Volume 8, Number 3     May/June 2000

Advanced Technology

Remote-Sensing Technology Proposals Selected

NASA's office of Earth Science at NASA Headquarters in Washington, DC has selected proposals for a new technology development program that will support the Earth Science Enterprise by monitoring and predicting natural hazards to help minimize the loss of human life and mitigate property damage. The Advanced Technology Initiatives Program (ATIP) will provide for core component and subsystem technology developments that support NASA's science research of Earth-observing instruments in the area of spaceborne and airborne remote-sensing measurements.

The Office of Earth Science is awarding 23 proposals through NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland. In addition, nine proposals have been tentatively accepted. Contract awards for tentatively selected proposals depend on funding availability. The minimum period of performance is 12 months. The total proposed period of performance should not exceed 36 months.

“The selection of these proposals represent our commitment to the development of new, cutting-edge technologies that will help us to understand our complex global environment and provide this knowledge to future generations for informed decision making,” said Dr. Ghassem Asrar, associate administrator for Earth Science at NASA Headquarters.

ATIP is designed to bring instrument, platform and information system components and subsystems to a demonstrated technology readiness level, allowing for future integration into ongoing technology development programs, such as the Earth Science Enterprise Instrument Incubator Program, New Millennium projects and future Earth science missions. This is consistent with and supportive of NASA's new way of doing business by developing key and critical technologies the Agency needs to reduce the development cycle of missions, from five to seven years down to two to three years.

The goal of ATIP is to develop and demonstrate component and subsystem technologies that reduce the risk, cost, size and development time of three areas of importance to the Earth Science Enterprise: Earth-observing instruments, platforms and information systems. Another goal is to enable new Earth observation measurements.

The Office of Earth Science intends to implement the Earth science technology program with affordable access to space, leading to greater program flexibility. A major part of this enabling process is the rapid development of small, low-cost remote-sensing instruments. Technological innovations in reducing the size, mass and/or power requirements for the current instruments and for the development of future remote-sensing instruments are essential to the future success of the Earth Science Enterprise.

ATIP is part of that program. NASA's Office of Earth Science studies how our global environment is changing using the unique perspective available from space and airborne platforms; it is dedicated to studying the long-term effects of natural and human-induced changes on our global environment. NASA is observing, documenting and assessing large-scale environmental processes, with current emphasis on seasonal-to-interannual climate variability, land-cover and land-use changes and global productivity, long-term climate change, atmospheric ozone research and studies related to the monitoring and prediction of natural hazards, minimizing the loss of human life and mitigating property damage. Satellite data, complemented by aircraft and ground data, are enabling researchers to understand environmental changes, to determine how human activities may have contributed to these changes and to understand the consequences of such changes.

For more information, contact Nand Topiwala at Goddard Space Flight Center. 301/286-7366, topiwala@pop500.gsfc.nasa.gov Please mention you read about it in Innovation.

Global Warming Phenomenon Under Study

A researcher from NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Alabama, working with a team of American and British investigators at the behest of the U.S. National Research Council (NRC), hopes a new joint study will shed additional light on the global warming phenomenon. According to the report, "Reconciling Observations of Global Temperature Change," the reality of global warming is not disputed. Just how much global warming Earth has experienced is the point of contention among many researchers, says Roy Spencer, senior NASA scientist for climate studies at the Global Hydrology and Climate Center in Huntsville. Estimates range from negligible change to a rise of 0.4 or 0.5 degree Celsius over the last 20 years.

The report, issued earlier this year at the annual conference of the American Meteorological Society in Long Beach, California, was produced to help resolve debate caused by differences between satellite measurements, which in the last 20 years have shown very little cumulative atmospheric warming, and surface-based measurements, which have shown substantial warming during the same period.

Researchers' first concern is the accuracy of their measurements, and not the origin of global warming. They are not trying to refute existing studies, nor are they pointing to a definitive cause for the trend. Rather, it is their hope to provide a more comprehensive overview of the global situation, using the latest in space technology to augment ground-based measurements.

The evidence reviewed by the NRC panel led them to conclude that recorded differences between surface and upper air trends over the past two decades are "at least partially real," according to the report. While the report does not attribute the surface warming to a particular cause, it does address possible reasons why the upper air may have warmed less rapidly than the surface. These reasons include both natural factors and human activities. The report also cites the susceptibility of surface- and satellite-based instruments and measuring techniques to some degree of error, leading to the disparate findings.

"The final consensus of the NRC study team is that satellite measurements do not refute the fact that surface temperatures have been rising” Spencer says. The study concludes that further research is needed to fully explain the differences between surface and tropospheric global warming trends.

"High-quality measurements are key to understanding this phenomenon," Spencer says. "It could take many more years of satellite-based and ground-based measurements before we can say just how much warming is the result of human activity as opposed to natural climate fluctuations."

The Global Hydrology and Climate Center is a joint venture between the government and academia to study the global water cycle and its effect on Earth's climate. Funded by NASA and jointly operated by Marshall and the University of Alabama in Huntsville, the center conducts research in a number of critical areas. Satellite tracking of hurricanes promises to improve global, severe weather forecasting capabilities. Research into lightning activity is providing new insight on the formation of tornadoes. Thermal studies of metropolitan areas are helping alert citizens and urban planners to the detrimental effects of the urban heat island. Also, NASA remote-sensing technologies explore new ways to aid farm productivity and identify outbreaks of disease.

For more information, contact Steve Roy at Marshall Space Flight Center. 256/544-0034, steve.roy@msfc.nasa.gov Or visit http://www.msfc.nasa.gov/news Please mention you read about it in Innovation.

NASA Official: Jonathan Root

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