Astro2020 Decadal Survey Released – NASA Ignores It
Keith’s note: It has been 24 hours and NASA has made no mention of this report. This new Decadal Survey covers the astronomy and astrophysics things that NASA will spend billions on over the coming decades. You’d think that this forward-looking, optimistic appraisal of the field would be something that NASA PAO and SMD would embrace. Yet NASA.gov, @NASA and SMD and PAO seem to be content to simply ignore it. NASA gets handed great news and it squanders the chance to make the support for its research more widely known and appreciated. Go figure.
New Report Charts Path for Next Decade of Astronomy and Astrophysics; Recommends Future Ground and Space Telescopes, Scientific Priorities, Investment
“A new decadal survey from the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine identifies scientific priorities, opportunities, and funding recommendations for the next 10 years of astronomy and astrophysics. The report presents a visionary plan for the field to pursue discovery and exploration of habitable planets, enhance understanding of the dynamic and changing universe, and study what drives the formation of galaxies. It recommends an ambitious program of investments to strengthen the profession, change how large strategic space missions are developed and matured, and achieve broad scientific capabilities.”
– Pathways to Discovery in Astronomy and Astrophysics for the 2020s, NAS Decadal Report
– Chairs Johnson, Beyer, and Stevens Statement on Release of Decadal Survey on Astronomy and Astrophysics 2020, House Science Committee
– Next Generation Very Large Array Strongly Endorsed by Decadal Survey, NRAO
– American Astronomical Society Supports Astro2020 Decadal Survey, AAS
– NOIRLab Response to Astro2020 Decadal Survey, NOIRLab
I live in Rio de Janeiro and just the other day I saw these NASA purses at a C&A store. I don’t know if they’re licensed but whatever. People not even interested in space exploration here actually buy them! Just saying…
Of course. NASA is one of humanity’s most valuable brands.
No license required, they just can’t imply any endorsement or affiliation (which probably doesn’t apply in this case.)
Would they have recommending more space scopes if the lower-cost delivery capabilities existed to the deploy them?
No. Launch cost is not what cost the most in a new Flagship space telescope program. Developing the scientific instruments and the satellite bus is about half the cost and operating the telescope is about one third the cost. Most of the expenditure is salaries for development and operations.
It certainly isn’t in this decadal survey, but low launch costs may eventually have a significant impact on the overall cost. The development costs are, in part, due to trying to cram as much capability as possible into the available launch mass and volume. And that’s driven by the high cost of a launch. Low cost launches open the possibility of throwing mass rather than engineers’ time (and salaries) at development problems.
I’ve had this exact conversation with various powers that be in regards to space telescopes (and who have been doing space missions back to the 70s), in particular that the Falcon was cheap enough that we could start launching Buicks instead of machines made of unobtainium (and that was before the Tesla Roadster launch). But the general consensus was that the pressure to include more stuff due to feature creep will always drive the design to try and cram more into the mass profile.
The last few proposals I was on we were instructed to use SpaceX pricing. So that’s built in already.
I think the earlier comment was about SpaceX’ Starship, not Falcon 9 or Heavy. The answer to that is no; the low cost of a Starship isn’t considered because (1) it hasn’t flown yet and (2) no one actually knows what that low cost will be once it does fly.
The decadal survey clocks in at over 600 pages long. It took me a solid day to read the whole thing. I would be surprised if NASA has an official response for at least a week. The whole thing has been very hush-hush this time. While I could guess what it would mostly be about, I had no idea at all what the actual statements would be until I read it.
“this time”? National Academies studies and reports have been like that for a long time. They have all sorts of rules to avoid conflict of interest or anyone trying to influence the results. For the planetary science decadal survey (due out in March), it’s occasionally been embarrassing. The people on the panels make presentations on the status of the survey and collect input from the community. On one occasion, the chairs of two of the sub-panels made a joint presentation, and made a point of saying they wanted the process to be as transparent as possible. Then, during the questions and answers, about half of their answers were, “We’re not allowed to talk about that.”
Well, I’ll only say that I knew a few people who prior to the 2010 survey release clearly called the superfecta.