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At least 91 records · Page 5

Use NASA Earthdata in the Cloud

With the impending arrival of new, high-data-volume Earth observation missions, NASA’s ability to effectively ingest, process, and archive large amounts of data requires the most cost-effective, flexible, and scalable data-management architectures and technologies. To meet these demands, NASA's Earth Science Data Systems (ESDS) Program is implementing a strategic vision to develop and operate multiple components of NASA's Earth Observing System Data and Information System (EOSDIS) in a commercial cloud environment. As more earth observing data is moved into the cloud, NASA EOSDIS wants to share our reasoning for moving data into the commercial cloud, as well as demonstrate how end-users can take advantage of both data in the cloud and cloud-deployed services. This presentation explains the enterprise reasons for moving data into the cloud, specifically the scalability of cloud systems, the flexibility to pivot to the most optimal language/system/architecture, and the reduced redundancy of a common architecture. Then we primarily focus on the user-driven reasons for moving to the cloud. Equal access to high performance computing helps all parties, especially users that don't have access to their own on-premise computing infrastructure. Rapid deployment allows users to spin up their own systems without needing the extensive platform previously required for large scale development. Cost effectiveness allows users a wide breadth of computing options, from super computer ability to small scale development, which can help underserved communities. Finally we link to internal resources that users can utilize to begin their cloud based development journey without having to be an expert in the field.

Nicholas Doty↗

CEOS Contributions to Informing Energy Management and Policy Decision Making Using Space-Based Earth Observations

Earth observations are playing an increasingly significant role in informing decision making in the energy sector. In renewable energy applications, space-based observations now routinely augment sparse ground-based observations used as input for renewable energy resource assessment applications. As one of the nine Group on Earth Observations (GEO) societal benefit areas, the enhancement of management and policy decision making in the energy sector is receiving attention in activities conducted by the Committee on Earth Observation Satellites (CEOS). CEOS has become the "space arm" for the implementation of the Global Earth Observation System of Systems (GEOSS) vision. It is directly supporting the space-based, near-term tasks articulated in the GEO three-year work plan. This paper describes a coordinated program of demonstration projects conducted by CEOS member agencies and partners to utilize Earth observations to enhance energy management end-user decision support systems. I discuss the importance of engagement with stakeholders and understanding their decision support needs in successfully increasing the uptake of Earth observation products for societal benefit. Several case studies are presented, demonstrating the importance of providing data sets in formats and units familiar and immediately usable by decision makers. These projects show the utility of Earth observations to enhance renewable energy resource assessment in the developing world, forecast space-weather impacts on the power grid, and improve energy efficiency in the built environment.

Eckman, Richard S.↗

Conference on Nutrition in Space and Related Waste Problems

As part of a continuing process man constantly seeks new habitats. In the late 1950's, he ventured into a vast and challenging new habitat, extraterrestrial space. Extending the realm of human life has always been a challenge to man, and inherent to all successful extensions of man into new domains is his ability to provide the essentials for life itself, his nutrition and controlled use of metabolic products. The provision of these essential requirements has always been a challenge and a motivating force in maintaining and extending human life on Earth. This challenge has now been extended beyond the Earth. As illustrated in this volume, many men and women of vision who continually devote their energies to feeding man on Earth have accepted the additional challenge of nutrition in space. They have already made inroads into the new problem of nutrition and waste handling in space and have already collected much physiological, psychological, toxicological, and pathological data related to space nutrition, feeding and elimination. They have elucidated man-machine interactions and the effects of these interactions on alimentation and elimination requirements in space. Thus light has been shed on specific research and development programs needed to establish requirements for nutrition and handling of metabolic wastes during manned space missions of 20 days' to 3 years' duration. These initial accomplishments have entailed the considerable efforts of many people and the knowledge and experience in nutrition and feeding gained by the Space Science Board of the National Academy of Sciences. This volume clearly represents the ability of scientists, engineers, and administrators to attack a problem as it arises; it clearly demonstrates the capability of the scientific and engineering communities to combine efforts, mobilize quickly, and devote their talents to a national need

