&DA-type activities are fragmented; funding can reside within the R&A program, the advanced technology development (ATD) program, the MO&DA program, or the suborbital program.⁴ The term "R&DA" used in the text of this report and in the data presented in Chapter 4 includes these elements (ATD, MO&DA, R&A, and suborbital programs). For many observers inside and outside the agency

who have not been students of the R&DA budgets, it has been difficult to correlate the impact of R&DA budget and policy changes with NASA science. There is no simple relationship between the agency's budget components and the goals for R&A outlined for each NASA science program office. The task group tried to bring the various programmatic elements together with their budgets as a first step toward linking budget trends to changing priorities.

Despite the disjointed nature of R&DA, the task group and the Space Studies Board isolated a set of components they consider to be common, fundamental elements of R&DA programs. These components are (1) theoretical investigations; (2) new instrument development; (3) exploratory or supporting ground-based and suborbital research; (4) interpretation of data from individual or multiple space missions; (5) management of data; (6) support of U.S. investigators who participate in international missions; and (7) education, outreach, and public information. Their role, in part, is not unlike the sequential discipline of hypothesis, test, and synthesis referred to as the scientific method.

1. Theoretical Investigations.

Theory plays a unifying role in the quest to understand nature by identifying important observational or experimental questions and providing a coherent framework for observations that may at first appear unrelated. Theory includes the development of numerical models and computer simulations that facilitate the broadest feasible applications of data from individual observations and the development of predictive capabilities. R&DA strategies support theoretical investigations that complement experimental programs.

2. New Instrument Development.

Many of the instruments that have enabled research in space have been developed under R&DA programs by small groups of innovative researchers in NASA centers, universities, and industry. Even instruments that fly on major missions often have design and proof-of-concept heritages that were funded by R&DA programs. R&DA funding for instrument development assumes even greater importance for smaller, faster, cheaper and technology-driven missions. This applies equally to robotic spacecraft and piloted platforms such as the International Space Station (ISS).

3. Exploratory Or Supporting Ground-Based and Suborbital Research.

Many disciplines require extensive supporting ground-based research to make effective use of space-based opportunities. Examples include ground-based and airborne observations of planets or galaxies, ground-based validation of satellite observations, airborne sampling of the atmosphere, and drop-tower experiments of micro-gravity effects.

4. Interpretation of Data from Individual Or Multiple Space Missions.

Major missions were once expected to fund extensive data analysis. With current policies that favor many much smaller missions making more limited observations and with the ascendancy of the ethic that publicly funded space data should rapidly be made public, data synthesis from one or more space missions to validate or refute hypotheses is increasingly the responsibility of R&DA programs.

5. Management of Data.

Careful stewardship of data and information is central to maximizing near-and long-term payoffs from R&DA-sponsored programs. Data management includes creating cata-

logues for data, conducting inventories of the data, and archiving the data. The success of data management programs can be measured by the ease with and rate at which the research community can access the data.

6. Support of U.S. Investigators Who Participate in International Missions.

NASA has a long record of productive international collaborations with other nations and groups of nations.⁵ The European Space Agency's (ESA's) Giotto mission, the Japanese Yohkoh mission, the Soviet Vega mission, the German Roentgen satellite, and the ESA Infrared Space Observatory are only a few of the many successful collaborative programs. R&DA programs have helped bridge research gaps in U.S. programs by supporting U.S. investigators' participation in international missions.

7. Education, outreach, and public information. The drama and adventure of science in space attract students to science and mathematics. Whether or not these students continue with space-related studies, the benefit to the nation of having a populace that is scientifically literate is unarguable. NASA's outreach programs and its R&DA programs are naturally complementary in that R&DA programs are often the source of the information that fuels outreach activities, and students who are influenced by outreach programs often find themselves working on R&DA projects first as undergraduates, then as research assistants in graduate school, and later as postdoctoral researchers.⁶

Although the contributions of R&DA activities to science and to the nation may be demonstrable, as illustrated in Chapter 2, the role and importance of R&DA to NASA and other agencies have been difficult to describe. Some agency and government officials have viewed the programs as "entitlements" for scientists. Moreover, decision makers report that they lack an appreciable understanding of R&DA, its direction, and its performance or output.

