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Hubble Space Telescope
Cycle 20 Announcement

Release Notice: December 07, 2011

NASA and The Space Telescope Science Institute (STScI) are pleased to announce the Cycle 20 Call for Proposals for Hubble Space Telescope (HST) Observations and funding for Archival Research and Theoretical Research programs. Participation in this program is open to all categories of organizations, both domestic and foreign, including educational institutions, profit and nonprofit organizations, NASA Centers, and other Government agencies.

This solicitation for proposals will be open through February 24, 2012 8:00pm EST. The Astronomer's Proposal Tools (APT), which is required for Phase I proposal submission, will be made available/released for Cycle 20 Phase I use around the 2nd week of January 2012 (if you need to start earlier you can request access to the beta version). Results of the selection will be announced in early June 2012.

Questions can be addressed to the STScI Help Desk (email: help@stsci.edu; phone: 410-338-1082).

Deadlines

  • Phase I Proposals: February 24, 2012 8:00 pm EST
  • E/PO Proposals: August 22, 2012 5:00 pm EDT

Late Breaking News

What's New for Cycle 20

  • Right Ascension (RA) Restrictions: As a result of a large backlog of approved orbits clustered in certain parts of the sky, RA restrictions will be imposed for GO observations in this cycle. Users are restricted to a maximum of 30 orbits per proposal within each of the following RA intervals: 165<RA<205 degrees (11h00m<RA<13h40m), and 350<RA<75 degrees (23h20m<RA<5h00m). Furthermore, any observations within these RA ranges must have increased scheduling flexibility. SNAP programs are not subject to the RA restrictions, but moving-target and Large Program observations are impacted.
  • Change to Default Proprietary Period for Large Programs: Following the recommendations of the Space Telescope Users Committee, data taken for all Large and Treasury Programs will have NO proprietary period as a default. Proposers may request proprietary periods of up to 12 months, subject to their justification being reviewed by the TAC.
  • Opportunity for Multi-Cycle Target of Opportunity Programs (ToO): Following the recommendations of the Space Telescope Users Committee, proposers may now apply for Long-Term status (up to two cycles) for ToO programs that target objects with an extremely low probability of occurrence during one cycle.
  • The procedures for verifying APT submissions have been updated: A message verifying a successful submission will appear in the Submission Log on the Submission Screen in APT within about a minute of submission. The PI and all CoIs will receive an automatic e-mail acknowledgement that the merged PDF submission was received successfully. ONLY after the Phase I deadline has passed, and all submissions are in their final form, will the PI and CoIs receive final notification that their submission has been successfully processed; this e-mail will mark the completion of that submission.
  • Joint HST/XMM-Newton proposals are now possible
  • Click here for details on these and other changes for Cycle 20

Release Documents

The Call for Proposals describes the policies and procedures for submitting a HST Phase I proposal. Get the CP as: PDF [US Letter Size], PDF [A4 Size], or as HTML.

The Primer provides an introductory overview of the Hubble Space Telescope and explains how to calculate the appropriate number of orbits for an observing proposal. Get the Primer as: PDF [US Letter Size], PDF [A4 Size], or as HTML.

Science Justification Templates for Cycle 20 HST Phase I

HST Phase I Roadmap

The Roadmap is a step-by-step guide to proposing and submitting an HST proposal.

DD Time

Up to 10% of the available HST observing time may be reserved for Director's Discretionary (DD) allocation.

Shortcuts

Scheduling Considerations