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NASA NTRS2010

Two-Phase Thermal Switching System for a Small, Extended Duration Lunar Science Platform

Issue: extended duration lunar science platforms, using solar/battery or radioisotope power, require thermal switching systems that: a) Provide efficient cooling during the 15-earth-day 390 K lunar day; b) Consume minimal power during the 15-earth-day 100 K lunar night. Objective: carry out an analytical study of thermal switching systems that can meet the thermal requirements of: a) International Lunar Network (ILN) anchor node mission - primary focus; b) Other missions such as polar crater landers. ILN Anchor Nodes: network of geophysical science platforms to better understand the interior structure/composition of the moon: a) Rationale: no data since Apollo seismic stations ceased operation in 1977; b) Anchor Nodes: small, low-power, long-life (6-yr) landers with seismographic and a few other science instruments (see next chart); c) WEB: warm electronics box houses ILN anchor node electronics/batteries. Technology Need: thermal switching system that will keep the WEB cool during the lunar day and warm during the lunar night.

Bugby, D.↗

NASA NTRS2011

SCOSTEP: Understanding the Climate and Weather of the Sun-Earth System

The international solar-terrestrial physics community had recognized the importance of space weather more than a decade ago, which resulted in a number of international collaborative activities such as the Climate and Weather of the Sun Earth System (CAWSES) by the Scientific Committee on Solar Terrestrial Physics (SCOSTEP). The CAWSES program is the current major scientific program of SCOSTEP that will continue until the end of the year 2013. The CAWSES program has brought scientists from all over the world together to tackle the scientific issues behind the Sun-Earth connected system and explore ways of helping the human society. In addition to the vast array of space instruments, ground based instruments have been deployed, which not only filled voids in data coverage, but also inducted young scientists from developing countries into the scientific community. This paper presents a summary of CAWSES and other SCOSTEP activities that promote space weather science via complementary approaches in international scientific collaborations, capacity building, and public outreach.

Gopalswamy, Natchimuthuk↗

NASA NTRS2020

Leveraging Space and Ground Assets in a Sensorweb for Scientific Monitoring: Early Results and Opportunities for the Future

Increased space and ground sensing is enabling dramaticnew measurements of a wide range of Earth Science andApplied Earth Science phenomena. New space sensors tomonitor volcanism, flooding, wildfires, weather, and manyother phenomena abound.New challenges exist to rapidly assimilate available dataand to optimize measurements (e.g. direct assets) to bestobserve these complex and dynamic spatiotemporalphenomena. Artificial Intelligence offers the potential toassist in data interpretation and resource allocation to bestallocate sensing assets. We describe some efforts to buildand experiment with such “sensorweb” systems as well asoffer some direction for the future sensorweb observationsystems.

Chien, Steve↗

NASA NTRS2017

GES DISC Greenhouse Gas Data Sets and Associated Services

NASA Goddard Earth Sciences (GES) Data and Information Services Center (DISC) archives and distributes rich collections of data on atmospheric greenhouse gases from multiple missions. Hosted data include those from the Atmospheric Infrared Sounder (AIRS) mission (which has observed CO2, CH4, ozone, and water vapor since 2002); legacy water vapor and ozone retrievals from TIROS Operational Vertical Sounder (TOVS); and Upper Atmosphere Research Satellite (UARS) going back to the early 1980s. GES DISC also archives and supports data from seven projects of the Making Earth System Data Records for Use in Research Environments (MEaSUREs) program that have ozone and water vapor records. Greenhouse gases data from the A-Train satellite constellation is also available: (1) Aura-Ozone Monitoring Instrument (OMI) and Microwave Limb Sounder (MLS) ozone, nitrous oxide, and water vapor since 2004; (2) Greenhouse Gases Observing Satellite (GOSAT) CO2 observations since 2009 from the Atmospheric CO2 Observations from Space (ACOS) task; and (3) Orbiting Carbon Observatory-2 (OCO-2) CO2 data since 2014. The most recent related data set that the GES DISC archives is methane flux for North America, as part of NASAs Carbon Monitoring System (CMS) project. This dataset contains estimates of methane emission in North America based on an inversion of the GEOS-Chem chemical transport model constrained by GOSAT observations (Turner et al., 2015). Along with data stewardship, an important focus area of the GES DISC is to enhance the usability of its data and broaden its user base. Users have unrestricted access to a new user-friendly search interface, which includes many services such as variable subsetting, format conversion, quality screening, and quick browse. The majority of the GES DISC data sets are also accessible through Open-source Project for a Network Data Access Protocol (OPeNDAP) and Web Coverage Service (WCS). The latter two services provide more options for specialized subsetting, format conversion, and image viewing. Additional data exploration, data preview, and preliminary analysis capabilities are available via NASA Giovanni, which obviates the need forusers to download the data (Acker and Leptoukh, 2007). Giovanni provides a bridge between the data and science and has been very successful in extending GES DISC data to educational users and to users with limited resources.