Without question, the task of linking measurable and quantifiable outputs to R&DA activities is difficult and echoes attempts to find "metrics" for government-funded research and development. However, the link between R&DA and the agency and enterprise strategic plans is one means by which to assess R&DA's performance and direction. NASA's science strategic plans are all built on a sequence of key elements—goals, objectives, implementation approaches,⁷ priorities, performance measures— that define the strategy for the program. The fundamental underpinnings of the strategy are critical science questions that the science program seeks to answer; these questions constitute the basis for the goals of the program. Increasingly, agency strategic plans are also focused on the applications of space sciences to practical needs. These applications, if they are to be effective, must be anchored in a strong science base.

R&DA provides an especially important and powerful means of ensuring that a strategy's goals, objectives, and critical science questions are rooted in good science and that they evolve to reflect scientific progress. It influences all elements of a strategy. For instance, R&DA serves as the platform from which to develop and improve implementation approaches (e.g., via development of new technologies) and through which the results of the program are extracted (e.g., via data analyses) to create meaningful results, performance measures, and progress in achieving initial goals and objectives. When programs are inadequately anchored by critical science questions, we find projects whose primary objectives are the collection of data; programs that continue without significant discoveries or advances; and results that can be forgotten without penalty. The more the R&DA activities are integrated into the strategy and managed with a view to enhancing the implementation and evolution of the strategy, the stronger is the overall program.

The effectiveness of R&DA's contribution to a strategy relies on the balance and health of R&DA programs as a whole. R&DA can be evaluated by examining the extent to which it contributes to progress in implementing the strategic plan. For example, one can ask, What is the impact of R&DA on refining critical questions, defining new and better approaches and technologies, answering critical

questions (data analysis), and placing answers within a scientific context (e.g., theory)? Other measures of R&DA contributions to NASA and the scientific community might entail exploring whether R&DA is sustaining an adequately sized research community, generating new ideas, identifying forward-looking technologies, providing infrastructure to permit widespread use of flight data, and providing training for new researchers and engineers.

The task group recognizes that serendipitous discoveries often depend on investigators having flexibility within their grants to explore anomalous observations or occasionally follow their curiosity. The task group believes that this is the nature of a research grant as opposed to a contract and does not wish the distinction to be lost. Within this context, however, it is important that R&DA projects be linked to critical science questions and that the linkages be stronger as project costs increase.

NASA's efforts to streamline and simplify missions so as to increase the flight rate also provide increased opportunities for investigators to access spaceflight data. Shorter-duration missions also allow effective responses to exciting new science discoveries, the rapid infusion of new technologies, and opportunities for involvement by young scientists. Examples of NASA programs employing this approach include the Earth System Science Pathfinder (ESSP) program for applications and the Small Explorer (SMEX) and Discovery programs for solar system exploration. The task group supports these approaches and notes the Explorer program as an exemplary case (Box 3.6).

The agency's move to smaller and shorter-duration flight programs has also introduced new demands on R&DA programs. For instance, much of the science and some of the technologies previously developed under lengthy flight projects will now be funded out of the research base. Similarly, those who submitted proposals to the ESSP program were directed to request only the funds necessary to collect and validate flight data; more general analyses of the data were to be provided through projects

funded by R&DA programs.⁸ Previously, a significant fraction of data analyses were funded by flight programs. Other emerging stresses on the R&DA program include the trend away from long flight project development periods, which allowed the development of project-unique technologies. Some flight projects in the past even carried definition-phase funds to develop needed technologies. Now shorter flight projects may be expected to be ready for launch within 3 years of project approval. In such a compressed schedule there is no time to develop new technologies. Thus, mission-specific technologies are now expected to be funded out of the research base.

The role of R&DA in supporting elements of the nation's scientific infrastructure is often obscured by NASA's image as a "mission agency." R&DA programs are primary sources of support for scientists outside NASA whose work benefits from access to space or use of aerospace technologies, and they are the dominant sources of support for NASA's in-house scientists. Not only are these programs of discovery, but they also educate each new generation of researchers in space-related sciences, engineering, and project management skills, and they stimulate interest in science and mathematics for many others. For space-related sciences, NASA's responsibility is equivalent to that of the National Science Foundation or the National Institutes of Health for disciplines that rely primarily on ground-rather than space-based observations.

In the face of flat or decreasing NASA science budgets, it is important to examine whether the agency's R&DA program can adequately meet the combination of traditional and new roles over the full range of scientific disciplines and research institutions.