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At least 163 records · Page 9

Actions Needed to Ensure Scientific and Technical Information is Adequately Reviewed at Goddard Space Flight Center, Johnson Space Center, Langley Research Center, and Marshall Space Flight Center

This audit was initiated in response to a hotline complaint regarding the review, approval, and release of scientific and technical information (STI) at Johnson Space Center. The complainant alleged that Johnson personnel conducting export control reviews of STI were not fully qualified to conduct those reviews and that the reviews often did not occur until after the STI had been publicly released. NASA guidance requires that STI, defined as the results of basic and applied scientific, technical, and related engineering research and development, undergo certain reviews prior to being released outside of NASA or to audiences that include foreign nationals. The process includes technical, national security, export control, copyright, and trade secret (e.g., proprietary data) reviews. The review process was designed to preclude the inappropriate dissemination of sensitive information while ensuring that NASA complies with a requirement of the National Aeronautics and Space Act of 1958 (the Space Act)1 to provide for the widest practicable and appropriate dissemination of information resulting from NASA research activities. We focused our audit on evaluating the STI review process: specifically, determining whether the roles and responsibilities for the review, approval, and release of STI were adequately defined and documented in NASA and Center-level guidance and whether that guidance was effectively implemented at Goddard Space Flight Center, Johnson Space Center, Langley Research Center, and Marshall Space Flight Center. Johnson was included in the review because it was the source of the initial complaint, and Goddard, Langley, and Marshall were included because those Centers consistently produce significant amounts of STI.

Information management↗

Quantum Theory of the Classical: Einselection, Envariance, Quantum Darwinism and Extantons

Core quantum postulates including the superposition principle and the unitarity of evolutions are natural and strikingly simple. I show that—when supplemented with a limited version of predictability (captured in the textbook accounts by the repeatability postulate)—these core postulates can account for all the symptoms of classicality. In particular, both objective classical reality and elusive information about reality arise, via quantum Darwinism, from the quantum substrate. This approach shares with the Relative State Interpretation of Everett the view that collapse of the wavepacket reflects perception of the state of the rest of the Universe relative to the state of observer’s records. However, our “let quantum be quantum” approach poses questions absent in Bohr’s Copenhagen Interpretation that relied on the preexisting classical domain. Thus, one is now forced to seek preferred, predictable, hence effectively classical but ultimately quantum states that allow observers keep reliable records. Without such (i) preferred basis relative states are simply “too relative”, and the ensuing basis ambiguity makes it difficult to identify events (e.g., measurement outcomes). Moreover, universal validity of quantum theory raises the issue of (ii) the origin of Born’s rule, p k =|ψ k | 2 , relating probabilities and amplitudes (that is simply postulated in textbooks). Last not least, even preferred pointer states (defined by einselection—environment—induced superselection)—are still quantum. Therefore, unlike classical states that exist objectively, quantum states of an individual system cannot be found out by an initially ignorant observer through direct measurement without being disrupted. So, to complete the ‘quantum theory of the classical’ one must identify (iii) quantum origin of objective existence and explain how the information about objectively existing states can appear to be essentially inconsequential for them (as it does for states in Newtonian physics) and yet matter in other settings (e.g., thermodynamics). I show how the mathematical structure of quantum theory supplemented by the only uncontroversial measurement postulate (that demands immediate repeatability—hence, predictability) leads to preferred states. These (i) pointer states correspond to measurement outcomes. Their stability is a prerequisite for objective existence of effectively classical states and for events such as quantum jumps. Events at hand, one can now enquire about their probability—the probability of a pointer state (or of a measurement record). I show that the symmetry of entangled states—(ii) entanglement—assisted invariance or envariance—implies Born’s rule. Envariance also accounts for the loss of phase coherence between pointer states. Thus, decoherence can be traced to symmetries of entanglement and understood without its usual tool—reduced density matrices. A simple and manifestly noncircular derivation of p k =|ψ k | 2 follows. Monitoring of the system by its environment in course of decoherence typically leaves behind multiple copies of its pointer states in the environment. Only pointer states can survive decoherence and can spawn such plentiful information-theoretic progeny. This (iii) quantum Darwinism allows observers to use environment as a witness—to find out pointer states indirectly, leaving systems of interest untouched. Quantum Darwinism shows how epistemic and ontic (coexisting in epiontic quantum state) separate into robust objective existence of pointer states and detached information about them, giving rise to extantons—composite objects with system of interest in the core and multiple records of its pointer states in the halo comprising of environment subsystems (e.g., photons) which disseminates that information throughout the Universe.

