Helio MIDEX POD - Concept 2.pdf

Partnership Opportunity Document (POD) for

NASA Goddard Space Flight Center (GSFC)

Heliophysics Medium Explorer Spacecraft and/or Instrument Booms

November 2024

1 Introduction and Scope

Current planning calls for NASA’s Science Mission Directorate (SMD) to release a Heliophysics Medium Explorer (MIDEX) Announcement of Opportunity (AO) in the summer of 2025 to solicit proposals to accomplish Decadal Survey science objectives.

In partnership with the Principal Investigator (PI)-led team, NASA Goddard Space Flight Center (GSFC) is developing a mission concept to be proposed for the Heliophysics MIDEX AO. The mission will use nominally three (possibly four if the budget allows) identical observatories, each consisting of a spacecraft bus and five science instruments, flying in highly elliptical orbits. With multiple instruments mounted on booms, GSFC is also seeking one or more partners to provide two different booms for each spacecraft (6-8 total flight booms). The booms may be provided by the spacecraft partner, through a teaming arrangement with the spacecraft partner, or through a stand-alone partnership separate from the spacecraft partner.

The partnership opportunity is being issued to select a teaming partner to serve as the satellite (spacecraft) integrator for this MIDEX mission and either the same or a second partner to provide instrument booms.

The satellite integrator activity includes:

• Three identical copies of a spacecraft bus (with an option for a fourth) consistent with a Class C mission per NPR 8705.4 Risk Classification for NASA Payloads (Note that it is possible to satisfy the requirements for a Class C mission with Class D spacecraft, see details below.)

• Instrument to spacecraft integration and environmental testing support (either at the vendor’s facility or at GSFC)

• Integration support for the observatories to the launch vehicle

• Support for initial mission operations (launch and early orbit operations) and ongoing mission support of the S/C buses.

OPTION 1: Mission Operations - GSFC may be interested in having the spacecraft provider provide mission operations support. If pursued, the spacecraft provider would be responsible for conducting routine mission operations from existing contractor-operated facilities.

The boom provider activity includes:

• Multiple booms for mounting instruments as described in the separate data package.

• Support for observatory integration and testing at the spacecraft provider’s facility.

GSFC intends to maintain an essential degree of insight into satellite integration and will exercise essential oversight to ensure that the implementation is responsive to

NASA requirements and constraints as defined in the upcoming AO (final release in 2025).

NOTE: Upon selection, GSFC may discuss, and further tailor the roles proposed by respondents in the best interests of the proposal.

The proposed mission is currently in pre-Phase A. If the proposal is downselected, the next step in the proposal process is a mission concept study culminating in a Concept Study Report (CSR), followed by a Site Visit.

The following schedule should be used as a basis for responses to this opportunity:

Release of draft AO FY2025 3rd quarter

Release of final AO FY2025 4th quarter

Pre-proposal conference ~3 weeks after final AO release

Step-1 proposal due 90 days after AO release

Selection for competitive Phase A studies

Mid 2026

Concept Study Reports (CSRs) due Early 2027

Step-2 downselect Late 2027

AO required Launch Readiness Date TBD based on AO, most likely

The dates above are estimates based on the Planning List for SMD Solicitations at somal.larc.nasa.gov, with a MIDEX AO date set at (FY) Q4 2025. More accurate dates should be available when the draft AO is released.

Total cost and cost fidelity are important issues for the proposal. The cost cap for this AO is expected to be $300M (FY25$), excluding launch vehicle, and not including mission specific adjustments to the cap. Proposed cost will include the instruments, spacecraft, instrument to spacecraft integration support, environmental testing, launch site operations, and mission and science operations for an expected mission duration of 2 years, including management and reserves. Reserves will be held at the Project level and not with the partners. A Phase A mission concept study will receive $3M (TBC) real year dollars (RY$) in funding from NASA SMD.

There will be no exchange of funds between the teaming partners for the portion of this partnership opportunity dealing with the preparation of the initial submission (Pre- Phase A, Step 1 proposal). Teaming partners are expected to support mission concept development and proposal development using internal funding. This will include considerable interaction between partners throughout this Pre-Phase-A effort. If downselected for Phase A, partial funding will be available to the teaming partners for Phase A, but company internal funding may still be required to provide support for generation of a Concept Study Report and the Site Visit. Full funding will be available for Phase B onward should the candidate mission concept be competitively selected for those additional phases.

