2.3 Principal Investigators and Science Team

ISO had four Principal Investigators (PIs), one for each of the scientific instruments. The scientific instruments were developed under national funding, with each PI being responsible for his/her own scientific instrument. Each instrument was developed by a group involving many institutes and industries. Over 45 organisations in total were involved. Figure 2.5 lists these organisations by country and instrument name.

Figure 2.5: Principal Investigator (PI) organisations by country and instrument.

The PIs were responsible for the delivery of their scientific instruments to the ESA Project for integration and testing with the satellite. In return for the effort of developing the instrument, the PIs were guaranteed the use of ISO for about one-third of its total operations time in orbit. The PIs planned this guaranteed time in great detail and shared it with their many Co-Investigators and Scientific Associates, about 100 astronomers in total. The remaining two-thirds of ISO's operations time was open to the scientific community, i.e. any scientist in Europe, the USA or Japan, through the submission of observing proposals.

An overview of the distribution of observing time per participating group is given in Figure 4.7.

The ISO Science Team advised ESA on all scientific aspects of the mission throughout the project's lifetime. The Team's main aims were to maximise the mission's scientific return and to ensure that ISO maintained its principal characteristic as an observatory satisfying the needs of the scientific community at large. The IST consisted of the ESA Project Scientist, the four instrument PIs, five Mission Scientists providing independent advice, and a representative from the ESA Project Team and both ISAS and NASA. The IST followed the development of the project and met quarterly to address the important scientific issues that arose during the period between the Development Phase and the end of the Post-Operations Phase.

The team consisted of:

• Instrument Principal Investigators:
  • C.J. Cesarsky, CEA, Saclay, F
  • P.E. Clegg, QMW, London, GB
  • Th. de Graauw, SRON, Groningen, NL
  • D. Lemke, MPIA, Heidelberg, D
• Mission Scientists:
  • Th. Encrenaz, Obs. de Meudon, Paris, F
  • H.J. Habing, Sterrewacht, Leiden, NL (Vice-chairman)
  • M.O. Harwit, Cornell University, USA
  • A.F.M. Moorwood, ESO, Garching, D
  • J.L. Puget, IAS, Orsay, F
• ESA Payload and Operations Manager:
  • M. Anderegg, ESTEC, Noordwijk, NL
• ESA Project Scientist:
  • M.F. Kessler, ESTEC, Noordwijk, NL (Chairman)^2.1
• NASA representative:
  • G. Helou, IPAC, USA
• ISAS representative:
  • H. Okuda, ISAS, Japan

The role of the Mission Scientists were to provide scientific input to the project and to represent the interests of the general astronomical community.