71 CLASSICAL AND QUANTUM MECHANICS, GENERAL PHYSIC↗

The effects of quantization on signal processing

Typically an analog signal from a space system is sampled, quantized by Analog-to-Digital (A/D) conversion, merged into a bit stream, communicated to a ground station, received by the ground station, and processed by the ground station to extract useful information for dissemination to the users. The cost of each of these steps is reduced as the number of quantization steps is reduced in the A/D converter. The number of quantization steps should be as small as possible without losing the required information content. This report deals specifically with the accuracy of averages as a function of the number of quantized samples used to compute the averages with the noise on the analog signal as a parameter. For example, the success of the Visible Infrared Spin Scan Radiometer (VISSR) Atmospheric Sounder (VAS) Demonstration depends upon temporally averaging multiple samples in an effort to reduce noise to a sufficiently low level such that temperature profile sounding is made possible. A tutorial description of this process is presented.

Montgomery, H. E.↗

Possible role of remote sensing for increasing public awareness of the Chesapeake Bay environment

Application of remote sensing techniques to the study of the Chesapeake Bay and the availability of the resulting information are discussed in terms of public awareness of the Chesapeake Bay, its total environment, and the need to protect that environment and to preserve the Bay. Recommendations given include: (1) continue the study of remote sensing technology and its use in the Chesapeake Bay region; (2) emphasize the importance of LANDSAT imagery to the evolution of remote sensing technological developments and the awareness of the environment and its changes; (3) increase dissemination of information of the environmental applications of remote sensing technology to the public; (4) design surveys of the Chesapeake Bay environment and its manmade changes; and (5) establish a coordinating regional institution to develop a management plan for the Chesapeake Bay.