Space environment↗

Visions of our Planet's Atmosphere, Land and Oceans: NASA/NOAA E-Theater 2003

The NASA/NOAA Electronic Theater presents Earth science observations from space in a spectacular way. Fly in from outer space to the conference location as well as the site of the 2002 Olympic Winter Games using data from NASA satellites and the IKONOS "Spy Satellite". See HDTV movie Destination Earth 2002 incorporating the Olympic Zooms, NBC footage of the 2002 Olympics, the shuttle, & the best NASA/NOAA Earth science visualizations. See the latest US and international global satellite weather movies including hurricanes, typhoons & "tornadoes". See the latest visualizations from NASA/NOAA and International remote sensing missions like Terra, Aqua, GOES, GMS , SeaWiFS, & Landsat. Feel the pulse of our planet. See how land vegetation, ocean plankton, clouds and temperatures respond to the sun & seasons. See vortexes and currents in the global oceans that bring up the nutrients to feed tiny algae and draw the fish, whales and fisherman. See the how the ocean blooms in response to these currents and El Nino/La Nina climate changes. See the city lights, fishing fleets, gas flares and bio-mass burning of the Earth at night observed by the the "night-vision" DMSP satellite. The presentation will be made using the latest HDTV and video projection technology by: Dr. Fritz Hasler NASA/Goddard Space Flight Center

Hasler, Fritz↗

An Agenda for Multimodal Foundation Models for Earth Observation

Archives of remote sensing (RS) data are increasing swiftly as new sensing modalities with enhanced spatiotemporal resolution become operational. While promising new breakthroughs, the sheer volume of RS archives stretches the limits of human analysts and existing AI tools, as most models are: i) limited to single data modalities; ii) task-specific; iii) heavily reliant on labeled data. The emerging Foundation Models (FMs) have the potential to address these limitations. Trained on vast unlabeled datasets through self-supervised learning, FMs enable generic feature extraction that facilitate specialization to a wide variety of downstream tasks. This paper describes a vision towards an FM for multimodal Earth Observation data (FM4EO), discussing key building blocks and open challenges. We put particular emphasis on multimodal reasoning, a topic underexplored in EO. Our ultimate goal is a practical path toward FM4EO with capacity to unlock breakthroughs in few-shot learning scenarios, multimodal geographic knowledge integration, synthesis, and hypothesis generation.

Ambrozio Dias, Philipe↗

ORBIT: Oak Ridge Base Foundation Model for Earth System Predictability

Earth system predictability is challenged by the complexity of environmental dynamics and the multitude of variables involved. Current AI foundation models, although advanced by leveraging large and heterogeneous data, are often constrained by their size and data integration, limiting their effectiveness in addressing the full range of Earth system prediction challenges. To overcome these limitations, we introduce the Oak Ridge Base Foundation Model for Earth System Predictability (ORBIT), an advanced vision transformer model that scales up to 113 billion parameters using a novel hybrid tensor-data orthogonal parallelism technique. As the largest model of its kind, ORBIT surpasses the current climate AI foundation model size by a thousandfold. Performance scaling tests conducted on the Frontier supercomputer have demonstrated that ORBIT achieves 684 petaFLOPS to 1.6 exaFLOPS sustained throughput, with scaling efficiency maintained at 41% to 85% across 49,152 AMD GPUs. These breakthroughs establish new advances in AI-driven climate modeling and demonstrate promise to significantly improve the Earth system predictability.

Wang, Xiao↗

ESAS-Derived Earth Departure Stage Design for Human Mars Exploration

The Vision for Space Exploration has set the nation on a course to have humans on Mars as early as 2030. To reduce the cost and risk associated with human Mars exploration, NASA is planning for the Mars architecture to leverage the lunar architecture as fully as possible. This study takes the defined launch vehicles and system capabilities from ESAS and extends their application to DRM 3.0 to design an Earth Departure Stage suitable for the cargo and crew missions to Mars. The impact of a propellant depot in LEO was assessed and sLzed for use with the EDS. To quantitatively assess and compare the effectiveness of alternative designs, an initial baseline architecture was defined using the ESAS launch vehicles and DRM 3.0. The baseline architecture uses three NTR engines, LH2 propellant, no propellant depot in LEO, and launches on the Ares I and Ares V. The Mars transfer and surface elements from DRM 3.0 were considered to be fixed payloads in the design of the EDS. Feasible architecture alternatives were identified from previous architecture studies and anticipated capabilities and compiled in a morphological matrix. ESAS FOMs were used to determine the most critical design attributes for the effectiveness of the EDS. The ESAS-derived FOMs used in this study to assess alternative designs are effectiveness and performance, affordability, reliability, and risk. The individual FOMs were prioritized using the AHP, a method for pairwise comparison. All trades performed were evaluated with respect to the weighted FOMs, creating a Pareto frontier of equivalently ideal solutions. Additionally, each design on the frontier was evaluated based on its fulfillment of the weighted FOMs using TOPSIS, a quantitative method for ordinal ranking of the alternatives. The designs were assessed in an integrated environment using physics-based models for subsystem analysis where possible. However, for certain attributes such as engine type, historical, performance-based mass estimating relations were more easily employed. The elements from the design process were integrated into a single loop, allowing for rapid iteration of subsystem analyses and compilation of resulting designs.

