Fermi Gamma-ray Space Telescope

Fermi Guest Investigator Program - Historical Summary

The call for Fermi GI proposals is issued annually as part of the NASA ROSES NRA and details are in Appendix D.6 of that document. Typically, proposals are due in the February/March timeframe and each new mission cycle starts in August. Since Fermi proposals are predominantly requests for grant support - all Fermi science data products are publicly available promptly following acquisition - the proposal PIs are almost exclusively from US institutions. Nonetheless, many non-US co-Is have participated in the program. The joint observatory partnerships are also open to non-US investigators.

Proposals to participate in the Fermi Guest Investigator Program are solicited by NASA through the ROSES NRA each year (or mission cycle). This graphic shows the number of proposals submitted and the number selected each year for the first 14 years of the mission. Proposals are evaluated through a two-stage process leading to the final selection totals shown. A peer-review meeting is organized each cycle typically in the April/May timeframe during which the scientific merit of each proposal is considered. A second stage review, in which details of funding requests from those selected in the stage-I review, is held about two months or later. As you can see from the graphic, selection rates have varied significantly over the course of the mission driven by proposal pressure and funding levels.

Fermi GI Proposal History

The number of proposals submitted per cycle currently averages about 100. The selection rate has averaged slightly better than one in three over the last 4 cycles. The table also gives the selection history of Large multi-year projects.

The same information, plus oversubscription rates, is presented here in tabular form. The number of Large Project awards per cycle is also listed.

Fermi GI Proposal History in Tabular Form

The graphic below depicts the average grant awards for each mission cycle. Both Large Project and standard proposal amounts are shown. Note that in several cycles no Large Project selections were made.

Fermi GI Program: Average Grant Awards per Cycle

Topical and Programattic Breakdown:

An example of proposed and selected proposals by scientific category (based on Cycle 9) is depicted graphically below. To a large extent, for the breakdowns by topical categories and proposal types, the relative proportions of submitted and selected proposals are similar. Thus, selection is mainly driven by proposal pressure. Also shown is the topical breakdown of selected proposals for a more recent mission cycle (Cycle 14). Some evolution in the program is evident, e.g., the appearance of "multi-messenger" science as a category and an increasing emphasis on development of new analysis methods with the goal of enhanced use of the data.

Cycle 9: Submitted by Topic Cycle 9: Slections by Topics

Topical Breakdown (Cycle 14 Selected Proposals)

Fermi science is broad in scope as can be seen from these charts. A list of the title, abstracts, and principal investigators of all selected programs is available elsewhere on this website.

In addition to a broad scientific diversity, the Fermi guest Investigations encompass a variety of activities such as theory, correlative multi-wavelength observations observations and algorithm/methods development pertinant to advancing the mission goals. Representative examples of how this breaks down are depicted gtraphically below. As can be seen correlated observation programs comprises a substantial portion of the program. Theory is also supported at a high level comprising typically ~25% of the program.

Accepted Proposals by Type (Cycle 8) and Selection by Type (Cycle 14)

Proposals involving the Fermi joint observing programs with NRAO, NOAO, VERITAS, Arecibo, INTEGRAL and TESS are offered to help facilitate multiwavelength studies of gamma-ray sources. A representative example of requests and awards is listed below based on mission Cycle 9 (note that the joint Fermi-TESS program was just initiated in Cycle 14). Radio-loud AGN and rotation-powered pulsars are the predominant topics that comprise the Fermi joint observation programs (although again, the program is entirely open with no a priori quotas). Participants may also request time on a NASA sponsored super-computing facility as part of their GI proposals.

Joint Program Summary
Program Requests Awards
  Proposals Hours Proposals Hours
NRAO 19 681 7 128
NOAO 6 588 3 236
VERITAS 4 72 1 30
INTEGRAL 1 70 0 0
Arecibo 2 80 1 30
High End Computing 0 - 0 -

Input on how to best organize and implement the Fermi GI program is provided by the Fermi Users Group. Please feel free to contact a member of the users group if you have any suggestion on how the GI program might be improved going into the future.