Announcement of Opportunity
Effective 28 August, 2006, XMM-Newton observing proposals were solicited in response to the Sixth Announcement of Opportunity, AO-6.
A letter from ESA's Director of Science, inviting you to participate in the Sixth Call for Proposals, is available in
electronic form (pdf).
The
Deadline for XMM-Newton AO-6 submission was
6 October, 2006, 12:00 UT.
Important changes for AO-6, relative to earlier Calls
PDF Scientific Justification
Scientific justifications must be submitted electronically via the
Remote Proposal Submission System as a single file in Portable Document Format (PDF). (This is a departure from earlier Calls which assumed delivery in Postscript format.)
Large Area Surveys
Proposals asking for observations of large areas of the sky through more than 10 individual observations with their fields of view touching each other or even overlapping need to be submitted in a special way as described in section 5.4 of the Policies and Procedures document.
New Scientific Category
A new scientific category has been introduced: "Cosmology, Extragalactic Deep Fields and Area Surveys" (see section 7.3.1 of the Policies and Procedures document).
Proposal Submission Procedure and Tools
XMM-Newton Proposals were submitted using the
XMM-Newton Remote Proposal Submission software.
The following tools are available to assist AO-6 proposers;
Proposal Submission Documentation
The following AO-6 documentation is available;
| Letter by the Director of Science announcing AO-6 |
pdf
|
| Policies and Procedures for the XMM-Newton AO-6 |
Online,
ps.gz,
pdf
|
| XMM-Newton Users' Handbook (UHB) |
Online,
ps.gz,
pdf
|
XMM-Newton Scientific Justification LaTeX Template (MANDATORY)
(Scientific Justification must not exceed 4 pages, 5 pages for Large Programs) |
Tex File
|
Please Note:
The XMM-Newton SOC always recommends the use of online documentation because it contains updated links to references in the text.
Notes on using the LaTeX Template File
Proposal justifications MUST be submitted as one file in
Portable Document Format (PDF). A PDF file can be generated from the LaTeX template in one of two ways:
-
Use a LaTeX installation which allows you to create PDF files directly from the .tex file (e.g. pdflatex). Some installations of pdflatex do not allow you to include postscript figures. In this case you might use method 2.
-
Use ps2pdf (preferably version 1.4) to convert a postscript file to PDF:
> latex file.tex
> dvips -Ppdf -G0 -o file.ps file.dvi
> ps2pdf14 file.ps file.pdf
Please take note of the following points regarding the use of the LaTeX template provided;
- Users must make sure that generated pdf output from the template is complete both when displayed with a viewer (acroread) and when printed on paper. LaTeX installations vary greatly and therefore it might not be possible to get all proposals to come out correctly with a single text page layout. In some cases the user will have to adjust the \topmargin=-7mm command in the template to vertically center the text.
- The page limit of 4 pages (5 pages only for justifications of "Large Programs") includes everything of your to-be-submitted proposal justification. Sections 4 and 5 (on previous work and publications) have to be included within the page limit, too.
- You are free to include color images in your proposal justification. Proposals are distributed to OTAC in electronic form. However, the scientific content of the images should still remain extractable when displayed or printed in black and white only.
- The font size (11pt) is mandatory.
AO-6 Timetable
| Key milestones for AO-6 are: |
| | Announcement of Opportunity | 28 August 2006 |
| | Due date for Proposals | 6 October 2006 (12:00 UT) |
| | Final OTAC approved programme | late December 2006 |
| | | |
| For approved proposals only: |
| | Start of phase II proposal submission | 15 January 2007 |
| | Closure of phase II proposal submission | 9 February 2007 |
| | Start of AO-6 observations | May 2007 |
Approved AO-6 observations are planned to be performed during the period May 2007 to May 2008 (approximate revolutions 1354 to 1537).
Other Useful Links for Proposers
The following links are available to assist AO-6 proposers;
All questions regarding XMM-Newton proposal submission should be directed to the
XMM-Newton Helpdesk.