2 Requirements

Mission Concept: To make coordinated measurements of ion flux and energy inputs through the Earth’s exobase transition region, this MIDEX concept consists of three (potentially four) identical 3-axis stabilized spacecraft which will accommodate instruments measuring in-situ electro-magnetic fields and particles. These spacecraft will be operated to provide the multiple measurements of ion fluxes and the drivers of ion escape at separated altitudes near and above the exobase. The mission is required to be NASA Class-C compliant as per NPR 7120.5. We are seeking proposals from any methodology which can demonstrate meeting this risk class, including (but not limited to):

• Three spacecraft, all parts Class-C compliant and/or with a Class-C high heritage bus. Costs for a fourth spacecraft shall be included.

• Three spacecraft with Class-D parts, but can argue that the complete bus is at Class-C level given sufficient flight heritage (as below). Costs for a fourth spacecraft shall be included.

• Four spacecraft all built with Class-D parts.

Note: A spacecraft that is not Class-C parts compliant, but has sufficient on orbit success can be classified as Class-C. See [Leitner and Hyde 2023] for full details, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.actaastro.2022.10.043. In short, to make the argument that the entire spacecraft bus should be accepted as Class-C despite not using Class-C parts, requires a minimum five recent flights at 3-year lifetime or longer, with the number of successes out of the last 5 flights divided by 5 > 0.80.

Class D components: Fully qualified per the GSFC’s standard hardware qualification requirements as specified in GSFC-STD-1000 and GSFC-STD-7000.

Instruments: Each spacecraft will carry an identical instrument complement consisting of five instruments developed by GSFC or a partner institution.

Developed at the Goddard Space Flight Center (GSFC):

1. A tophat electrostatic analyzer for ions, deployed on a partner-supplied boom

2. A vector electric field package (double-probes and Langmuir Probes), deployed on instrument-supplied booms

3. A three-axis fluxgate magnetometer measuring magnetic field fluctuations, deployed on a partner-supplied boom

From partner institutions:

4. Ionization gauge to measure neutral gas pressure

5. Tophat electrostatic analyzer to measure energetic ions and electrons

Booms: The GSFC tophat analyzer for ions and the magnetometer will need to be accommodated on partner-supplied booms. The proposed spacecraft must be able to accommodate these booms, which may be proposed together with the spacecraft, or separately. A summary of the requirements for each boom is given in the separate data package.

In addition, the electric field package has six stiff booms and a seventh boom supporting the Langmuir Probe that will need to be accommodated (but not provided by the spacecraft partner.)

The location and methodology for Observatory level Integration & Test (I&T) shall be described in the response.

More detailed information on the mission payload and spacecraft requirements will be provided to those responding with a Notice of Interest (NOI). A Notice of Interest (it is intentionally not called a notice of intent) does not obligate an organization to provide a POD response.

2.1 Spacecraft

Provide three identical fully qualified and tested spacecraft buses capable of supporting mission needs defined in the separate data package. Cost and schedule for a fourth (optional) spacecraft should also be provided.

2.2 Integration and Test

The spacecraft partner is expected to be responsible for integration and test of the mission instruments to the spacecraft bus at the spacecraft vendor’s facility. The instruments will be delivered to the S/C bus vendor for integration with the bus. Final environmental testing is expected to be performed at the spacecraft vendor’s facility unless the vendor proposes to use GSFC facilities.

Option 1: Mission Operations Center (MOC)

GSFC is also considering options for the Mission Operations Center (MOC), including using an existing GSFC MOC, a third-party MOC, or a MOC provided by the spacecraft teaming partner. Any non-GSFC selection needs to be compatible with the GSFC MOC operations. If interested in this option, the proposer may propose the use of a proposer-provided mission operations control capability. In this case, provide information on your capabilities and a ROM cost estimate in your response package.

Note that respondents are expected to submit a proposal for at least the spacecraft and associated support and/or the booms. Spacecraft respondents are encouraged to address the Mission Operations Option described above. Responding to the Option or not responding to the Option will not impact the partner selection. All interested parties are required to respond to this POD in accordance with Section 5 below.

