Michael: I've taken a read of this and urge Tim and Hitoshi to do so as well. To remind, this initiative is our last real chance of substantial federal funds for PFS!! Comments: Project Summary: I'm assuming we're allowed the full page? If so, we could enlarge the intellectual merit to include discussion of PFS science that we're doing (consistent with Section 3.2, of which there's no mention in the summary). Dark energy, DM and Galactic archeology are all hot topics and we are doing truly unique science in the era of Gaia and extending cosmological probes beyond BOSS etc etc. Also, do we want to hint at US access to PFS nights somewhere in broader impact. The $180M is misleading in the summary unless it appears in the Broader impact section itself which it currently doesn't. 1. Introduction - reads well 2. Instruments. I think we need the overview figures here. HSC: A picture of M31 with inset zoom and a PSF measurement curvey? PFS: An overview of the whole instrument (e.g. current Figure 2a but there are nicer ones). NB: Current Figure 1 is largely irrelevant. We're not asking for money for the positioner so why show a Cobra unit? The last sentences of Section 2 is critical. Do we want to lie and say with the $10M we will close the deal for building PFS given likely contributions from other partners. Hitoshi: you are the PI. How do we handle this delicate issue??!!! 3. Scientific Justification: Reads well, even so I say it myself! I think Section 3.4 can be deleted and so the key issue is what are the figures for this section. Indeed, do we have space? 4. Plan of Work: What is missing is the management chart. Who's doing what? Figure 2 could stay but not Figure 1. We could ideally have a flow chart of how the pipeline will work?? It seems odd there's no figure on software. I don't understand what is coming in Section 4.4 That's it for now Richard I put a very scribbled-on copy in your mailbox. I am sure my scribbles are unreadable, and will be by myself tomorrow, but I may be able to translate. You left Jenny off the team ;-((. Do you have any idea how these will be refereed? There is a bit of hype that would probably register well with the folks at NSF, but will not fly by external referees so well. I am worried that the data stuff is much sexier and more supportable than the PFI stuff, which uses most of the money; but it screws up the emphasis. It is quite well written and reasonably closely argued, but I suspect the bar will be very high. The issue of the total cost I think requires honesty. The $10M we are asking for from the NSF will not get the project over the hump, and we should not pretend that it will. Funding involving additional partners is not even mentioned, and it was part and parcel of every SDSS proposal to the NSF in history, all of which were, in the end, successful. --jim I agree that the proposal is nicely written. I see two problems reading through: 1. In my mind, the proposal cannot make up its mind as to whether it is for the SUMIRE survey or the PFS spectrograph. Mostly it is for SUMIRE, but here and there it is for PFS to work with LSST. While in principle that would be a very nice proposal, we are not actually offering time to the US community, and so to hint about the utility of PFS for LSST seems like cheating to me -- I'd be very annoyed as a referee. 2. I think this is what Jim means as well, but the statement of work is pretty fractured. Instead of a proposal, it's a laundry list of to-do items. Can we in fact change the emphasis a bit in S4? I would combine 4.2 and 4.3 into "develop the software tools needed to support next-generation large surveys" where (a) is tackling formidable sky subtraction and (b) is making vast data resources publicly available ala what will be required for LSST. Both of these are public facing tasks in their own way, so feel right for MSIP. Then maybe as an afterthough S4.2 -- and by the way, we have some pesky hardware stuff we need too, but cut some of that detail for this 8 pager? I have some word stuff I'll put in your box in the morning. thanks, jenny One other thought. It seems to me the proposal hinges on SUMIRE being a valuable resource to the US community "in the LSST/JWST era" as we say in the intro. However, we never really lay out clearly why this is so, in one place. So maybe bullets, and maybe they are these (?): 1. Solving software challenges for HSC/PFS prepares us for LSST (and is the aim of this proposal). 2. PFS will provide crucial spec-z training samples that are a basic requirement of all next-generation dark energy surveys. The only other competitive spectrograph is one planned for the GMT** (cite Newman). 3. As we push to yet higher redshifts with JWST, PFS will provide the benchmark 0.5 < z < 2 survey over SDSS-like volumes. 4. (If you want) The PFS instrument itself will be one of the only wide-area spectrographs able to manage follow-up of LSST targets...we are working on getting PFS time to the US community. While all of these things are alluded to, I think listing them in abbreviated form in the intro (particularly the software and the spec-zs) and then returning to them at the end of S3 might help strengthen the proposal -- or maybe there are other better reasons I haven't thought of. ** This telescope has not yet been built. The issue of the total cost I think requires honesty. The $10M we are asking for from the NSF will not get the project over the hump, and we should not pretend that it will. Funding involving additional partners is not even mentioned, and it was part and parcel of every SDSS proposal to the NSF in history, all of which were, in the end, successful. On this issue, I would recommend adding "We are currently in negotiations with additional foreign partners which we believe will lead to $10 M in additional funds". or something like this to the text. -David Hi Michael - I can send more detailed comments tonight, but for now: NB: Current Figure 1 is largely irrelevant. We're not asking for money for the positioner so why show a Cobra unit? A good point. Mike, do you agree? I don’t' think I agree – I think the reason to show these is to highlight what it is that we are integrating, why it is complex, and therefore requires substantial investment. I think I'd prefer that we shorten the text and perhaps the figure caption a bit before dropping this. Also note that we could save space if the figure caption margins were extended horizontally. Also, we could shorten the "unique US role" a bit. In any case, I think it might read better if were moved to the management approach section. The last sentences of Section 2 is critical. Do we want to lie and say with the $10M we will close the deal for building PFS given likely contributions from other partners. Hitoshi: you are the PI. How do we handle this delicate issue??!!! Can we finesse this by characterizing the remainder as reserves, and suggest that we are looking for funds elsewhere for that part? -Mike