data ordering↗

NASA NTRS2000

New Views of the Moon: Improved Understanding Through Data Integration

Understanding the Moon is crucial to future exploration of the solar system.The Moon preserves a record of the first billion years of the Earth-Moon system's history, including evidence of the Moon's origin as accumulated debris from a giant impact into early Earth. Lunar rocks provide evidence of early differentiation and extraction of a crust. Lacking an atmospheric shield, the Moon's regolith retains a record of the activity of solar wind over the past 4 billion years. It also holds a complete record of impact cratering, and analysis of samples has allowed calibration of ages, and thus dating of other planetary surfaces. And because of its proximity to Earth, it's low gravity well, and stable surface, the Moon's resources will be useful both in establishing lunar habitations and as fuel for exploration beyond the Moon. Lunar science has advanced tremendously in the 30 years since the Apollo and Luna missions. We know that the Moon is strongly differentiated, and recent tungsten isotope studies indicate that this differentiation occurred soon after solar system formation. The Moon probably accreted rapidly from debris that formed as a large planetesimal struck the early Earth. Ancient highland rocks provide evidence of early lunar differentiation, and basalts formed by later melting within the mantle reveal it cumulus nature. However, the timing, extent, and depth of differentiation, variations within the mantle, and lateral and vertical variations within the crust can only be surmised from the limited sample suites,gravity studies,and surface geophysics of the Apollo era. Data from the recent Lunar Prospector and Clementine missions permit reassessment of the global characteristics of the Moon and a reexamination of the distribution of elemental components, rock and soil types, and resources, as well as remanent magnetism, gravity field, and global topography New research provides some answers, but also leads to new questions.

Jolliff, B. L.↗

NASA NTRS2011

InSAR Scientific Computing Environment

This computing environment is the next generation of geodetic image processing technology for repeat-pass Interferometric Synthetic Aperture (InSAR) sensors, identified by the community as a needed capability to provide flexibility and extensibility in reducing measurements from radar satellites and aircraft to new geophysical products. This software allows users of interferometric radar data the flexibility to process from Level 0 to Level 4 products using a variety of algorithms and for a range of available sensors. There are many radar satellites in orbit today delivering to the science community data of unprecedented quantity and quality, making possible large-scale studies in climate research, natural hazards, and the Earth's ecosystem. The proposed DESDynI mission, now under consideration by NASA for launch later in this decade, would provide time series and multiimage measurements that permit 4D models of Earth surface processes so that, for example, climate-induced changes over time would become apparent and quantifiable. This advanced data processing technology, applied to a global data set such as from the proposed DESDynI mission, enables a new class of analyses at time and spatial scales unavailable using current approaches. This software implements an accurate, extensible, and modular processing system designed to realize the full potential of InSAR data from future missions such as the proposed DESDynI, existing radar satellite data, as well as data from the NASA UAVSAR (Uninhabited Aerial Vehicle Synthetic Aperture Radar), and other airborne platforms. The processing approach has been re-thought in order to enable multi-scene analysis by adding new algorithms and data interfaces, to permit user-reconfigurable operation and extensibility, and to capitalize on codes already developed by NASA and the science community. The framework incorporates modern programming methods based on recent research, including object-oriented scripts controlling legacy and new codes, abstraction and generalization of the data model for efficient manipulation of objects among modules, and well-designed module interfaces suitable for command- line execution or GUI-programming. The framework is designed to allow users contributions to promote maximum utility and sophistication of the code, creating an open-source community that could extend the framework into the indefinite future.

Rosen, Paul A.↗

NASA NTRS2022

On-Orbit Performance of the Spitzer Space Telescope: Science Meets Engineering

The Spitzer Space Telescope operated for over 16 years in an Earth-trailing solar orbit, returning not only a wealth of scientific data but also, as a by-product, spacecraft and instrument engineering data that will be of interest to future mission planners. These data will be particularly useful because Spitzer operated in an environment essentially identical to that at the L2 LaGrange point, where many future astrophysics missions will operate. In particular, the radiative cooling demonstrated by Spitzer has been adopted by other infrared space missions, from JWST to SPHEREx. We aim to facilitate the utility of the Spitzer engineering data by collecting the more unique and potentially useful portions into a single, readily accessible publication. We avoid discussion of less unique systems, such as the telecom, flight software, and electronics systems, and do not address the innovations in mission and science operations that the Spitzer team initiated. These and other items of potential interest are addressed in references supplied in an appendix to this paper.

