Roman Observations Time Allocation Committee: Final Report and Recommendations

TL;DR

This report details the Roman Space Telescope's survey planning, recommending specific time allocations for core community surveys and general astrophysics, aiming to optimize scientific output across multiple astrophysical research areas.

Contribution

It provides a structured framework and specific recommendations for survey time allocations and observing strategies for the Roman Space Telescope's core and general astrophysics surveys.

Findings

Recommended 74.5% of observation time for core surveys.

Proposed survey designs include nominal, underguide, and overguide options.

Balanced time allocation to maximize scientific and astrophysics goals.

Abstract

The Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope is poised to revolutionize our scientific understanding of exoplanets, dark matter, dark energy, and general astrophysics, including through an innovative community approach to defining and executing sky surveys. The Roman Observations Time Allocation Committee (ROTAC) was convened to recommend time allocations for the three Core Community Surveys (CCS) using the Wide Field Instrument (WFI): the High Latitude Wide Area Survey, the High Latitude Time Domain Survey, and the Galactic Bulge Time Domain Survey, as well as balance the time allocation for the General Astrophysics Surveys. Each CCS had a corresponding Definition Committee that collected community input and designed proposals for a nominal (in-guide) survey, as well as underguide and overguide options with smaller and larger time allocations, respectively. These options explored different ways of fulfilling the mission science requirements while maximizing general astrophysics science goals enabled by the surveys. In this report, the ROTAC lays out its recommendations for the three CCS observing designs and the WFI time allotment for CCS (74.5%) and the General Astrophysics Surveys (25.5%).