3 Pre-Proposal Support It is expected that the selected POD respondent will provide support using their own resources to help develop the required proposal elements in response to the Heliophysics MIDEX AO in the following areas:

Item 1: Spacecraft Bus and associated support This will involve meeting with the PI, project manager, project system engineers, and other proposal team members to establish the mission architecture, to help define both end-to-end mission and elemental performance requirements, to provide well-defined interfaces for the instruments, launch vehicle and ground system elements, and to identify any necessary technology developments, study topics, and/or other risk areas that may affect mission success. More specific activities and outcomes of the proposal support are listed as the following:

• The selected respondent shall actively participate in concept development to determine a credible design-to-cost solution that meets AO constraints.

• The selected respondent shall produce a spacecraft design report that includes requirements, block diagram, components, performance, technical budgets (mass, power, data, propellant, pointing, communications, etc.), fault tolerance, verification approach, technology demonstration, risks, analyses of typical mission subsystems, cost estimate, and ground system/operation related requirements (e.g., ground system contact time, data latency, space-ground system interface) in support of the concept design and the mission master equipment list development.

• The selected respondent shall produce a launch vehicle accommodations report to document the details (e.g., performance, fairing envelope, payload adaptor fitting, tipoff/roll rate, center of gravity height, quasi static load/fundamental frequency environments, time between liftoff and separation).

• The selected respondent shall identify heritage of spacecraft bus systems in support of the proposal development.

Option 1: Mission Operations (if this option is included in response)

• The selected respondent shall produce a ground system report that shows ground stations, ground system block diagram with mission operations center functions and interfaces, operations, staffing, and cost estimate.

• The selected respondent shall identify heritage ground systems in support of the proposal development.

Item 2: Instrument Booms and associated support This will involve meeting with the PI, project manager, instrument systems engineer, and other proposal team members to establish the boom configurations, to help define performance requirements, to provide well-defined interfaces to the instruments and spacecraft, and to identify any necessary technology developments, study topics, and/or other risk areas that may affect mission success. More specific activities and outcomes of the proposal support are listed as the following:

• The selected respondent shall actively participate in concept development to determine a credible design-to-cost solution that meets AO constraints.

• The selected respondent shall produce a boom design report that includes requirements, any applicable block diagrams, components, performance, technical budgets (mass, power), fault tolerance, verification approach, technology demonstration, risks, cost estimate, and operation related requirements in support of the concept design and the mission master equipment list development.

• The selected respondent shall identify heritage of the booms in support of the proposal development.

For these items and the option, these mission design efforts will culminate in a Technical Management Review (TMR) in approximately mid-April 2025 and will also include cost estimation for all partner-provided mission elements and for all mission phases (Phase A-F).

Following the TMR, partners are expected to aid the proposal team in the development /production of the required proposal content as well as supporting parts of the proposal production.

4 Competitive Phase A Support

If the mission is selected for a Phase A study, the proposal team will receive partial funding from NASA SMD to conduct a Phase A study and submit a detailed Concept Study Report per the milestones shown in Section 1. Successful respondents to this POD will be allocated a portion of this funding.

The spacecraft respondent would be responsible for identifying the spacecraft subsystem requirements, providing all aspects of the spacecraft architecture (either directly, or through purchasing or teaming arrangements) and providing a detailed description of all mission operations needed for mission success. The respondent would be required to develop an implementation schedule of the spacecraft bus that provides the best value to the Government consistent with the nominal schedule.

If the proposal is selected for development and launch, the selected partner will be the mission integrator responsible for the design, development, integration and testing of the spacecraft consistent with a Class C mission per NPR 8705.4 Risk Classification for NASA Payloads.

5 POD Response Guidance

Potential respondents are asked to contact the GSFC Point of Contact as soon as possible after release of this document with a Notice of Interest. Be specific on whether you anticipate responding for the spacecraft, the booms, or both. This contact does not create an obligation to respond to the POD but allows GSFC to disseminate more details on the payload interfaces and concept of operations and to provide answers to questions from potential partners. All Notice of Interest respondents will receive a Data Package with further details that will facilitate a focused response. These details are competition sensitive and not to be shared outside the teams necessary to prepare a full response. All questions and answers will be sent to those who responded to the Notice of Interest, while the source of the questions shall be held confidential. Questions and answers that contain information unique to a respondent’s proprietary approach will not be shared if they are identified as such.

