NASA LaRC Solicitation: Teaming Opportunity for a Mars Aerial Platform Scout Mission (MARS)

Synopsis – Feb 15, 2006

General Information

Solicitation Number: SS-NNL06MARSAerial3
Posted Date: Feb 15, 2006
FedBizOpps Posted Date: Feb 15, 2006
Original Response Date: Mar 02, 2006
Current Response Date: Mar 02, 2006
Classification Code: A — Research and Development
NAICS Code: 541710 – Research and Development in the Physical, Engineering, and Life Sciences

Contracting Office Address

NASA/Langley Research Center, Mail Stop 144, Industry Assistance Office, Hampton, VA 23681-0001

Description

Teaming Opportunity for a Mars Aerial Platform Scout Mission (Mars) – NASA Langley Research Center (LaRC) is seeking partners from all U.S. industries, academia, non-profit organizations, Federally Funded Research and Development Centers (FFRDC), and other government agencies to participate in developing a proposal addressing the goals and objectives for a NASA Announcement of Opportunity (AO) for the Mars Scout 2006 and Mission of Opportunity. Mars Scout missions are envisioned to be focused investigations of Martian biological, chemical and physical phenomena and processes. The Mars Scout mission opportunity was established to provide for innovative, rapid-response investigations. Mars Scout investigations are led by a Principal Investigator supported by Co-Investigators and an implementation team. These teams will pursue missions of high scientific value by utilizing observation platforms of their choice and design. The observation platform selected for use by the LaRC team is an aerial platform.

The Mars Scout AO is expected to be released in April 2006 with the step-1 proposal due 90 days later. Multiple complete mission proposals will be selected to proceed to step-2 (Phase A), with a single mission selected for implementation. A launch date in 2011 is planned.

This synopsis solicits science team partners (Co-Investigators) in the following four areas: (1) The geology of Mars with particular emphasis on surface evolution and surface features modified by wind, water, volcanism and impact processes; requires experience and expertise in analysis and interpretation of Mars geological data and in Mars mission planning and operations. (2) The geology of Mars with particular emphasis on the long-term evolution of surface and interior of Mars, including evidence of possible evidence of glaciation and surface liquid water; requires experience and expertise in analysis and interpretation of Mars geological data and in Mars mission planning and operations. (3) The geology of Mars with particular emphasis on high spatial resolution imagery of geological and terrain features and its interpretation in terms of regional-scale measurements; requires experience and expertise in analysis and interpretation of geological Mars data and in Mars mission planning and operations. (4) The chemistry of the atmosphere of Mars with particular emphasis on water-driven photochemical and chemical processes and surface-atmospheric coupling: requires knowledge, experience, expertise and application of photochemical models of the Mars atmosphere.

It is noted that two previous teaming opportunities for the Mars Aerial Platform Scout Mission were issued on March 29, 2005 (SS-NNL05MARS) and January 18, 2006 (SS-NNL06MARSAerial), seeking partners in other mission areas. Both of these opportunities are closed.

Teaming offers will be reviewed, evaluated, and selected at NASA LaRC. If selected through this synopsis, each partner is expected to become a full member of the science team and proposal development team. LaRC will require each selected partner to provide a letter of commitment in the submitted proposal. Partners will be expected to participate in future science team meetings, develop strategic science objectives and evaluate mission science data. LaRC anticipates issuing contracts, other agreements or grants to the selected science team members, provided the mission concept is selected for implementation.

Interested parties may propose as a partner for any, all, or any combination of the areas sought. Partner selections will be made by LaRC based on the listed criteria in the following order of importance: (1) Relevant Experience and Past Performance: This criterion evaluates the offeror’s relevant science experience and past performance in similar activities and mission science teams. Provide a description of relevant Mars planetary science experience including a summary of significant achievements and key publications. Each offeror shall specifically discuss the relevance of their experience in reference to the science areas described above. (2) Cost and schedule control: This criterion evaluates the offeror’s ability to control both cost and schedule. The offeror should provide evidence of successfully controlling cost and schedule for similar development programs and provide evidence of management processes in this area. (3) Technical Capability and Personnel: This criterion evaluates the offeror’s technical capability to perform the science duties, and the availability of the offeror to perform the duties. The offeror shall describe the technical capability, availability and adequacy of key personnel for the proposal and the mission.

NASA will not reimburse organizations for the cost of submitting information in response to this synopsis. NASA will not pay for technical assessment or proposal preparation costs incurred by team members.

It is expected that the teaming organizations will participate actively in the proposal process and that selection of the proposal for mission implementation would result in contracts, other agreements or grants for the selected partner(s). This teaming opportunity does not represent a guarantee to selection of award of any contract, agreement or grant nor is it to be construed as a commitment by NASA to pay for the information solicited. It is expected that partner(s) selected would provide (at no cost to NASA), science consultation, technical data, proposal inputs, schedule and cost estimates consistent with the NASA Scout guidelines as described in the AO.

Responses to this partnering synopsis shall be limited to 5 pages for each science area of interest (i. e., Offerors responding to one or more of the four areas may submit up to 5 pages per area). Responses shall address each of the aforementioned evaluation criteria. A cover page that clearly identifies the area of interest addressed by the response does not count towards the total allocated page count.

All responses shall be submitted to LaRC electronically via e-mail by 5:00 PM Eastern Standard Time on March 2, 2006 to: Brian D. Killough at Email: Brian.D.Killough@larc.nasa.gov

Science and Programmatic questions should be directed to: Dr. Joel S. Levine at (757)864-5692 or e-mail: Joel.S.Levine@nasa.gov

Point of Contact

Name: Nancy M Sessoms
Title: Contracting Officer
Phone: (757) 864-2471
Fax: (757) 864-7709
Email: Nancy.M.Sessoms@nasa.gov

Name: Liliana J Richwine
Title: Contract Specialist/Contracting Officer
Phone: (757) 864-2478
Fax: (757) 864-7709
Email: Liliana.J.Richwine@nasa.gov