Flaherty, Kevin↗

Visions of our Planet's Atmosphere, Land and Oceans: NASA/NOAA Electronic-Theater 2002. Spectacular Visualizations of our Blue Marble

Spectacular Visualizations of our Blue Marble The NASA/NOAA Electronic Theater presents Earth science observations and visualizations in a historical perspective. Fly in from outer space to the 2002 Winter Olympic Stadium Site of the Olympic Opening and Closing Ceremonies in Salt Lake City. Fly in and through Olympic Alpine Venues using 1 m IKONOS "Spy Satellite" data. Go back to the early weather satellite images from the 1960s and see them contrasted with the latest US and international global satellite weather movies including hurricanes & "tornadoes". See the latest visualizations of spectacular images from NASA/NOAA remote sensing missions like Terra, GOES, TRMM, SeaWiFS, Landsat 7 including new 1 - min GOES rapid scan image sequences of Nov 9th 2001 Midwest tornadic thunderstorms and have them explained. See how High-Definition Television (HDTV) is revolutionizing the way we communicate science. (In cooperation with the American Museum of Natural History in NYC). See dust storms in Africa and smoke plumes from fires in Mexico. See visualizations featured on the covers of Newsweek, TIME, National Geographic, Popular Science & on National & International Network TV. New computer software tools allow us to roam & zoom through massive global images e.g. Landsat tours of the US, and Africa, showing desert and mountain geology as well as seasonal changes in vegetation. See animations of the polar ice packs and the motion of gigantic Antarctic Icebergs from SeaWinds data. Spectacular new visualizations of the global atmosphere & oceans are shown. See vertexes and currents in the global oceans that bring up the nutrients to feed tiny algae and draw the fish, whales and fisherman. See the how the ocean blooms in response to these currents and El Nicola Nina climate changes. See the city lights, fishing fleets, gas flares and biomass burning of the Earth at night observed by the "night-vision" DMSP military satellite.

Hasler, A. F.↗

Robotic space simulation integration of vision algorithms into an orbital operations simulation

In order to successfully plan and analyze future space activities, computer-based simulations of activities in low earth orbit will be required to model and integrate vision and robotic operations with vehicle dynamics and proximity operations procedures. The orbital operations simulation (OOS) is configured and enhanced as a testbed for robotic space operations. Vision integration algorithms are being developed in three areas: preprocessing, recognition, and attitude/attitude rates. The vision program (Rice University) was modified for use in the OOS. Systems integration testing is now in progress.

Bochsler, Daniel C.↗

Let’s Unleash the Network Judgment: A Self-Supervised Approach for Cloud Image Analysis

Accurate cloud type identification and coverage analysis are crucial in understanding the Earth’s radiative budget. Traditional computer vision methods rely on low-level visual features of clouds for estimating cloud coverage or sky conditions. Several handcrafted approaches have been proposed; however, scope for improvement still exists. Newer deep neural networks (DNNs) have demonstrated superior performance for cloud segmentation and categorization. These methods, however, need expert engineering intervention in the preprocessing steps—in the traditional methods—or human assistance in assigning cloud or clear sky labels to a pixel for training DNNs. Such human mediation imposes considerable time and labor costs. We present the application of a new self-supervised learning approach to autonomously extract relevant features from sky images captured by ground-based cameras, for the classification and segmentation of clouds. We evaluate a joint embedding architecture that uses self-knowledge distillation plus regularization. We use two datasets to demonstrate the network’s ability to classify and segment sky images—one with ~85,000 images collected from our ground-based camera and another with 400 labeled images from the WSISEG database. We find that this approach can discriminate full-sky images based on cloud coverage, diurnal variation, and cloud base height. Additionally, it semantically segments the cloud areas without labels. The approach shows competitive performance in all tested tasks, suggesting a new alternative for cloud characterization.

