Earth Science Programs - Basic Research Opportunities in Earth Science - page 132

for the Earth, the moon, Mars, and Venus; measures time-variable
gravity, postglacial rebound, and ice sheet thickness variations; and
models the structure variations and sources of the Earth's main and
crustal magnetic fields. The program also operates an international space
geodetic network and provides precise celestial and terrestrial reference
frames to the community.
• Solid Earth and Natural Hazards Program supports research related to
geodynamics and geodesy, geopotential fields, geologic applications of
remote sensing, and natural hazards. The program also supports the
development and operation of global and regional geodetic networks and
airborne data acquisition. The budget for this program was $24 million, of
which half was devoted to research and half to infrastructure.
• Land Surface Hydrology Program supports research on the scientific basis
of water resources management and the role of water in land-atmosphere
interactions.
• Global Energy and Water Cycle Experiment (GEWEX) supports research
to observe, understand, and model the hydrological cycle and energy
fluxes in the atmosphere, at the land surface, and in the upper oceans.
NASA also supports hydrologic studies in specific regions, such as the
Amazon Basin and arid and semiarid lands.
EAR works with both the space science and the Earth sciences offices of
NASA. Collaborative research tends to focus on technology development,
equipment acquisition, and research related to large geophysical networks.
Possible future collaborations identified by NASA program managers include the
Plate Boundary Observatory, remote-sensing data purchases, and research in
planetary volcanism. In their view, additional technology development is
hampered by an NSF policy against funding soft-money researchers at federal
centers such as the Jet Propulsion Laboratory.
Lessons Learned from Previous Collaborations with USGS, DOE, and NASA
Multiagency collaborations save money and permit broad scientific
objectives to be reached that could not be achieved by an individual agency. Such
collaborations may take the form of joint solicitations, commonly with joint
panel evaluations, or each agency may fund investigators separately. The latter
can be awkward to manage because the agencies are on different funding
schedules and researchers may have to go through two peer review processes.
NSF, USGS, DOE, and NASA program managers identified the following
“lessons learned” in establishing joint projects: