This article provides a walk through of the various parts of the Astronomer's Proposal Tool (APT), the software through which JWST proposals are developed and submitted. APT software can be downloaded from the APT software page; version 2025.5 (or later) is required for Cycle 5 submissions. Additional information about APT can found at JWST Astronomer's Proposal Tool Overview.

As described in JWST Guidelines and Checklist for Proposal Preparation, a proposal consists of a completed APT proposal form and an attached PDF file. This article describes the items that must be filled out in the APT proposal form; this information is also available from the context-sensitive help in APT. Not every item described here needs to be filled out for every proposal. For example, some items are only relevant for observing proposals, while others are only relevant for archival proposals. APT will automatically let you know which items need to be filled out, depending on which proposal type you choose. JWST Preparation of the PDF Attachment describes the items that must be addressed in the attached PDF file. If there is a discrepancy between the APT form and what is written in the "Technical Justification" of the PDF attachment, the APT form takes precedence. In other words, proposals are reviewed based on the information in the APT form.

Proposal Information form

The following items are found on the APT Proposal Information form.

Title

The title of your proposal should be informative, and must not exceed two printed lines. Please use mixed case instead of all upper case.

Abstract

Write a concise abstract describing the proposed investigation, including the main science goals and the justification for requesting observations or funding from JWST. The abstract must be written in standard ASCII (no LaTex formatting) and should be no longer than 1700 characters (including spaces). This limit is enforced by APT.

Category 

Select one of the following categories:

• GO—General Observer Proposal
• Survey—Survey Proposal
• AR—Archival Research Proposal

Proposals for Director’s Discretionary Time submitted outside of the normal review cycles should select:

• DD—Director’s Discretionary Time Proposal

Optional check boxes

On the same line and to the right of the Category drop-down, proposers may mark the following check boxes if they are relevant to the proposal. Please note that these flags come with additional requirements which must be addressed in the PDF attachment, as described in JWST Proposal Categories.

Legacy

(This keyword appears in the APT form only for AR Proposals.)

Mark this keyword if you are submitting a Legacy AR Proposal.

Theory

(This keyword appears in the APT form only for AR Proposals.)

Mark this keyword if you are submitting an AR Theory Proposal. 

Cloud Computing

(This keyword appears in the APT form only for AR Proposals.)

Mark this keyword if you are submitting an AR Cloud Computing Studies Proposal. 

Data Science Software

(This keyword appears in the APT form only for AR Proposals.)

Mark this keyword if you are submitting an AR Data Science Software Proposal. 

Calibration

(This keyword can be set for both GO and AR Proposals.)

Mark this keyword if you are submitting a Calibration GO or Calibration AR Proposal. 

Treasury

(This keyword appears in the APT form only for GO Proposals.)

Mark this keyword if you are submitting a Treasury GO Proposal. 

Long-Term Monitoring

(This keyword appears in the APT form only for GO Proposals.)

Mark this keyword if your proposal is eligible for the LTM Initiative. Once checked, observations for two future cycles beyond the default 3-cycle limit will be able to be requested (though not required).

Roman Preparatory Science

(This keyword can be set for all proposal types.)

Mark this keyword if your proposal is eligible for the RPS Initiative. 

GO-Archival

(This keyword appears in the APT form only for GO Proposals. Once checked, the set of keywords for AR proposals will appear.)

Mark this keyword if you are submitting a Combined GO+AR Proposal. 

Multi-Observatory

(This keyword appears in the APT form only for GO Proposals.)

Mark this keyword if you are submitting a Joint Observing Proposal. 

DD Type

(This keyword appears in the APT form only for DD Proposals.)

Choose the DD type from the drop-down list if you are submitting a DD Proposal. 

Multi-Observatory Information

APT has a "Multi-Observatory" flag on the same line as the proposal Category. When JWST is primary, you are prompted to request time on one or more coordinated telescopes. And when JWST is secondary, you are prompted to identify the primary observatory and provide the primary proposal ID. Generally, this keyword appears in the APT form only for GO Proposals (except for Joint JWST-HST Programs that allow both GO and DD Proposals).

For this Cycle 5 Call for Proposals, proposers should select JWST as "Primary."

Proposers should also check the box confirming that "We have not submitted a similar coordinated proposal for another observatory's peer review this year." This statement refers to coordinated proposals involving JWST. 

Coordinated Telescopes

ALMA Hours

If you are asking for both JWST and ALMA observing time then list the requested number of ALMA hours. You should also provide detailed information on the ALMA observations in the "Justify Coordinated Observations with Other Facilities" section of the PDF attachment. If you are not requesting any new ALMA observations, then leave that field blank.