Spitzer↗

DOE OSTI2016

Beyond microbes: Are fauna the next frontier in soil biogeochemical models?

The explicit representation of microbial communities in soil biogeochemical models is improving their projections, promoting new interdisciplinary research, and stimulating novel theoretical developments. However, microbes are the foundation of complicated soil food webs, with highly intricate and non-linear interactions among trophic groups regulating soil biogeochemical cycles. This food web includes fauna, which influence litter decomposition and the structure and activity of the microbial community. Given the early success of microbial-explicit models, should we also consider explicitly representing faunal activity and physiology in soil biogeochemistry models? Herein we explore this question, arguing that the direct effects of fauna on litter decomposition are stronger than on soil organic matter dynamics, and that fauna can have strong indirect effects on soil biogeochemical cycles by influencing microbial population dynamics, but the direction and magnitude of these effects remains too unpredictable for models used to predict global biogeochemical patterns. Given glaring gaps in our understanding of fauna-microbe interactions and how these might play out along climatic and land use gradients, we believe it remains early to explicitly represent fauna in these global-scale models. However, their incorporation into models used for conceptual exploration of food-web interactions or into ecosystem-scale models using site-specific data could provide rich theoretical breakthroughs and provide a starting point for improving model projections across scales.

59 BASIC BIOLOGICAL SCIENCES↗

NASA NTRS2016

An Optimum Space-to-Ground Communication Concept for CubeSat Platform Utilizing NASA Space Network and Near Earth Network

National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) CubeSat missions are expected to grow rapidly in the next decade. Higher data rate CubeSats are transitioning away from Amateur Radio bands to higher frequency bands. A high-level communication architecture for future space-to-ground CubeSat communication was proposed within NASA Goddard Space Flight Center. This architecture addresses CubeSat direct-to-ground communication, CubeSat to Tracking Data Relay Satellite System (TDRSS) communication, CubeSat constellation with Mothership direct-to-ground communication, and CubeSat Constellation with Mothership communication through K-Band Single Access (KSA).A Study has been performed to explore this communication architecture, through simulations, analyses, and identifying technologies, to develop the optimum communication concepts for CubeSat communications. This paper will present details of the simulation and analysis that include CubeSat swarm, daughter shipmother ship constellation, Near Earth Network (NEN) S and X-band direct to ground link, TDRS Multiple Access (MA) array vs Single Access mode, notional transceiverantenna configurations, ground asset configurations and Code Division Multiple Access (CDMA) signal trades for daughter mother CubeSat constellation inter-satellite crosslink. Results of Space Science X-band 10 MHz maximum achievable data rate study will be summarized. Assessment of Technology Readiness Level (TRL) of current CubeSat communication technologies capabilities will be presented. Compatibility test of the CubeSat transceiver through NEN and Space Network (SN) will be discussed. Based on the analyses, signal trade studies and technology assessments, the functional design and performance requirements as well as operation concepts for future CubeSat end-to-end communications will be derived.

CubeSat RF Communication↗

NASA NTRS1991

Flight project data book, 1991

The Office of Space Science and Applications (OSSA) is responsible for planning, directing, executing, and evaluating that part of the overall NASA program that has as its goal the use of the unique characteristics of the space environment to conduct a scientific study of the universe, to solve practical problems on Earth, and to provide the scientific research foundation for expanding human presence beyond Earth into the solar system. OSSA manages the development of NASA's flight instrumentation for space science and applications including free flying spacecraft, Shuttle and Space Station payloads, and the suborbital sounding rockets, balloons, and aircraft programs. A summary is provided of future flight missions, including those approved and currently under development and those which appear in the OSSA strategic plan.