54 ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES↗

Satellite Embedding-Based Population Imputation for Areas with Missing Building Footprint Data: A Computer Vision-Based Approach

High-resolution population modeling is important for supporting effective decision-making across diverse sectors. LandScan Mosaic generates population estimates at the level of individual buildings and aggregates them to 3 arc-second grids, and this approach performs well in regions where building footprint data are comprehensive and reliable. However, large portions of the globe still suffer from incomplete, sparse, or entirely missing building stock datasets, creating a structural limitation for strictly building-based population models. To address this research gap, this study proposes a computer vision-based framework that employs Google Earth Engine satellite embeddings and UNet, which allows us to directly impute grid-level population estimates in building-data-deficient areas. Applied to Taiwan as a case study, the framework achieved strong predictive performance with R$^{2}$ of 0.89, RMSE of 18.70, and MAE of 8.41, outperforming traditional machine learning approaches. Notably, the proposed framework effectively addressed building false-positive errors inherent in Global Human Settlement Layer (GHSL) data, correctly identifying uninhabited areas that were erroneously classified as populated. The framework also offers significant advantages for global population mapping, particularly in terms of scalability and temporal consistency, thereby extending the coverage and accuracy of high-resolution population products in data-scarce regions worldwide. Urban planners, decision makers, and related stakeholders can obtain granular population distributions to support more accurate and targeted infrastructure investment, service delivery, resource allocation, and risk assessment decisions.

97 MATHEMATICS AND COMPUTING↗

The Stellar Imager (SI)"Vision Mission"

The Stellar Imager (SI) is a "Vision" mission in the Sun-Earth Connection (SEC) Roadmap, conceived for the purpose of understanding the effects of stellar magnetic fields, the dynamos that generate them, and the internal structure and dynamics of the stars in which they exist. The ultimate goal is to achieve the best possible forecasting of solar/stellar magnetic activity and its impact on life in the Universe. The science goals of SI require an ultra-high angular resolution, at ultraviolet wavelengths, on the order of 100 micro-arcsec and thus baselines on the order of 0.5 km. These requirements call for a large, multi-spacecraft (less than 20) imaging interferometer, utilizing precision formation flying in a stable environment, such as in a Lissajous orbit around the Sun-Earth L2 point. SI's resolution will make it an invaluable resource for many other areas of astrophysics, including studies of AGN s, supernovae, cataclysmic variables, young stellar objects, QSO's, and stellar black holes. ongoing mission concept and technology development studies for SI. These studies are designed to refine the mission requirements for the science goals, define a Design Reference Mission, perform trade studies of selected major technical and architectural issues, improve the existing technology roadmap, and explore the details of deployment and operations, as well as the possible roles of astronauts and/or robots in construction and servicing of the facility.

Carpenter, Ken↗

The Stellar Imager (SI) "Vision Mission"

The Stellar Imager (SI) is a Vision Mission in the Sun-Earth Connection (SEC) NASA Roadmap, conceived for the purpose of understanding the effects of stellar magnetic fields, the dynamos that generate them, and the internal structure and dynamics of the stars in which they exist. The ultimate goal is to achieve the best possible forecasting of solar/stellar activity and its impact on life in the Universe. The science goals of SI require an ultra-high angular resolution, a t ultraviolet wavelengths, on the order of 100 micro-arcsec and baselines on the order of 0.5 km. These requirements call for a large, multi-spacecraft (>20) imaging interferometer, utilizing precision formation flying in a stable environment, such as in a Lissajous orbit around the Sun-Earth L2 point. In this paper, we present an update on the ongoing SI mission concept and technology development studies.

