Progress Toward Implementation of the 2013 Decadal Survey for Solar and Space Physics A Midterm Assessment (2020) / Chapter Skim
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3 Progress, Opportunities, and Challenges for Decadal Survey Research Goals and Recommendations
3 Progress, Opportunities, and Challenges for Decadal Survey Research Goals and Recommendations
Pages 49-90
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In contrast, the NASA overall budget rose by 23 percent over this time period, and the NASA Science Mission Directorate (SMD) budget rose by 30 percent.
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program CISM summer school renamed Boulder Space Weather Summer Continue NSF CISM summer school School, administered and organized by NCAR, funded by NSF Have NSF community workshops for professional development of Continuation of Annual CEDAR, GEM Summer Student Workshops graduate students Recognize Solar and Space Physics as subdiscipline for NSF's annual Survey of Earned Doctorates Color Key: NASA, NSF, NOAA/other FIGURE 3.1 Highlights of progress and plans for the 2013 decadal survey research recommendations.
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, the 2014 Heliophysics roadmap (bottom) , and as presented by HPD Director Fox in April 2019 (next page)
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and GDC are substantially delayed compared with the Heliophysics roadmap, even though the actual NASA HPD budget exceeds the roadmap forecast. As of October 2019, the IMAP mission is in its formulation phase; the GDC mission has had only a community-supported concept study; and there are no current plans to start the DYNAMIC or MEDICI missions.
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Prior to her arrival, there had been six different directors or acting directors since 2011. Despite management and budgetary challenges, NASA successfully launched three large-class missions -- Van Allen Probes, Magnetic Multiscale Mission (MMS)
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3.2 6.1 5.2 10.4 11.0 6.9 Laboratory Nuclear, Atomic, and Plasma Physics 0.2 0.8 0.9 0.8 0.6 0.6 (LNAPP) Space Weather Science and Applications 5.0 15.7 20.0 15.9 Total 65.0 65.9 78.4 122.1 161.8 155.3 ROADMAP Expected Budget 59 60 69 74 99.4 107 NOTE: Provided by NASA HPD and the summed expected research budget from the NASA HPD roadmap.
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. NOTE: AER = Aeronomy; AO = Arecibo Observatory; GSF = Geospace Facilities; MAG = Magnetospheric Physics; STR = Solar-Terrestrial Relations; SWX = Space Weather.
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NSF has also continued support of the Center for Integrated Space Weather Monitoring (CISM) summer school, now renamed the Boulder Space Weather Summer School.
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During more than 6 years of operation, IRIS has enabled crucial research on each of the four key science goals of the solar and space physics decadal survey, as well as many of the research focus areas of the Heliophysics roadmap. The application of machine learning techniques, combined with the extensive database of IRIS observations, has also revolutionized our diagnostic capabilities of the solar chromosphere, a key region in the solar atmosphere that will be the focus of NSF's new 4m DKIST telescope.
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The initiation of DRIVE was recommended to maximize the science return from NASA heliophysics missions and NSF large solar and space physics ground-based facilities by coordinating existing research programs and making specific, cost-effective augmentations. Specifically, DRIVE aims to "diversify" observing platforms, "realize" the scientific potential of existing assets, "integrate" observing platforms into successful investigations, "venture" forward with new technologies, and "educate" the future heliophysics workforce.
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For example, one of the highly successful NSF Geospace CubeSats is the Colorado Student Space Weather Experiment with more than 20 science papers, including one in Nature (Li et al., 2017)
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NASA SMD released the first grant solicitation for scientific CubeSats as part of ROSES 2013.8 The first NASA Heliophysics CubeSat science mission, the Miniature X-ray Solar Spectrometer (MinXSS) , was launched in December 2015 to the International Space Station (ISS)
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Decadal Survey Recommendation: NSF's CubeSat program should be augmented to enable at least two new starts per year. Detailed metrics should be maintained, documenting the accomplish ments of the program in terms of training, research, technology development, and contributions to space weather forecasting.
