Notice to the Community: Exobiology Proposals Due May 2018

Important Notice to the Astrobiology Community:
A Notice of Intent (NOI) for 2018 Exobiology proposals is due on April 16, 2018. The 2018 Exobiology proposal due date is May 24, 2018.

Exobiology in ROSES 2018 Solicitation
 
NASA’s Science Mission Directorate (SMD) has announced the release of its annual omnibus solicitation for basic and applied research, Research Opportunities in Space and Earth Science (ROSES) 2018, available at http://solicitation.nasaprs.com/ROSES2018.
 
Included in the ROSES solicitation is the Exobiology Program, an element of the NASA Astrobiology Program. Research in Exobiology is centered on the origin and early evolution of life, the potential of life to adapt to different environments, and the implications for life elsewhere. This research is conducted in the context of NASA’s ongoing exploration of our stellar neighborhood and the identification of biosignatures for in situ and remote sensing applications.
 
For further information on the science scope of Astrobiology, please refer to the Astrobiology Strategy, which can be found on the Astrobiology web page at: https://astrobiology.nasa.gov/research/astrobiology-at-nasa/astrobiology-strategy/.
 
The areas of research emphases in this solicitation are as follows:
• Prebiotic Evolution
• Early Evolution of Life and the Biosphere
• Evolution of Advanced Life
• Large scale environmental change and Macro-evolution
• Biosignatures and Life Elsewhere

Proposals are sought for new projects within the scope of the Exobiology Program. Proposals submitted in response to this program element should be for new work that is not currently supported by the program or for investigations that would extend to their next logical phase those tasks that have been funded in the Astrobiology program, but whose periods of performance expired in the last year or are expiring in the first half of this year.

Program Exclusions
Research aimed at investigating the habitability of planetary bodies in our Solar System other than Earth or in other planetary systems should be submitted to the Habitable Worlds program (E.4).

Proposals focused on the formation and stability of habitable planets and the formation of complex organic molecules in space and their delivery to planetary surfaces should be submitted to the Emerging Worlds program (C.2).

Proposals aimed at the identification and characterization of radio signals from extrasolar planets that may harbor intelligent life are not solicited at this time.

Important Dates
Notice of Intent (NOI) Due Date: April 16, 2018
Proposal Due Date: May 24, 2018

For additional information, visit: https://nspires.nasaprs.com/external/solicitations/summary!init.do?solId={230826F5-3897-2444-00D2-FF0DA8FBC59A}&path=open

NOTICE: This program element no longer uses the two-step proposal submission process common in Appendix C. Instead, a Notice of Intent (NOI) is requested in place of a Step-1 proposal. NOI and proposal due dates are given in Tables 2 and 3 of ROSES.

Proposals to this program element are subject to a relevance requirement in addition to and that supersedes those detailed in the ROSES Summary of Solicitation.