Carpenter, K.↗

The Stellar Imager (SI) "Vision Mission"

The Stellar Imager (SI) is a Vision Mission in the Sun-Earth Connection (SEC) NASA Roadmap, conceived for the purpose of understanding the effects of stellar magnetic fields, the dynamos that generate them, and the internal structure and dynamics of the stars in which they exist. The ultimate goal is to achieve the best possible forecasting of solar/stellar activity and its impact on life in the Universe. The science goals of SI require an ultra-high angular resolution, at ultraviolet wavelengths, on the order of 100 micro-arcsec and baselines on the order of 0.5 km. These requirements call for a large, multi-spacecraft (greater than 20) imaging interferometer, utilizing precision formation flying in a stable environment, such as in a Lissajous orbit around the Sun-Earth L2 point. In this paper, we present an update on the ongoing SI mission concept and technology development studies.

Carpenter, K.↗

Europa Clipper Proposed Mission - an Update

Europa, the fourth largest moon of Jupiter, is believed to be one of the best places in the solar system to look for extant life beyond Earth. The 2011 Planetary Decadal Survey, Vision and Voyages, states: “Because of this ocean’s potential suitability for life, Europa is one of the most important targets in all of planetary science.” Exploring Europa to investigate its habitability is the goal of the planned Europa Mission. This exploration is intimately tied to understanding the three “ingredients” for life: liquid water, chemistry, and energy. The Europa Mission would investigate these ingredients by comprehensively exploring Europa’s ice shell and liquid ocean interface, surface geology and surface composition to glean insight into the inner workings of this fascinating moon. In addition, a lander mission is seen as a possible future step, but current data about the Jovian radiation environment and about potential landing site hazards and potential safe landing zones is insufficient. Therefore an additional goal of the mission would be to characterize the radiation environment near Europa and investigate scientifically compelling sites for hazards, to inform a potential future landed mission.

Kirby, Karen↗

Global Reach: A View of International Cooperation in NASA's Earth Science Enterprise

Improving life on Earth and understanding and protecting our home planet are foremost in the Vision and Mission of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA). NASA's Earth Science Enterprise end eavors to use the unique vantage point of space to study the Earth sy stem and improve the prediction of Earth system change. NASA and its international partners study Earth's land, atmosphere, ice, oceans, a nd biota and seek to provide objective scientific knowledge to decisi onmakers and scientists worldwide. This book describes NASA's extensi ve cooperation with its international partners.

Source record↗

Risk of Adverse Health Outcomes & Decrements in Performance due to Inflight Medical Conditions: ExMC Pharmacy Research Plan

The Exploration Medical Capabilities (ExMC) Element of NASA's Human Research Program is charged with identifying medical capabilities that can address the challenges of prevention, diagnosis, and treatment of disease and injuries that could occur during exploration missions beyond Earth's orbit. Faced with the obstacle of access to in-flight medical care, and limitations of vehicle space, time, and communications; it is necessary to prioritize what medical consumables are manifested for the flight, and which medical conditions are addressed. Studies of astronaut health establish the incidence of common and high risk medical conditions that require medical intervention during long-duration exploration missions. In 2000, the Institute of Medicine (IOM) convened a committee of experts, Committee on Creating a Vision for Space Medicine during Travel beyond Earth Orbit, to examine the issues surrounding astronaut health and safety for long duration space missions. Two themes run throughout the committee's final report: (1) that not enough is known about the risks to human health during long-duration missions beyond Earth's orbit or about what can effectively mitigate those risks to enable humans to travel and work safely in the environment of deep space and (2) that everything reasonable should be done to gain the necessary information before humans are sent on missions of space exploration (IOM, 2001). Although several spaceflight focused pharmaceutical research studies have been conducted, few have provided sufficient data regarding medication usage or potency changes during spaceflight. The Du pharmaceutical stability study assessed medications flown on space shuttles to and from the International Space Station (ISS) from 2006 until 2008; of which some medications were still viable beyond their expiration dates (Du et al, 2011). However, as with many spaceflight studies, the small 'n' associated with this study limits the ability to draw strong conclusions from it. Dr. Wotring and others have recently published articles containing information regarding medication usage, indications, and efficacy gleaned from spaceflight records (Wotring et al, 2015, 2016; Barger et al, 2014; Basner and Dinges, 2014). Although some conclusions can be drawn from these studies, the inability to fully quantify medication usage, indications, side effects, and effectiveness, limits insight as to which medications should be prioritized for further research.

Antonsen, Erik↗