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Chapter 6 discusses how the solar and space physics community could improve their chances of being awarded a mid-scale facility. Finding 3.4: NASA and NSF have provided a number of opportunities for the science community to add to the array of diverse observing platforms that enable heliophysics science, including a robust and growing NASA CubeSat program, continuation of a strong suborbital program, and creation of a NSF midscale facilities program.
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included a one-time $2.50 million investment in GONG to increase its robustness for future space weather 13 For Heliophysics, the report noted that CubeSats can provide measurements from high risk orbits, augment large facilities with targeted supporting measurements, and have the potential to enable constellation missions.
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NSO proposals to the Air Force and NSF to enhance the synoptic instrumentation for research and space weather operations were declined in 2019. To maintain and grow the synoptic program beyond the NOAA-NSO agreement, NSO would need additional funding sources prior to 2021.
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As another example, DKIST construction funds came from the NSF facilities budget, while its operations budget and grants program will be in the AST budget -- a budget that will not be incremented because of the new major facility. This results in the paradox that the world's most scientifically powerful ground-based solar telescope will reduce the funding available to support that very telescope's scientific potential.
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Finding 3.8: The operations and maintenance model for NSF's large facilities has had significant impacts on the AGS and AST budgets. DRIVE/Realize for NASA In order to realize the scientific potential of the HSO, the decadal survey recommendations to NASA included increased MO&DA funding and institution of a mission-specific GI program.
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The Changing Landscape Related to Realizing Scientific Potential Broad community involvement in NASA Heliophysics missions is critical for realizing their maximum scientific potential. The GI program, while extremely valuable, has traditionally enabled such participation primarily after launch.
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Finding 3.9: A model similar to the PS Program used in the Planetary Science Division would contribute to realizing the scientific potential of Heliophysics missions by ensuring broad and diverse community participation. DRIVE/Realize and the Role of Data Science in Solar and Space Physics Another development mentioned in the decadal survey, but which has become even more pressing in recent years, is the size of data sets and our ability to efficiently store, retrieve, and analyze the data in a reproducible way.
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In addition to these general computing applications, the number of open-source software packages specific to the solar and space physics community has grown considerably over the last 5 years,19 such as space weather open-source applications in the Community Coordinated Modeling Center (CCMC)
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An example of an existing program is the Large Synoptic Survey Telescope Data Science Fellowship Program, which teaches data skills not easily addressed by current astrophysics programs. Interdisciplinary Collaboration: Establishing Opportunities for Solar and Space Physicists to Collaborate with Data Scientists, Statisticians, and Computer Scientists To effectively implement modern statistical and computational techniques, the solar and space physics community will need support for engaging in interdisciplinary collaboration with data scientists, statisticians, and computer scientists specializing in machine learning and data mining.
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However, there is still no clear home for outer heliosphere research at NSF. Finding 3.12: The placement of solar and space physics in multiple divisions and directorates arises from the cross-cutting relevance of the science.
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At the same time, both have uncovered new phenomena in the outer heliosphere that cannot be understood with the measurements of their limited payload. One exception is the specific attention given to the ongoing necessity of L1 solar wind observations and coronagraphs to monitor Earth space weather conditions and to enable space weather–related science.
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Applying knowledge from heliophysics research also helps to interpret stellar activity in other systems, while observing other Sun-like stars can teach us about the potential extremes of solar activity. Similarly, heliophysics research contributes to exoplanet science through the applications of concepts and models used for solar system planet–solar wind interactions and space weather influences on atmospheres and surfaces.
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Decadal Survey Recommendation: NASA and NSF together should create heliophysics science centers to tackle the key science problems of solar and space physics that require multidisci plinary teams of theorists, observers, modelers, and computer scientists, with annual funding in the range of $1 million to $3 million for each center for 6 years, requiring NASA funds ramping to $8 million per year (plus increases for inflation)
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The new NASA Heliophysics Space Weather Science and Applications (SWxSA) program, as discussed in Chapter 4, could explore space weather partnerships with Artemis flight opportunities and in collaboration with the NASA Human Exploration and Operations Mission Directorate.
