Management and Organisation of Science Instruments

Abstract

Here we describe how Herschel was built, following the usual ESA framework, with industry, consortia of universities and research laboratories, ESA and member states working together. Although the HIFI, PACS and SPIRE consortia organised themselves differently in managing time and resources, planning the use of their guaranteed observing time and exploiting their data, all shared the same science-driven management approach. Here HIFI is chosen as a typical case to illustrate the process and difficulties involved in creating and managing such consortia and to analyse how they organised their respective community and managed their development and their own scientific observation programmes. PACS serves as a typical case to study the interaction between the consortia, industry and ESA, and SPIRE illustrates the success-oriented approach of the instrument teams and subtle differences in the way they organised their observing programmes. The testimony of the instruments' principal investigators offers a unique comprehensive analysis of the management of large and complex space science instruments and analyses the social context for innovation in the light of coopetition and sociality concepts. It suggests that a less risk-averse approach to science instrument management, compared to the current conservative method of estimating technology maturity, could better drive technical innovation and lead to greater scientific success.