Overview

The Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope’s Wide Field Instrument’s observing program will include both Core Community Surveys, defined by a community-led process, and General Astrophysics Surveys, for which a minimum of 25% of Roman’s observing time will be reserved in the first five years and which will primarily be selected via traditional peer-reviewed calls for proposals.

In 2021 the Roman Project released a Request for Information to the science community to solicit comments on (a) whether to select an Early-Definition General Astrophysics Survey, and (b) to outline and submit survey concepts that would demonstrably benefit from selection as an Early-Definition General Astrophysics Survey. Twenty complete submissions were received with over 340 unique authors. A review of these submissions has been completed by an Early-Definition Astrophysics Survey Assessment Committee.

The committee found that there was sufficient justification to define an Early-Definition General Astrophysics Survey through a community-led process. The top-ranked concept was a survey of the Galactic plane. Accordingly, a community-defined Roman Galactic Plane General Astrophysics Survey, of up to approximately 700 hours, will be defined by a committee of community members utilizing community input in an analogous method to the definition of Roman's Core Community Surveys by the Core Community Survey definition committees. There are no mission level science requirements on a Roman Galactic Plane Survey, leaving the full parameter space available to define the observational strategies (filters, depth, cadence, etc.) in a way that will enable a broad range of astrophysical investigations with Roman data of the Galactic Plane.

Definition Committee Membership

A Galactic Plane General Astrophysics Survey Definition Committee charged with providing a executable survey to the Roman mission. The membership of that committee is:

• Bob Benjamin, U Wisconsin-Whitewater (Co-chair)
• Rachel Street, Las Cumbres Observatory (Co-chair)
• Rachael Beaton, STScI
• Sean Carey, Caltech/IPAC
• Kishalay De, MIT
• Janet Drew, University College London
• Matthew De Furio, UT Austin
• Thomas Kupfer, Universität Hamburg
• Dante Minniti, Universidad Andrés Bello
• Roberta Paladini, Caltech/IPAC
• Eddie Schlafly, STScI
• Catherine Zucker, CfA | Harvard & Smithsonian

White Paper and Science Pitches

Two different categories were solicited by the project to inform the definition of the Galactic Plane Survey.

The science pitch option were intended to provide those with limited time, or a kernel of an idea, with a means to convey that information to the committee that will define the survey. This option aimed to capture, from a large cross-section of the community, the full breadth of science investigations possible with a Roman Galactic Plane Survey, as well as high level information on what aspects of survey design are most important for these investigations. Science pitches are intended to be short, one to two paragraph descriptions describing science investigations that could be enabled by the Galactic Plane Survey.

White papers describing in more detail science investigations that could be enabled by the Galactic Plane Survey were also requested. White papers provide the Roman Mission, the definition committee, and the astronomical community with a detailed understanding of the observational strategy space over which trades need to be considered and consensus built.

White papers and science pitches were requested by May 20, 2024, but the committee is still accepting feedback. Submit your science pitch here and submit white papers as PDF files to roman-surveys@lists.nasa.gov with the subject line Galactic Plane White Paper. Include a cover page listing the title of the white paper, the name, affiliation, and contact information of the submitting author, a list of contributing authors with affiliation and contact information, any relevant scientific categories from the below list, and any additional scientific keywords. A Word template is provided here for convenience and as an example of what to provide in the cover page, but is not required to be used.

Next Steps

The definition committee will deliver a report to the Roman Observing Time Allocation Committee (ROTAC) in Spring 2025. The ROTAC will be charged with making a final recommendation to the Roman Mission on the balance between each Core Community Survey and the General Astrophysics Survey allocation.