Source record↗

NASA NTRSDate not supplied

Multi-Decadal Nitrogen Dioxide and Derived Products from Satellites (MINDS) Datasets Released by NASA GES DISC and Their Applications for Air Quality

Nitrogen dioxide (NO2), a pervasive air pollutant, comes from vehicles, power plants, industrial emissions, and off-road sources such as construction or lawn and gardening equipment. The NASA Goddard Earth Sciences Data and Information Services Center (GES DISC) curates many remote sensing datasets with NO2 retrievals, which have been utilized for air quality research and applications. The remotely-sensed datasets include those generated by the Ozone Monitoring Instrument (OMI) on the Aura satellite, the TROPOspheric Monitoring Instrument (TROPOMI) onboard the Copernicus Sentinel-5 Precursor (S5P), and the Ozone Mapping and Profiling Suite (OMPS) Nadir-Mapper (NM) instrument on the Suomi National Polar-orbiting Partnership (S- NPP). In collaboration with the NASA Making Earth System Data Records for Use in Research Environments (MEaSUREs) Multi-Decadal Nitrogen Dioxide and Derived Products from Satellites (MINDS) project, the GES DISC recently released MINDS datasets. The NASA MEaSUREs MINDS project aims to develop long-term NO2 global data records by adapting a consistent retrieval algorithm to multiple instrument measurements. Long-term data records will be achieved by applying consistent retrieval approaches to multiple satellite instruments, including OMI (2004 - ); the Global Ozone Monitoring Experiment (GOME, 1995-2011) onboard the second European Remote Sensing satellite (ERS-2); the Scanning Imaging Spectrometer for Atmospheric Cartography (SCIAMACHY, 2002-2012) onboard the ENVIronmental SATellite (ENVISAT); GOME-2 on the Meteorological Operational satellites (MetOp-A and MetOp-B, 2006 - ); and TROPOMI onboard the Copernicus S5P (2017 - ). The long-term record (1995 to present) of MINDS datasets makes them very useful for air quality trend studies. Some MINDS datasets with high spatial resolution of only a few kilometers can be used for air quality research and applications at regional scales. In this presentation, we will introduce all of the MINDS products and services, and demonstrate use cases of MINDS data for studying air quality. We will also present a few other NO2 datasets acquired from NASA’s Health and Air Quality Applied Sciences Team (HAQAST), to be archived and distributed by the GES DISC, and highlight some of their applications for air quality and health.

Feng Ding↗

DOE OSTI2024

Land Use Change Alters Soil Organic Carbon: Constrained Global Patterns and Predictors

Abstract Land use change (LUC) alters the global carbon (C) stock, but our estimation of the alteration remains uncertain and is a major impediment to predicting the global C cycle. The uncertainty is partly due to the limited number and geographical bias of observations, and limited exploration of its predictors. Here we generated a comprehensive global database of 5,980 observations from 790 articles. The number of sites evaluated is at least seven times larger than in previous meta‐analyses. Our constrained estimates of different LUC's effects on soil organic C (SOC) and their variations across global climates reveal underestimation/overestimation in previous estimates. Converting forests and grasslands to croplands reduced SOC by 24.5% ± 1.53% (−11.03 ± 1.06 Mg ha −1 ) and 22.7% ± 1.22% (−8.09 ± 0.67 Mg ha −1 ), while 28.0% ± 1.56% (4.46 ± 0.42 Mg ha −1 ) and 33.5% ± 1.68% (5.8 ± 0.38 Mg ha −1 ) increases, respectively, were obtained in the reverse processes. Converting forests to grasslands decreased SOC by 2.1% ± 1.22% (−1.13 ± 0.44 Mg ha −1 ), while the reverse process increased SOC by 18.6% ± 1.73% (3.31 ± 0.51 Mg ha −1 ). Modeled relative importance of 10 drivers of LUC's impact on SOC revealed that higher initial SOC (iSOC) does not solely determine SOC loss in SOC‐negative LUC scenarios as previously proposed. Across four decades, reconverting croplands to forests and grasslands recovered only 49.5% (6.1 ± 0.51 Mg ha −1 ) and 75.3% (7.0 ± 0.38 Mg ha −1 ) of the iSOC, respectively, indicating the need for protecting C‐rich ecosystems. Our global data set advances information on LUC's effect on SOC and can be valuable to constrain Earth system models to reliably estimate global SOC stocks and plan climate change mitigation strategies.

Environmental Sciences & Ecology↗

DOE OSTI2024

Characterizing and communicating uncertainty: lessons from NASA’s Carbon Monitoring System

Navigating uncertainty is a critical challenge in all fields of science, especially when translating knowledge into real-world policies or management decisions. However, the wide variance in concepts and definitions of uncertainty across scientific fields hinders effective communication. As a microcosm of diverse fields within Earth Science, NASA’s Carbon Monitoring System (CMS) provides a useful crucible in which to identify cross-cutting concepts of uncertainty. The CMS convened the Uncertainty Working Group (UWG), a group of specialists across disciplines, to evaluate and synthesize efforts to characterize uncertainty in CMS projects. This paper represents efforts by the UWG to build a heuristic framework designed to evaluate data products and communicate uncertainty to both scientific and non-scientific end users. We consider four pillars of uncertainty: origins, severity, stochasticity versus incomplete knowledge, and spatial and temporal autocorrelation. Using a common vocabulary and a generalized workflow, the framework introduces a graphical heuristic accompanied by a narrative, exemplified through contrasting case studies. Envisioned as a versatile tool, this framework provides clarity in reporting uncertainty, guiding users and tempering expectations. Beyond CMS, it stands as a simple yet powerful means to communicate uncertainty across diverse scientific communities.