Wilkerson, T. D.↗

NORTH DAKOTA CARBONSAFE PHASE III: SITE CHARACTERIZATION AND PERMITTING OF GEOLOGIC STORAGE OF CARBON DIOXIDE

The Energy & Environmental Research Center (EERC), in partnership with Minnkota Power Cooperative Inc. (Minnkota), SLB, and Computer Modelling Group Ltd. (CMG), supported wide-scale deployment of carbon capture and storage (CCS) as part of the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) National Energy Technology Laboratory Carbon Storage Assurance Facility Enterprise (CarbonSAFE) Initiative Phase III. This phase included the acquisition, analysis, and development of information to fully characterize two storage complexes to demonstrate viable storage resources for commercial volumes of CO2 (defined by DOE as a minimum of 50 million tonnes [MMt] of CO2 within a 30-year period) (National Energy Technology Laboratory, 2024). Phase III also involved the preparation, submission, and approval of North Dakota underground injection control (UIC) Class VI storage facility permits (SFPs)—required precursors to applications for Class VI injection well permits. The presumed viability of commercial-scale CCS, situated adjacent to Minnkota’s Milton R. Young Station (MRYS), is validated by Minnkota’s continued pursuit of Project Tundra—an initiative to build the world’s largest lignite-based CCS project in central North Dakota (www.projecttundrand.com). Project Tundra comprises two scopes of work, Tundra Capture (installation of postcombustion CO2 capture at MRYS) and Tundra SGS (secure geologic storage). The efforts of North Dakota CarbonSAFE Phase III, Site Characterization and Permitting, supported Tundra SGS. Extensive site-specific characterization activities included a successful multimeasurement geophysical approach and drilling a stratigraphic test well (J-ROC 1, subsequently renamed Liberty-1) adjacent to MRYS. Core collection and analyses, downhole testing and fluid sampling, and geophysical logging were performed on J-ROC 1 and on a nearby stratigraphic test well (known as J-LOC 1), which was drilled, cored, and tested under a complementary project funded by the North Dakota Lignite Research Program. The injection tests performed on J-LOC 1 positively impacted the CarbonSAFE project, resulting in fewer proposed injection wells and significant construction, operations, and monitoring cost savings. The characterization data collected and analyses performed were integrated into geologic models, and successive numerical simulations were run to determine CO2 plume extent and subsurface pressure buildup associated with the planned CO2 injection rate of nearly 4 MMt per year. The latter doubles the CarbonSAFE Initiative goal with an estimated 100 MMt of CO2 stored in 20 years. Application of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA’s) method for estimating the Class VI Rule area of review (AOR) to the overpressurized Broom Creek Formation inspired an alternative method of calculation, called risk-based AOR delineation. This peer-reviewed method was applied for the first time during the storage facility-permitting process. The two SFP applications submitted in 2021 successfully resulted in North Dakota Industrial Commission (NDIC) orders in 2022 authorizing the creation of the storage facility areas and amalgamation of pore space as well as establishing financial responsibility requirements. After approval of the SFPs, Minnkota filed in 2022 applications for permits to reenter the J-ROC 1 well and to drill two new wells—all with the intended purpose to become Class VI injection wells. To establish eligibility under the Internal Revenue Code for Section 45Q tax incentives, a monitoring, reporting, and verification (MRV) plan was prepared and submitted by Minnkota to EPA in 2022, resulting in the first such plan approved in North Dakota. Also in 2022, under the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA), Minnkota prepared and submitted an environmental information volume (EIV) describing the proposed CCS project and associated potential environmental impacts. Based on the EIV, DOE determined that the proposed construction project required an environmental assessment, and Minnkota submitted the first draft in 2023 and a revised draft in 2024. Both submissions were followed by a public comment period. Subsequently, DOE issued a finding of no significant impact (FONSI) on September 13, 2024. A successful outreach program, strongly based in the production, presentation, and dissemination of informational material, fostered an environment to aid stakeholders in making informed decisions regarding the planned project. Opportunities for public input were provided at various steps along the way, including at county planning and zoning meetings, before and during the SFP administrative hearing, and during environmental assessment public comment periods. In addition, land/pore space owners and mineral owners had various points of contact, including granting access rights, securing pore space leasing, and mineral owner notifications. Based upon the successful storage facility permitting issued by NDIC, approval of the MRV plan by EPA, and receipt of a FONSI under the NEPA, Minnkota is continuing its pursuit of Project Tundra. In December 2023, the Office of Clean Energy Demonstrations under its Carbon Capture Demonstrations Projects Program announced funding for the capture system (Office of Clean Energy Demonstrations, 2023) and a proposal for CarbonSAFE Phase IV: Construction funding was submitted in March 2024 for the storage project. A go/no-go decision to proceed with construction and operations in the Broom Creek Formation is anticipated in 2024. References National Energy Technology Laboratory, CarbonSafe Initiative, https://netl.doe.gov/carbon-management/carbon-storage/carbonsafe (accessed August 2024). Office of Clean Energy Demonstrations, 2023, OCED selects three projects in CA, ND, and TX to reduce harmful carbon pollution, create new economic opportunities, and advance carbon reducing technologies, December, www.energy.gov/oced/articles/oced-selects-three-projects-ca-nd-and-tx-reduce-harmful-carbon-pollution-create-new (accessed August 2024).

Peck, Wesley↗

NASA Scientific and Technical Information System (STI) and New Directory of Numerical Data Bases

The heart of NASA's STI system is a collection of scientific and technical information gathered from worldwide sources. Currently containing over 2.2 million items, the data base is growing at the rate of 140,000 items per year. In addition to announcement journals, information is disseminated through the NASA RECON on-line bibliographic search system. One part of RECON is NALNET which lists journals and books held by the NASA Centers. Another service now accessible by recon is a directory of numerical data bases (DND) which can be shared by NASA staff and contractors. The DND describes each data base and gives the name and phone number of a contact person. A NASA-wide integrated library system is being developed for the Center libraries which will include on-line catalog and subsystems for acquisition, circulation control, information retrieveal, management information, and an authority file. These subsystems can interact with on-line bibliographic, patron, and vendor files.