Chandra ksec

If you are asking for both JWST and Chandra observing time then list the requested number of Chandra kiloseconds. You should then also provide detailed information on the Chandra observations in the "Justify Coordinated Observations with Other Facilities" section of the PDF attachment. If you are not requesting any new Chandra observations (or if you have Chandra time that has already been awarded), then leave that field blank.

HST Orbits

If you are asking for both JWST and HST observing time then list the requested number of HST orbits, including overheads. You should then also provide detailed information on the HST observations in the "Justify Coordinated Observations with Other Facilities" section of the PDF attachment. If you are not requesting any new HST observations (or if you have HST time that has already been awarded), then leave that field blank.

NASA Keck Nights

If you are asking for both JWST and NASA Keck observing time, then list the requested number of NASA Keck nights. You should also provide detailed information on the NASA Keck observations in the "Justify Coordinated Observations with Other Facilities" section of the PDF attachment. If you are not requesting any new NASA Keck observations, then leave that field blank.

NOIRLab Nights

If you are asking for both JWST and NOIRLab observing time then list the requested number of nights on NOIRLab telescopes. You should then also provide detailed information on the NOIRLab observations in the "Justify Coordinated Observations with Other Facilities" section of the PDF attachment. If you are not requesting any new NOIRLab observations (or if you have NOIRLab time that has already been awarded), then leave that field blank.

NRAO Hours

If you are asking for both JWST and NRAO (VLBA, VLA, or GBT) observing time then list the requested number of NRAO hours. You should then also provide detailed information on the NRAO observations in the "Justify Coordinated Observations with Other Facilities" section of the PDF attachment. If you are not requesting any new NRAO observations (or if you have NRAO time that has already been awarded), then leave that field blank.

TESS Targets

If you are asking for TESS short-cadence targets in addition to JWST observing time, then list the requested number of TESS targets. You should also provide detailed information on the TESS targets, including the required cadence, in the "Justify Coordinated Observations with Other Facilities" section of the PDF attachment. If you are not requesting any new TESS targets, then leave that field blank.

XMM-Newton ksec

If you are asking for both JWST and XMM-Newton observing time then list the requested number of XMM-Newton kiloseconds. You should then also provide detailed information on the XMM-Newton observations in the "Justify Coordinated Observations with Other Facilities" section of the PDF attachment. If you are not requesting any new XMM-Newton observations (or if you have XMM-Newton time that has already been awarded), then leave that field blank.

Pure Parallel Proposal

(This field appears in the APT form only for GO and DD Proposals.)

Mark this keyword if you are submitting a Pure Parallel Proposal. 

Cycle

For a Cycle 5 Proposal, enter "5" (this is the default).

Expandable menus 

(These menus appear in the APT form only for GO, Survey, and DD Proposals.)

Make sure to mark the APT Proposal Information form appropriately using the expandable menus, and provide all the requested information. If these fields are not marked and filled out in the APT Proposal Information form those requests might not be met, even if they are described in the proposal. 

Explain unschedulable observations

Use this textbox to justify and explain any observations which APT deems "unschedulable."

Supply Meteoroid Zone Justification

Use this textbox to justify why observations in the Micrometeoroid Avoidance Zone are required.

Number of Target of Opportunity Activations

(This menu appears in the APT form only for GO and DD Proposals.)

For ToO observations, enter the number of Non-Disruptive, Disruptive, and Ultra-disruptive ToO activations (per cycle). For more information, see the Target of Opportunity section of JWST Proposal Categories.

Request custom time allocation

(This menu appears in the APT form only for GO and DD Proposals.)

If the time calculated by APT does not reflect the allocation needed, you can request a custom time allocation following the instructions in the JWST Observing Overheads and Time Accounting Overview. 

Future cycles

(This field appears in the APT form only for GO and DD Proposals.)

If you are requesting observations in future cycles, enter the time requests in each future cycle here. Future Cycles Proposals should provide a year-by-year breakdown of the time requested using the "Future Cycles" pull-down menu where "Next Cycle" corresponds to Cycle 6 and "Third Cycle" corresponds to Cycle 7, etc. If this field is not marked and filled out, the Future Cycles request might not be met, even if it is described in the proposal. The APT file should only contain the observations corresponding to the current cycle. APT files for time awarded in Future Cycles will be requested at a later time. For more information, see the Future Cycles GO section of JWST Proposal Categories.

