Final Spitzer Director's Discretionary Time Available

NASA's Spitzer space telescope is executing the “Beyond” phase of the mission — the final 3+ years. The Beyond phase will continue through 29 January 2020, and the observatory will be decommissioned on 30 January 2020. Through the remainder of the mission Director's Discretionary Time (DDT) proposals are solicited for new, high-impact science programs that “must be done” before the end of the mission.

1. Only Priority 1 science programs that must be executed before the end of the Spitzer mission will be selected.

2. All proposals receive science and technical reviews. The deadline for submission of programs that are not time critical is 3 May 2019 at 12 noon PDT. The earliest possible execution for observations approved in that review is late July. The review of programs ≥100 hours may involve special handling.

3. Time critical DDT proposals may be submitted at any time through the end of the mission. Any proposal submitted after 3 May must include a brief description of why it was not possible to submit the proposal by the deadline. This text should be included in the “Other Comments” box on the proposal submission webform. The review of time-critical proposals will be done as rapidly as resources allow. 

4. Proposals of any size may be submitted. Proposers should carefully check their target visibilities to understand what fraction of the time the target they are requesting is visible.

5. Investigators should not utilize DDT to resubmit all or part of a proposal that was rejected by the normal peer review process. 

6. The default proprietary period for all DDT programs is zero days. A maximum 90-day proprietary period can be proposed and should be justified.

7. DDT requests must include the following:

•  A strong scientific justification (and justification of time criticality, if requested).
•  A strong justification for timing constraints, if requested.
•  A description of the long-term legacy value of the program.
•  Completed Astronomical Observation Requests (AORs).

8. All required materials to prepare the proposal are available on the proposal kit webpage.

•  Read and follow the instructions in the DDT proposal guidelines (version 5). 
•  Use DDT proposal template (version 3) to prepare the proposal file, and adhere to the page limits.

9. Submit proposals through the DDT webform (not Spot).

10. Direct all questions to the Helpdesk at [email protected].