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By NASA
Since its launch in 2014, the Physical Sciences Informatics (PSI) system has served as NASA’s online repository for physical science data. Now, the PSI system is live with new updates to further align with NASA’s open data policy.
With its first significant update in over five years, the data repository has been completely redesigned, featuring a new layout, improved structure, and enhanced search functionalities. This updated system was created with a focus on user experience, and more updates are anticipated as new features are introduced.
A key new feature of the system is, the PSI Submission Portal. This tool is designed to streamline the processes of collecting, curating, and publishing new data by enabling Principal Investigators and scientific teams to upload files directly to the system with the support of a data curator. The Portal also offers a dedicated workspace for data submitters, assigns a unique digital object identifier to each dataset, and standardizes the documentation and data structure for each investigation.
Both the updated PSI system and Submission Portal can be accessed at PSI.NASA.gov.
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By NASA
3 min read
NASA Develops Process to Create Very Accurate Eclipse Maps
New NASA research reveals a process to generate extremely accurate eclipse maps, which plot the predicted path of the Moon’s shadow as it crosses the face of Earth. Traditionally, eclipse calculations assume that all observers are at sea level on Earth and that the Moon is a smooth sphere that is perfectly symmetrical around its center of mass. As such, these calculations do not take into account different elevations on Earth or the Moon’s cratered, uneven surface.
For slightly more accurate maps, people can employ elevation tables and plots of the lunar limb — the edge of the visible surface of the Moon as seen from Earth. However, now eclipse calculations have gained even greater accuracy by incorporating lunar topography data from NASA’s LRO (Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter) observations.
Using LRO elevation maps, NASA visualizer Ernie Wright at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland, created a continuously varying lunar limb profile as the Moon’s shadow passes over the Earth. The mountains and valleys along the edge of the Moon’s disk affect the timing and duration of totality by several seconds. Wright also used several NASA data sets to provide an elevation map of Earth so that eclipse observer locations were depicted at their true altitude.
The resulting visualizations show something never seen before: the true, time-varying shape of the Moon’s shadow, with the effects of both an accurate lunar limb and the Earth’s terrain.
“Beginning with the 2017 total solar eclipse, we’ve been publishing maps and movies of eclipses that show the true shape of the Moon’s central shadow — the umbra,” said Wright.
A map showing the umbra (the Moon’s central shadow) as it passes over Cleveland at 3:15 p.m. local time during the April 8, 2024, total solar eclipse. NASA SVS/Ernie Wright and Michaela Garrison “And people ask, why does it look like a potato instead of a smooth oval? The short answer is that the Moon isn’t a perfectly smooth sphere.”
The mountains and valleys around the edge of the Moon change the shape of the shadow. The valleys are also responsible for Baily’s beads and the diamond ring, the last bits of the Sun visible just before and the first just after totality.
A computer simulation of Baily’s beads during a total solar eclipse. Data from Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter makes it possible to map the lunar valleys that create the bead effect. NASA SVS/Ernie Wright Wright is lead author of a paper published September 19 in The Astronomical Journal that reveals for the first time exactly how the Moon’s terrain creates the umbra shape. The valleys on the edge of the Moon act like pinholes projecting images of the Sun onto the Earth’s surface.
A visualization of Sun images being projected from lunar valleys that are acting like pinhole projectors. Light rays from the Sun converge on each valley, then spread out again on their way to the Earth. NASA SVS/Ernie Wright The umbra is the small hole in the middle of these projected Sun images, the place where none of the Sun images reach.
Viewed from behind the Moon, the Sun images projected by lunar valleys on the Moon’s edge fall on the Earth’s surface in a flower-like pattern with a hole in the middle, forming the umbra shape. NASA SVS/Ernie Wright The edges of the umbra are made up of small arcs from the edges of the projected Sun images.
This is just one of several surprising results that have emerged from the new eclipse mapping method described in the paper. Unlike the traditional method invented 200 years ago, the new way renders eclipse maps one pixel at a time, the same way 3D animation software creates images. It’s also similar to the way other complex phenomena, like weather, are modeled in the computer by breaking the problem into millions of tiny pieces, something computers are really good at, and something that was inconceivable 200 years ago.
For more about eclipses, refer to:
https://science.nasa.gov/eclipses
By Ernie Wright and Susannah Darling
NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, Md.
Media Contact:
Nancy Neal-Jones
NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, Md.
301-286-0039
nancy.n.jones@nasa.gov
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Last Updated Sep 19, 2024 Editor wasteigerwald Contact wasteigerwald william.a.steigerwald@nasa.gov Location NASA Goddard Space Flight Center Related Terms
Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO) Solar Eclipses Uncategorized Explore More
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By NASA
Timothy Lang (ST11) is a co-author on an article titled “Effective Visualization of Radar Data for Users Impacted by Color Vision Deficiency”, which was recently accepted for publication in Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society. The article is led by Zachary Sherman of Argonne National Laboratory (ANL), and it is an outgrowth of a long-standing collaboration on open science between ANL, MSFC, and other institutions that predates NASA Science Policy Directive (SPD) 41a and the Transform to Open Science (TOPS) campaign. Color Vision Deficiency (CVD) affects up to 8% of genetic males and 0.5% of genetic females, and traditional color maps used in radar meteorology and other Earth sciences often lack perceptual accuracy and clarity when viewed by those affected by CVD. The article reviews new color maps that convey useful and clear scientific information whether viewed by those with normal color perception or those with CVD. These color maps are available in open-source repositories like cmweather (https://github.com/openradar/cmweather) and pyart (http://arm-doe.github.io/pyart/). The article and the open-source CVD-friendly color maps are excellent examples of the greater inclusivity fostered when open science is practiced.
