HST Proposal Search Help

Use the HST Proposal Search form to look up information for a specific HST proposal. You can show the abstract and other related information, as well as look up the data archived from this proposal. These datasets can then be marked for retrieval.

Note All the data retrieved through this interface will be sent to the Archive Host machine archive.stsci.edu, from which it may be transferred via anonymous FTP. Only public data may be retrieved; retrieval of proprietary data is not yet supported through this interface. To retrieve proprietary data (if you are priveleged to do so), you will need to submit the retrieval through StarView.

Proposal ID

The HST proposal number (or the program ID) under which the observation was executed. You can enter either the proposal number (e.g., 5410), or the program ID (e.g., 2JB). Program IDs are mapped in a one-to-one relation to proposal IDs. Program IDs are also used as the second, third, and fourth letters of an HST dataset name. So if you know only the dataset name- say, U2460107T- you can look up the proposal information in this form by entering 246 as the proposal ID.

You may enter only one proposal or program ID in this field, because this form is designed to return information about one specific proposal.

Obset ID

An observation set within the proposal. (An observation set is also known as a scheduling unit (su) or a visit.) Specifying an obset is optional. If no obset is given, all obsets form the proposal will be shown. When specifying an obset, it must be a two-character string. For example, for the first obset of a proposal, specify 01, not just 1.

You can specify one or more observation sets by using commas; for example, 03,04,B1 will find all the observations from obsets 03, 04, and B1. You can also wildcard an obset ID; 0* will return all observations from any obset that begins with a 0.

Show Abstract and/or Data

Select whether you want to see the proposal abstract and/or associated datasets. If you opt to view the abstract, other information besides the proposal abstract will be returned.

Show all or public

Select whether you would like to see all data or only public data. HST data has a nominal proprietary period of one year (though in special cases, this may be shortened or extended). The Release Date field gives the end of the dataset's proprietary period. Public datasets will be shown with a "Mark" button, which allows you to mark those datasets for retrieval. Datasets which are not public will not have a "Mark" button, because the HST Archive Web interface will not allow you to retrieve proprietary data.