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FIGURE 3.8 Technology Development: HTIDeS. SOURCE: Nicola Fox, NASA HPD Director, presentation to the committee on February 25, 2019.
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The 2019 selections for the NSF FDSS program meet the goal of this DRIVE recommendation, although a regular cadence is needed to ensure that this program has a positive impact on solar and space physics. Decadal Survey Recommendation: A suitable replacement for the NSF Center for Integrated Space Weather Modeling summer school should be competitively selected, and NSF should enable opportunities for focused community workshops that directly address professional development skills for graduate students.
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The CISM summer school, now the Boulder Space Weather Summer School, has been funded by the NSF. In addition, NASA has continued to fund the Heliophysics Summer School.
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These include ensuring funding for science areas that fall between divisions such as outer heliosphere research, full participation in HSCs, and recognition of solar and space physics as a subdiscipline in the annual survey of earned doctorates. In addition to evaluating the progress on decadal survey recommendations, the committee identified new opportunities that have emerged since the decadal survey was published.
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5. ASA should find ways to increase solar and space physics community participation in strategic N missions and enhance the diversity of mission teams.
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The 2018 SALMON opportunity solicited several different types of MoO. Two technology demonstrations and two science missions were selected for Phase A study as potential rideshares for the IMAP mission.33 It is anticipated that one from each category will be selected to launch with IMAP.
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For one of the slots, NOAA has partnered with NASA to launch its Space Weather Follow-On mission to L1.36 As discussed above, in 2018, NASA released a call for both a science and a technology demonstration MoO to fly as rideshares with the IMAP mission. While rideshares can contribute to reduced cost and increased flight opportunities, the potential impact of delays imposed on the major mission by the minor mission has to be managed.
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mission line that is cost-capped at $520 million per mission in fiscal year 2012 dollars including full life-cycle costs. Decadal Survey Recommended STP Science Targets: Although the new STP program would involve moderate missions being chosen competitively, the survey committee recommends that their science targets be ordered as follows so as to systematically advance understanding of the full coupled solar-terrestrial system: R3.1: The first new STP science target is to understand the outer heliosphere and its interac tion with the interstellar medium, as illustrated by the reference mission Interstellar Mapping and Acceleration Probe (IMAP)
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The launch date for Solar outer heliosphere and its IMAP anticipated in the decadal survey was 2021 and had already been shifted to 2022 by the time NASA issued its survey implementation plan in the 2014 Roadmap. The second STP science target would study NASA PROGRAM IMPLEMENTATION 129 the variability in space weather driven by lower-atmosphere weather on Earth.
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However, these missions do not adequately observe Earth's poles and thus will not fully address the decadal survey top-level Research Recommendation 3.2 "to provide a comprehensive understanding of the variability in space weather driven by lower-atmosphere weather on Earth." As discussed in Chapter 2, progress made since the decadal survey highlights an increasing community need for a DYNAMIC-like whole atmosphere mission, particularly to resolve day-to-day wave and mean state variability, and to obtain the highly coveted day and nighttime wind measurements throughout the whole thermosphere that drive many processes in the AIM system. GOLD, AWE, and ICON can only partially address science questions that would be answered by DYNAMIC.
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The targeted science goals and measurement capabilities of GOLD, AWE, and ICON do not address several key objectives in the top-level decadal survey science challenge posed by DYNAMIC. Recommendation 3.4: NASA should take the steps necessary to prepare for the release an Annouce ment of Opportunity for a DYNAMIC-like mission.41 3.6 IMPLEMENT A LARGE LWS GDC-LIKE MISSION Decadal Survey Research Recommendation R4.0: The survey committee recommends that, following the launch of RBSP and SPP, the next LWS science target focus on how Earth's atmo sphere absorbs solar wind energy.
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8. Any space weather operational goals or requirements.
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Space Weather 16:1817.
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310-313 in Space Weather of the Heliosphere: Processes and Forecasts (C. Foullon and O.E.
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2016b. Heliophysics V: Space Weather and Society.
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