After a year of turmoil, NASA said it would end its financial support for the independent advisory groups that for decades helped guide the agency’s research in planetary science. The decision would limit the agency’s ability to draw on outside advice while also blocking a public window into NASA’s operations.

The move to end financial support, which included funding for annual in-person meetings, travel, and websites, was announced in a letter from Louise Prockter, NASA’s Planetary Science Division director. The letter extolled the virtues of the groups, made up of volunteers including scientists at universities and NASA centers. They “have fostered collaboration, built consensus, and strengthened ties,” Prockter wrote. But, she added, presidential executive orders and a tight budget made it impossible for the agency to continue to support the groups.

NASA had eliminated its formal scientific advisory committees last year, following a broader purge by the White House across the federal bureaucracy. But the planetary groups were never part of this apparatus. They could not make formal recommendations to NASA—but they were also nominally free of federal control.

Source https://www.science.org/content/article/nasa-ends-support-planetary-science-advisory-groups

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