Figure 1. APT special fields that need to be filled out as applicable

Science Time and Charged Time

(These fields appear in the APT form only for GO and DD Proposals.)

APT calculates the Science Time and the Charged Time based on the observations specified in APT. The Science Time is the amount of time that the instruments spend on-sky observing targets, while the Charged Time also includes all of the instrument and observatory overheads needed to support the science observations.

Total Targets Requested

(This field appears in the APT form only for Survey Proposals.)

This field is calculated automatically by APT by summing all targets associated with each example included the proposal. 

Data Volume

(This field appears in the APT form only for GO, Survey, and DD Proposals.)

This field is calculated automatically by APT for all observations in the proposal. For information on managing data volume, see JWST Data Volume and Data Excess.

Proposal Size

(This field appears in the APT form only for GO and DD Proposals.)

The Proposal Size is determined and filled by APT based on the Charged Time (or Requested Time). 

Exclusive Access Period

(This field appears in the APT form only for GO, Survey, and DD Proposals.)

Enter the requested exclusive access period (formerly known as a proprietary period), of either 0, 3, 6, or 12 (months), that will apply to all observations in the program. The default exclusive access period is 0 for Large, Treasury and Calibration GO Programs, and for Director's Discretionary Programs, and 12 months for Medium, Small, and Very Small GO Programs and Survey Programs. See JWST Data Rights and Duplications for more information. The benefits of or need for a non-default exclusive access period must be discussed in the "Special Requirements" section of the proposal.

Scientific Category

Specify one Scientific Category from the list below. Please adhere to our definitions of these categories. If you find that your proposal fits into several categories, then select the one that you consider most appropriate. If you are submitting a Calibration AR Proposal, then choose the Scientific Category for which your proposed calibration will be most important. STScI reserves the right to re-assign proposals to other categories to ensure the highest chance of the proposal being reviewed by experts with the proper expertise. Proposals in these Scientific Categories will be reviewed by panels of the same names.

Galactic Panels 

Alternate Category

If your science goals straddle two separate science categories, users have the option to add an alternate category, which provides more flexibility in where the proposal will be assigned for review. When an alternate category is chosen, APT will allow keywords from both categories to be selected, up to a limit of 10 total keywords.

Science Keywords

From the list of Science Keywords (see Appendix - Science Keywords), please select those that best describe the science goals of the proposal. Your choice here is important. Based on the keywords that you specify, your proposal will be assigned to specific reviewers during the proposal review. Note that the proposals are graded on their in-field impact and out-of-field impact (as well as suitability & feasibility) by reviewers with expertise that closely matches that of the proposal but also by reviewers with more distant expertise.

Please give as many keywords as possible, but not more than ten. You must give at least three.

Proposal PDF Attachment

List the location on your computer of the PDF file to be attached to your submission. As described in JWST Preparation of the PDF Attachment, this file should be prepared using one of the provided templates, contain all required sections, and adhere to the page limits. The entire PDF attachment must be anonymized, in accordance with the guidelines specified in JWST Anonymous Proposal Reviews.

Other sections under the proposal information

Selecting the arrow to the left of the items in the Tree Editor of APT will show subordinate sections that can be selected to enter additional information. For the Proposal Information form, this includes Proposal Description, Team Expertise, Principal Investigator, and Co-Investigator information.

Proposal Description 

(This form appears in APT only for GO, Survey, and DD Proposals.)

Describe in 1 to 2 paragraphs the observations requested in this proposal, indicating targets, instruments, modes, and any special requirements. This section should provide an overview of the proposed observations for reference by the program coordinators and instrument scientists, who will be reviewing and implementing the observations. This observing description will be publicly available for accepted proposals, unlike the "Technical Justification" section of the PDF attachment, which always remains confidential. The Observing Description in APT will not be visible for TAC reviewers. Proposers should not use that free text field as a replacement for page limit space. 

Team Expertise

The Team Expertise section provides a free-format text box to enter the relevant "Team Expertise and Background" information. The suggested length is one page. See JWST Anonymous Proposal Reviews for details on what information to provide here. The Team Expertise and Background in APT will not be visible for TAC reviewers until they are requested by an authorized person to be utilized as described in JWST Anonymous Proposal Reviews. Please note: the box supports ASCII text. Special text markup and LaTeX characters will not show correctly.

