Submitting Circulars
Become a GCN Circulars Submitter
Anyone can become a GCN Circulars submitter by receiving a peer endorsement from an existing submitter. An endorsement vouches that the user is in good standing with the astronomy community.
Peer endorsements (inspired by arXiv) help us to grow the GCN community sustainably while protecting the research integrity of GCN Circulars. We welcome submitters of diverse backgrounds including professional astronomers, amateurs, educators, and students.
Migrating from GCN Classic
If you were authorized to submit GCN Circulars through the legacy GCN Classic site, then you are already authorized to submit GCN Circulars through this new site.
Once you have signed in to this new web site using the same email address that you used with GCN Classic, you can approve peer endorsement requests from other users.
To Request a Peer Endorsement
To become a GCN Circulars submitter, sign in or sign up and then navigate to Peer Endorsements settings from the user menu in the navigation bar. Enter the name or email address of an existing GCN Circulars submitter to request an endorsement from them. This should be someone who you know and who knows you: a fellow researcher, an advisor, or an instructor. The user that you select will be notified by email and should approve your request shortly.
If you don't know any existing GCN Circulars users, don't worry! Just contact us for help joining GCN Circulars.
To Approve a Peer Endorsement
Once you are a GCN Circulars submitter, you can approve new users. Any endorsement requests addressed to you will appear in the Approve Endorsements section of your Peer Endorsements settings.
You may take any one of the following actions for peer endorsement requests addressed to you:
- Approve if you know the user and you can vouch that they are in good standing.
- Reject if you do not know the user or cannot vouch for them.
- Reject and Report if you believe that the request is spam or is from a bot.
Post a GCN Circular
Before you post your first GCN Circular:
- Read the Style Guide for formatting and best practices that have been established by the GCN community.
- Review your user profile to adjust how your name and optional affiliation appear in Circulars that you post.
There are two ways to post a GCN Circular: via web form or via email.
Post a GCN Circular by Web Form
To post a GCN Circular via the web form, simply go to the GCN Circulars archive, click the button, and complete the form.
Pre-fill GCN Circulars web form with a hyperlink
Tip: You can pre-fill default values for the subject and body by passing them to the web form in the URL query string:
https://gcn.nasa.gov/circulars/new?subject=...&body=...Post a GCN Circular by Email
To submit a GCN Circular by email, send a message to: circulars@gcn.nasa.gov.
The legacy address gcncirc@capella2.gsfc.nasa.gov forwards emails to circulars@gcn.nasa.gov. This forwarding will be retired on December 31, 2024. Note that the new address is stricter than the old address about the From: address matching the sender.
Do not send your Circular to both email addresses. If you send it to both addresses, then it will be distributed twice as two different circulars.