Wilson, J.↗

Connecting Space to Village: Tethys Adoption Within SERVIR

The SERVIR program, a joint development initiative of National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) and United States Agency for International Development (USAID), works in partnership with leading regional organizations world-wide to help developing countries use information provided by Earth observing satellites and geospatial technologies for managing climate risks and land use. SERVIR empowers decision-makers with tools, products, and services to act locally on critical issues related to four key areas: Food Security and Agriculture, Water and Water-related Disasters, Land Use/Land Cover and Ecosystems, Weather and Climate. SERVIR is improving awareness, increasing access to information, and supporting analysis to help people in West Africa, Eastern and Southern Africa, Hindu Kush-Himalaya (HKH), the Lower Mekong, South America and Mesoamerica. NASA funds an Applied Sciences Team (AST), composed of experts from universities and research institutions around the United States. Through AST, SERVIR adopted the Tethys platform introduced by Brigham Young University (BYU) for the implementation of tools to deliver scientific data to stakeholders in the Hindu Kush-Himalaya region. Several Tethys applications developed within SERVIR have raised interest amongst decision makers in the countries served by our regional hubs. They see these new apps as key vehicles to disseminate complex information related to weather models, hydrological models, and air quality monitoring, and as such the scope of our Tethys efforts continue to expand to other regions. As of July 2019, each one of the SERVIR hubs (with the exception of Amazonia, which has only recently started), have stood up Tethys portals and have at least one individual trained in the implementation and maintenance of a Tethys portal and in the creation of basic applications. HKH, with BYU's valuable support, has implemented very sophisticated applications that showcase the possibilities and the benefits that the Tethys platform brings.

Tethys↗

A Collaboration Website for Muon Catalyzed Fusion and Muon Beam Production

This project sets up a website to support the nascent Muon Catalyzed Fusion collaboration including development of particle accelerators and transport beamlines for muon beams. The website is envisioned as having the general public information pages and private pages for collaboration members. Multimedia elements like images, text animations, and video lectures, covering a broad spectrum of topics will populate the educational site, covering muon facilities, to comprehensive explorations and seminal documents that define the science of Muon Catalyzed Fusion, Acceleration, Applications, Instrumentation, Beamline Design, and beam dynamics design codes. Ensuring compatibility across devices and operating systems, it also features integration with Google Docs for collaboration, a code repository (GitHub), a blog platform with comments (WordPress), the potential for ChatGPT integration and interactive graph plotting with Python Plotty to enhance data visualization. This project will maintain public and protected private pages, due to the proprietary nature of the work or research in progress. The public sections will be built to foster dissemination of information and highlight recent work within the NK Labs collaboration, including lectures, published papers, and regular blog posts with open commenting. The private section will support unpublished or nonpublic research, by facilitating collaborative efforts through integrated Google Docs and Python Plotty for shared graphing work. Ultimately, this project strives to make complex scientific knowledge more accessible to the public, foster enhanced collaboration, and serve as a platform for sharing cutting-edge research in Muon Catalyzed Fusion and Accelerators.

43 PARTICLE ACCELERATORS↗

The NASA Technical Report Server

The National Aeronautics and Space Act of 1958 established NASA and charged it to "provide for the widest practicable and appropriate dissemination of information concerning its activities and the results thereof." The search for innovative methods to distribute NASA's information lead a grass-roots team to create the NASA Technical Report Server (NTRS), which uses the World Wide Web and other popular Internet-based information systems as search engines. The NTRS is an inter-center effort which provides uniform access to various distributed publication servers residing on the Internet. Users have immediate desktop access to technical publications from NASA centers and institutes. The NTRS is comprised of several units, some constructed especially for inclusion in NTRS, and others that are existing NASA publication services that NTRS reuses. This paper presents the NTRS architecture, usage metrics, and the lessons learned while implementing and maintaining the service. The NTRS is largely constructed with freely available software running on existing hardware. NTRS builds upon existing hardware and software, and the resulting additional exposure for the body of literature contained ensures that NASA's institutional knowledge base will continue to receive the widest practicable and appropriate dissemination.

