Research & Development (R&D) Services for the Naval Research Laboratory Space Sciences Division

7/30/2021 A new Question and Answer sheet has been posted. ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 7/22/2021 Questions and Answers, Amendment 0002, and a conformed copy of the solicitation have been posted. Please note that Att. J-3 and Exhibit A have also been revised. Revised versions are marked accordingly and posted. ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 7/16/2021 Questions and Answers, Amendment 0001, and a conformed copy of the solicitation have been posted. Outstanding questions will be answered as soon as possible. ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- The Naval Research Laboratory (NRL) is the Navy's corporate laboratory for conducting basic and applied research in the space sciences. NRL supports a number of terrestrial and space experiments in the areas of terrestrial, atmospheric, solar, and astronomical research from a variety of ground based, airborne, balloon, rocket, and space platforms. Major research areas include ultraviolet remote sensing of the upper atmosphere, spectrographic and imaging studies of the solar atmosphere and heliosphere, and astronomical radiation ranging from ultraviolet through gamma rays. The results are of importance to a fundamental understanding of natural radiation and geophysical phenomena in the space environment, radio communications, and ultimately to the operation of Naval ships and aircraft. Ongoing and planned research includes stand-off detection of the terrestrial environment, in situ and remote sensing of the middle and upper atmosphere, environmental modeling of the geospace environment, studies of the Sun and heliosphere, and studies of high energy celestial sources. The purpose of this Request for Proposals (RFP) is to acquire scientific, engineering, and related services for the Space Science Division (SSD) and related organizations, as required, for the formulation, design, development, fabrication, integration, testing, verification, operation, and data analysis of spaceflight and ground system hardware and software, including the development and validation of technologies to enable future science missions. To conduct these investigations, technical support is needed for the design, fabrication, assembly, testing, and calibration of experiments, scientific instrument structures, components, subsystems, support equipment, and related field operations. Tasks include computer modeling, experiment design, data analysis, instrument packaging, payload testing, and field deployments. Furthermore, technical expertise is required for the analysis of data obtained from these investigations. New computer programs must be written and existing software must be modified and documented. Among the scientific instrument modeling, simulation, development, data acquisition, reduction, and analysis efforts are the following activities: Geospace Science and Technology: Investigations to study, understand and ultimately forecast the energetics, dynamics, and state of the geospace (i.e. terrestrial and near-Earth space) environment, to develop and apply new techniques for in situ and remote sensing of the geospace environment and associated theoretical modeling activities. High Energy Space Environment: Investigations to advance the observational and theoretical understanding of the energetic photon and charged particle environment in space, and the development and use of advanced detector systems for energetic photons and particles for space and terrestrial applications. Solar and Heliospheric Physics: Investigations to advance the understanding of the origin of the outer solar atmosphere, the corona, the coupling between the fine magnetic structure at the photosphere and, the dynamic processes occurring in the corona, the coupling between the Sun and the Earth, and to develop the experimental and theoretical techniques to forecast this coupling. This requirement is a re-compete effort for current contract N00173-14-C-2027 which was awarded to Praxis, Inc.