54 ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES↗

DOE OSTI2024

Data for publication: "A fresh take: Seasonal changes in terrestrial freshwater inputs impact salt marsh hydrology and vegetation dynamics"

This data repository contains data associated with the manuscript "A fresh take: Seasonal changes in terrestrial freshwater inputs impact salt marsh hydrology and vegetation dynamics". This study was conducted at the Elkhorn Slough National Estuarine Research Reserve in Watsonville, California from October 2019 - June 2022. We sought to understand the role of shallow freshwater inputs from adjacent uplands on salt marsh hydrologic behavior and vegetation productivity. This dataset contains CSV files of the following: daily salt marsh subsurface water level and pore water conductivity, monthly vegetation survey measurements, soil core data. Estuary surface water level, conductivity, and local precipitation were downloaded from the National Estuarine Research Reserve System (Centralized Data Management Office) at https://cdmo.baruch.sc.edu/.

54 ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES↗

DOE OSTI2015

Final Report Collaborative Project. Improving the Representation of Coastal and Estuarine Processes in Earth System Models

This project aimed to improve long term global climate simulations by resolving and enhancing the representation of the processes involved in the cycling of freshwater through estuaries and coastal regions. This was a collaborative multi-institution project consisting of physical oceanographers, climate model developers, and computational scientists. It specifically targeted the DOE objectives of advancing simulation and predictive capability of climate models through improvements in resolution and physical process representation. The main computational objectives were: 1. To develop computationally efficient, but physically based, parameterizations of estuary and continental shelf mixing processes for use in an Earth System Model (CESM). 2. To develop a two-way nested regional modeling framework in order to dynamically downscale the climate response of particular coastal ocean regions and to upscale the impact of the regional coastal processes to the global climate in an Earth System Model (CESM). 3. To develop computational infrastructure to enhance the efficiency of data transfer between specific sources and destinations, i.e., a point-to-point communication capability, (used in objective 1) within POP, the ocean component of CESM.

54 ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES↗

DOE OSTI2016

5th Annual Earth System Grid Federation

The purpose of the Fifth Annual Earth System Grid Federation (ESGF) Face-to-Face (F2F) Conference was to present the most recent information on the state of ESGF’s software stack and to identify and address the data needs and gaps for the climate and weather communities that ESGF supports.

54 ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES↗

NASA NTRS1990

High rate information systems - Architectural trends in support of the interdisciplinary investigator

Data systems requirements in the Earth Observing System (EOS) Space Station Freedom (SSF) eras indicate increasing data volume, increased discipline interplay, higher complexity and broader data integration and interpretation. A response to the needs of the interdisciplinary investigator is proposed, considering the increasing complexity and rising costs of scientific investigation. The EOS Data Information System, conceived to be a widely distributed system with reliable communication links between central processing and the science user community, is described. Details are provided on information architecture, system models, intelligent data management of large complex databases, and standards for archiving ancillary data, using a research library, a laboratory and collaboration services.

Handley, Thomas H., Jr.↗

NASA NTRS1993

Earth observational research using multistage EOS-like data

This grant is funded as a part of a program in which both research and educational impact are intended. Research work under this grant is directed at the understanding and use of future hyperspectral data such as that from imaging spectrometers. Specifically, the objectives of the work are (1) to prepare suitable means for analyzing data from sensors which have large numbers of spectral bands, (2) to advance the fundamental understanding of the manner in which soils and vegetative materials reflect high spectral resolution optical wavelength radiation, and (3) to maximize the impact of the results on the educational community. Over the life of the grant, the work has thus involved basic Earth science research and information system technique understanding and development in a mutually supportive way, however, more recently it has become necessary to focus the work primarily on areas (1) and (3). During the last year, the level of effort on this grant has been reduced to half its previous value. We have also been advised that this grant will end with the current year, thus this will be the penultimate semiannual progress summary.

Johannsen, C. J.↗