Nelson, Michael L.↗

The Widest Practicable Dissemination: The NASA Technical Report Server

The National Aeronautics and Space Act of 1958 established NASA and charged it to "provide for the widest practicable and appropriate dissemination of information concerning [...] its activities and the results thereof." The search for innovative methods to distribute NASA s information lead a grass-roots team to create the NASA Technical Report Server (NTRS), which uses the World Wide Web and other popular Internet-based information systems as search engines. The NTRS is an inter-center effort which provides uniform access to various distributed publication servers residing on the Internet. Users have immediate desktop access to technical publications from NASA centers and institutes. The NTRS is comprised of several units, some constructed especially for inclusion in NTRS, and others that are existing NASA publication services that NTRS reuses. This paper presents the NTRS architecture, usage metrics, and the lessons learned while implementing and maintaining the services over the initial 6-month period. The NTRS is largely constructed with freely available software running on existing hardware. NTRS builds upon existing hardware and software, and the resulting additional exposure for the body of literature contained will allow NASA to ensure that its institutional knowledge base will continue to receive the widest practicable and appropriate dissemination.

Nelson, Michael L.↗

The widest practicable dissemination: The NASA technical report server

The National Aeronautics and Space Act of 1958 established NASA and charged it to 'provide for the widest practicable and appropriate dissemination of information concerning...its activities and the results thereof.' The search for innovative methods to distribute NASA's information lead a grass-roots team to create the NASA Technical Report Server (NTRS), which uses the World Wide Web and other popular Internet-based information systems as search engines. The NTRS is an inter-center effort which provides uniform access to various distributed publication servers residing on the Internet. Users have immediate desktop access to technical publications from NASA centers and institutes. The NTRS is comprised of several units, some constructed especially for inclusion in NTRS, and others that are existing NASA publication services that NTRS reuses. This paper presents the NTRS architecture, usage metrics, and the lessons learned while implementing and maintaining the services over the initial six-month period. The NTRS is largely constructed with freely available software running on existing hardware. NTRS builds upon existing hardware and software, and the resulting additional exposure for the body of literature contained will allow NASA to ensure that its institutional knowledge base will continue to receive the widest practicable and appropriate dissemination.

Nelson, Michael L.↗

NASAwide electronic publishing system-prototype STI electronic document distribution: Stage-4 evaluation report: Appendices - Part 2

This evaluation report contains an introduction, seven chapters, and five appendices. The Introduction describes the purpose, conceptual framework, functional description, and technical report server of the Scientific and Technical Information (STI) Electronic Document Distribution (EDD) project. Chapter 1 documents the results of the prototype STI EDD in actual operation. Chapter 2 documents each NASA center's post processing publication processes. Chapter 3 documents each center's STI software, hardware. and communications configurations. Chapter 7 documents STI EDD policy, practices, and procedures. The appendices consist of (A) the STI EDD Project Plan, (B) Team members, (C) Phasing Schedules, (D) Accessing On-line Reports, and (E) Creating an HTML File and Setting Up an xTRS. In summary, Stage 4 of the NASAwide Electronic Publishing System is the final phase of its implementation through the prototyping and gradual integration of each NASA center's electronic printing systems, desk top publishing systems, and technical report servers, to be able to provide to NASA's engineers, researchers, scientists, and external users, the widest practicable and appropriate dissemination of information concerning its activities and the result thereof to their work stations.

