NASA Seeks Cubesat Proposals

ROSES-11 Amendment 9: New proposal opportunities for Earth and space science experiments using short duration orbital platforms including CubeSats.

Short duration orbital platforms, such as CubeSats, may offer new capabilities for the conduct of NASA scientific research, education, and technology advancement. NASA has commenced a CubeSat Launch Initiative and begun regularly providing launch opportunities for CubeSats as secondary payloads on NASA launch vehicles.
ROSES-2011 has been amended to include the requirements for submitting proposals using short duration orbital platforms, including CubeSats, in Section IV(h) of the ROSES Summary of Solicitation.

Generally speaking, proposals for investigations that are carried out through development, launch, and operation of a short duration orbital experiment, such as one on a CubeSat, are permitted in any ROSES program element that solicits investigations for use on suborbital platforms, including aircraft, sounding rockets, and scientific balloons. In this sense, a CubeSat-based investigation is a “suborbital class” investigation even though it will generally be placed into orbit. Cube Sat based “suborbital class” investigations are subject to the same cost constraints and risk tolerance constraints that traditional suborbital investigations are subject to.

On or about May 18, 2011, this Amendment to the NASA Research Announcement “Research Opportunities in Space and Earth Sciences (ROSES) 2011” (NNH11ZDA001N) will be posted on the NASA research opportunity homepage at http://nspires.nasaprs.com/ (select “Solicitations” then “Open Solicitations” then “NNH11ZDA001N”). You can now track amendments, clarifications, and corrections to ROSES and subscribe to an RSS feed at: http://nasascience.nasa.gov/researchers/sara/grant-solicitations/roses-2011

Questions concerning the individual program elements through which short duration orbital platforms, including CubeSats, are solicited may be addressed to the NASA Point of Contact identified in the Summary of Key Information at the end of each program element appendix. General questions concerning the NASA Science Mission Directorate’s solicitation for experiments based on short duration orbital platforms, including CubeSats may be addressed to Dr. Paul Hertz, Science Mission Directorate, NASA Headquarters, Washington, DC 20546-0001; Telephone: (202) 358-0986; E-mail: paul.hertz@nasa.gov.