Principal Investigator

Enter the first and/or last name of the Principal Investigator (PI). Please use standard ASCII. Entering the first few letters (at least two) and pressing enter or tab will bring up a window containing a list of matches from our proposer database. Clicking on your entry will supply APT with the address information. For U.S. PIs, the institutional affiliation is defined as the institution that will receive funding if the proposal is approved.

If you are not in the database, click on "Add a New Investigator". If you are in the database, but the address information is incorrect, click on "Update This Address." Both clicks will take you to the MyST web page so you can be added to, or update information in, the database. Once you have entered your information into MyST, you must redo the database search and supply APT with the updated information.

APT will not compromise the anonymous status of the proposal. It will keep investigator and institutional information, as well as the separate Team Expertise and Background section, from the TAC and Panels until they are requested by an authorized person to be utilized as described in JWST Anonymous Proposal Reviews. 

Co-Principal Investigators and Co-Investigators

Co-Principal Investigators (Co-PIs) and Co-investigators (Co-Is) can be added in APT as necessary. By default, APT will provide one blank Co-I template. Please add other Co-PIs and Co-Is or delete as necessary. There is a limit of 999 Co-PIs and Co-Is on any proposal. For each Co-PI and Co-I, enter the name and select the correct person from the list of database matches. As for PIs, requests to "Add a New Investigator" or "Update This Address" will take you to the MyST web page. For U.S. Co-Is the institutional affiliation is defined as the institution that will receive funding if the proposal is approved.

If a proposal has a non-U.S. PI and one or more U.S. CoIs, then you must select the US Admin CoI box (in the PI form), then select one of the U.S. CoIs.  This indicates which U.S. CoI will be the Administrative PI for overseeing the grant funding for U.S. investigators (see JWST Proposal Submission Policies). Proposals with a US PI are optionally allowed to designate a Co-I to be the US Admin PI. (e.g., if the PI is a graduate student or a postdoctoral researcher not allowed to hold a grant by their institution). 

Once a program is approved, additional Co-PIs and Co-Is can only be added with prior approval from STScI.

Contact

If one of the Co-Is (or another individual) is to serve as the contact for a proposal, then the Contact keyword box should be checked. The Contact is the person the PI has designated to receive all (non-budgetary) questions/information on the proposal and to be the official voice for the team. More than one Co-I may be designated as the Contact. Once designated, only the Co-Is identified as Contact may make Change Requests in an approved proposal so that conflicting requests are not made.

For Large and Treasury GO Programs, we will contact the proposer within 1-2 weeks of the submission deadline if we need to verify our understanding of the appropriate scheduling constraints. If a Co-I is to serve as the contact for this verification, then the Contact box should be set accordingly. Any person may be designated as the Contact.

Targets

(This item appears in the APT form only for GO, Survey, and DD Proposals.)

JWST GO observing proposals must specify all of the proposed targets in APT. 

Survey proposals only need example targets for the example observations.

See the APT Targets page for more details.

Observations

(This item appears in the APT form only for GO, Survey, and DD Proposals.)

An APT observation is the basic proposal design element, consisting of one (or sometimes more) astronomical target(s) and one JWST observing mode using a corresponding APT observation template. See the APT Observations page for more details.

For Survey proposals, the proposer should enters the number of targets associated with each example observation in "Targets Requested."

APT contains data entry boxes at the exposure specification lines in each observation template where users can (at their discretion) add cross-reference information to a specific ETC workbook (WB) and calculation (CALC) ID within the workbook. See JWST APT-ETC Connectivity for more information. The ETC workbook will not be part of the review process. 

 Special Requirements

Special requirements in APT are defined parameters used to constrain observation scheduling for scientific reasons, or to indicate other situations requiring specific actions. This includes specifying requirements for Aperture Position Angles (orientations). See the APT Special Requirements page for more details. All Special Requirements must have a scientific justification, discussed explicitly in the PDF portion of the proposal. The Visit Planner is the tool that helps identify if observations have been over-constrained with special requirements (that in some cases may be in conflict). Special requirements may only be added under exceptional circumstances after a proposal is accepted for execution.

Verifying special requirements

Certain special requirements can force observations into the portion of a target's visibility that is within the Micrometeoroid Avoidance Zone (MAZ). In this case, APT's Visit Planner will flag the observations. If the observations are flagged, then proposers should re-evaluate their special requirements to determine whether the observations can be made outside the MAZ. If the observations can only be obtained using the special requirements, then proposers must provide a justification in APT using the "Supply Meteoroid Zone Justification" pull down menu in the APT Proposal Information form. See the APT Micrometeoroid Avoidance article for more information.

Next: JWST Preparation of the PDF Attachment