Tuey, Richard C.↗

A Projected Network Model of Online Disinformation Cascades

Within the past half-decade, it has become overwhelmingly clear that suppressing the spread of deliberate false and misleading information is of the utmost importance for protecting democratic institutions. Disinformation has been found to come from both foreign and domestic actors, but the effects from either can be disastrous. From the simple encouragement of unwarranted distrust to conspiracy theories promoting violence, the results of disinformation have put the functionality of American democracy under direct threat. Present scientific challenges posed by this problem include detecting disinformation, quantifying its potential impact, and preventing its amplification. We present a model on which we can experiment with possible strategies toward the third challenge: the prevention of amplification. This is a social contagion network model, which is decomposed into layers to represent physical, ''offline'', interactions as well as virtual interactions on a social media platform. Along with the topological modifications to the standard contagion model, we use state-transition rules designed specifically for disinformation, and distinguish between contagious and non-contagious infected nodes. We use this framework to explore the effect of grassroots social movements on the size of disinformation cascades by simulating these cascades in scenarios where a proportion of the agents remove themselves from the social platform. We also test the efficacy of strategies that could be implemented at the administrative level by the online platform to minimize such spread. These top-down strategies include banning agents who disseminate false information, or providing corrective information to individuals exposed to false information to decrease their probability of believing it. We find an abrupt transition to smaller cascades when a critical number of random agents are removed from the platform, as well as steady decreases in the size of cascades with increasingly more convincing corrective information. Finally, we compare simulated cascades on this framework with real cascades of disinformation recorded on Whatsapp surrounding the 2019 Indian election. We find a set of hyperparameter values that produces a distribution of cascades matching the scaling exponent of the distribution of actual cascades recorded in the dataset. We acknowledge the available future directions for improving the performance of the framework and validation methods, as well as ways to extend the model to capture additional features of social contagion.

42 ENGINEERING↗

MARVEL Reactivity Control System (RCS)

MARVEL plans to be the first new operational reactor at INL in many years. These documents are being made publicly available to disseminate key information on the MARVEL reactor for private sector use towards reactor development.

21 SPECIFIC NUCLEAR REACTORS AND ASSOCIATED PLANTS↗

MARVEL Reactor Structure (MRS)

MARVEL plans to be the first new operational reactor at INL in many years. These documents are being made publicly available to disseminate key information on the MARVEL reactor for private sector use towards reactor development.

21 SPECIFIC NUCLEAR REACTORS AND ASSOCIATED PLANTS↗

MARVEL Fuel and CoreSystem (FCS)

MARVEL plans to be the first new operational reactor at INL in many years. These documents are being made publicly available to disseminate key information on the MARVEL reactor for private sector use towards reactor development.

21 SPECIFIC NUCLEAR REACTORS AND ASSOCIATED PLANTS↗

MARVEL Instrumentation and Control System (ICS)

MARVEL plans to be the first new operational reactor at INL in many years. These documents are being made publicly available to disseminate key information on the MARVEL reactor for private sector use towards reactor development.

21 SPECIFIC NUCLEAR REACTORS AND ASSOCIATED PLANTS↗

Space weather observations, modeling, and alerts in support of human exploration of Mars

Space weather observations and modeling at Mars have begun but they must be significantly increased to support the future of Human Exploration on the Red Planet. A comprehensive space weather understanding of a planet without a global magnetosphere and a thin atmosphere is very different from our situation at Earth so there is substantial fundamental research remaining. It is expected that the development of suitable models will lead to a comprehensive operational Mars space weather alert (MSWA) system that would provide rapid dissemination of information to Earth controllers, astronauts in transit, and those in the exploration zone (EZ) on the surface by producing alerts that are delivered rapidly and are actionable. To illustrate the importance of such a system, we use a magnetohydrodynamic code to model an extreme Carrington-type coronal mass ejection (CME) event at Mars. The results show a significant induced surface field of nearly 3,000 nT on the dayside that could radically affect unprotected electrical systems that would dramatically impact human survival on Mars. Other associated problems include coronal mass ejection (CME) shock-driven acceleration of solar energetic particles producing large doses of ionizing radiation at the Martian surface. In summary, along with working more closely with international partners, the next Heliophysics Decadal Survey must include a new initiative to meet expected demands for space weather forecasting in support of humans living and working on the surface of Mars. It will require significant effort to coordinate NASA and the international community contributions.

79 ASTRONOMY AND ASTROPHYSICS↗