Questions can be sent to the contact listed below via email. For purposes of this partnership opportunity, the primary contact is:

POC: Laura Ottenstein, Laura.Ottenstein-1@nasa.gov

Responses to this POD shall:

1. Be in a presentation format (viewgraphs) that shall not exceed 15 pages for the spacecraft (Item 1), 10 pages for the booms (Item 2), and 5 pages for Option 1:

Missions Operations. The font size for the text shall be no smaller than 12 point.

File format should be PDF. The presentation should include, at a minimum:

a. Demonstrate understanding and flight experience in the design, fabrication, integration and testing of space qualified hardware.

b. Identify any pertinent missions for which the respondent has provided support for proposal writing in the areas of hardware design, fabrication, integration and testing, and mission operations (if applicable).

c. Provide a technical summary/description of the proposed spacecraft bus and/or boom concept including relevant heritage.

d. Identify available design and modeling capabilities required to support development of the spacecraft bus and/or booms.

e. Highlight particularly critical or challenging areas for the design.

f. Identify fabrication and testing facilities that will be required to support development and test of the spacecraft bus and/or booms; and important analysis/trade studies that might be needed.

g. Provide scope of the assumed mission operations.

h. Provide Rough Order of Magnitude (ROM) cost estimate and schedule for: a) Mission implementation (spacecraft build), instrument to spacecraft integration, observatory-level testing, launch vehicle integration, and initial operations and checkout and b) ongoing mission support of the spacecraft buses, and/or b) Boom implementation, testing, delivery, and post-delivery support. All hardware information should clearly distinguish between the cost and schedule for two copies (for the spacecraft and/or set of booms), three copies, and four copies. If responding to the Mission Operations Option, include estimates for developing the MOC and operating the mission over a two-year mission life.

i. Indicate what level of resources would be allocated to the proposal phase of support. Discuss skills that will be provided and ideas on what level of conceptual design would be provided.

2. Address all requirements noted in sections 2 through 4 of this document and all requirements in the Data Package.

Responses will be treated as proprietary information and controlled as such.

Final presentation packages must be received by 1700 EST, January 6, 2025.

Presentations are to be delivered electronically to Laura Ottenstein at the above listed email address.

Following receipt of responses, NASA/GSFC will set up teleconferences with each respondent for oral presentation and questions and answers. The timeline of these teleconferences is expected to be the 1-2 weeks after the response deadline date.

Partnership selection(s) is expected to be made 1-2 weeks week after final presentations. NASA/GSFC reserves the option to NOT select any teaming partners under this POD offering based on materials received.

All respondents to this POD will be offered a debrief after final selection.

6 Evaluation Factors and Criteria

Selection criteria will be consistent with the desire to encourage cost effective partnerships between the Government and Industry. The information requested in Sections 2-5 will allow the evaluators to determine how well the respondents’ systems match and enable the MIDEX mission.

The evaluation team will use the following factors in selection and award:

1. Technical Approach (40%): Respondents will be evaluated on their ability to meet the technical requirements given in this document and the Data Package.

This includes demonstrated understanding of the requirements and proposed approach to meet those requirements.

2. Relevant Experience and Past Performance (35%): Special emphasis will be given to demonstrated experience with similar missions and mission operations (if proposed).

3. Cost/Schedule (25%): Respondents will be evaluated on their overall cost, specific cost, resources allocated during the proposal phase, and on the reasonableness of cost and schedule estimates.

7 Acronyms

• AO Announcement of Opportunity

• CSR Concept Study Report

• EST Eastern Standard Time

• FY Fiscal Year (October 1 – September 30)

• GSFC Goddard Space Flight Center

• MIDEX Medium Explorer

• MOC Mission Operations Center

• NASA National Aeronautics and Space Administration

• NOI Notice of Interest

• NPR NASA Procedural Requirement

• PDF Portable Document Format

• PI Principal Investigator

• POC Point of Contact

• POD Partnership Opportunity Document

• ROM Rough Order of Magnitude

• RY Real Year

• SMD Science Mission Directorate

• S/C Spacecraft

• TBC To Be Confirmed

• TBD To Be Determined

• TMR Technical & Management Review