Read the paper at: https://journals.ametsoc.org/view/journals/bams/aop/BAMS-D-23-0056.1/BAMS-D-23-0056.1.xml.
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By NASA
3 min read
Preparations for Next Moonwalk Simulations Underway (and Underwater)
NASA used its remotely piloted Ikhana aircraft to test technology it helped develop or recommended to the U.S. Forest Service, including a system to send sensor data to decision makers on the ground in near real time.Credit: NASA It’s not easy to predict the path of forest fires—a lot depends on constantly changing factors like wind. But it is crucial to be as accurate as possible because the lives, homes, and businesses of the tens of thousands of people living and working in fire-prone areas depend on the reliability of these predictions. Sensors mounted on airplanes or drones that provide a picture of the fire from above are an important tool, and that’s where NASA comes in.
In partnership with the U.S. Forest Service, local and state firefighting agencies, and the Bureau of Land Management, NASA plays a pivotal role in battling infernos. The agency’s extensive experience and technical expertise in remote sensing technology have significantly improved the speed and accuracy of information relayed to firefighting decision-makers.
According to Don Sullivan, who specialized in information technology design at the time, the Airborne Science Program at NASA’s Ames Research Center in Silicon Valley, California, was integral to that effort.
In the 1990s, NASA began a project to adapt uncrewed aircraft for environmental research. The researchers at Ames wanted to ensure the technology would be useful to the broadest possible spectrum of potential end users. One concept tested during the project was sending data in real-time to the ground via communications links installed on the aircraft.
That link sent data faster and to multiple recipients at once—not just the team on the fire front line, but also the commanders organizing the teams and decision makers looking at the big picture across the entire region throughout the fire season, explained Sullivan.
For the Forest Service, this was a much-needed upgrade to the original system on their crewed jets: rolling up a printout and later thumb drives with thermal sensor data placed into a plastic tube attached to a parachute and dropped out of the airplane. NASA’s remotely piloted aircraft called Ikhana tested the technology, and it’s still used by the agency to collect data on wildfires.
Since the introduction of this technology, wildfires have gotten bigger, burn hotter, and set new records every year. But in California in 2008, this technology helped fight what was then the worst fire season on record. A NASA test flight using a data downlink system provided updated information to the incident managers that was crucial in determining where to send firefighting resources and whether a full evacuation of the town of Paradise was needed.
Without that timely information, said Sullivan, “there likely would have been injuries and certainly property damage that was worse than it turned out to be.”
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Last Updated Jul 31, 2024 Related Terms
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By NASA
4 min read
Preparations for Next Moonwalk Simulations Underway (and Underwater)
This image shows an aviation version of a smartphone navigation app that makes suggestions for an aircraft to fly an alternate, more efficient route. The new trajectories are based on information available from NASA’s Digital Information Platform and processed by the Collaborative Departure Digital Rerouting tool.NASA Just like your smartphone navigation app can instantly analyze information from many sources to suggest the best route to follow, a NASA-developed resource is now making data available to help the aviation industry do the same thing.
To assist air traffic managers in keeping airplanes moving efficiently through the skies, information about weather, potential delays, and more is being gathered and processed to support decision making tools for a variety of aviation applications.
Appropriately named the Digital Information Platform (DIP), this living database hosts key data gathered by flight participants such as airlines or drone operators. It will help power additional tools that, among other benefits, can save you travel time.
Ultimately, the aviation industry… and even the flying public, will benefit from what we develop.
Swati Saxena
NASA Aerospace Engineer
“Through DIP we’re also demonstrating how to deliver digital services for aviation users via a modern cloud-based, service-oriented architecture,” said Swati Saxena, DIP project manager at NASA’s Ames Research Center in California.
The intent is not to compete with others. Instead, the hope is that industry will see DIP as a reference they can use in developing and implementing their own platforms and digital services.
“Ultimately, the aviation industry – the Federal Aviation Administration, commercial airlines, flight operators, and even the flying public – will benefit from what we develop,” Saxena said.
The platform and digital services have even more benefits than just saving some time on a journey.
For example, NASA recently collaborated with airlines to demonstrate a traffic management tool that improved traffic flow at select airports, saving thousands of pounds of jet fuel and significantly reducing carbon emissions.
Now, much of the data gathered in collaboration with airlines and integrated on the platform is publicly available. Users who qualify can create a guest account and access DIP data at a new website created by the project.
It’s all part of NASA’s vision for 21st century aviation involving revolutionary next-generation future airspace and safety tools.
Managing Future Air Traffic
During the 2030s and beyond, the skies above the United States are expected to become much busier.
Facing this rising demand, the current National Airspace System – the network of U.S. aviation infrastructure including airports, air navigation facilities, and communications – will be challenged to keep up. DIP represents a key piece of solving that challenge.
NASA’s vision for future airspace and safety involves new technology to create a highly automated, safe, and scalable environment.
What this vision looks like is a flight environment where many types of vehicles and their pilots, as well as air traffic managers, use state-of-the-art automated tools and systems that provide highly detailed and curated information.
These tools leverage new capabilities like machine learning and artificial intelligence to streamline efficiency and handle the increase in traffic expected in the coming decades.
Digital Services Ecosystem in Action
To begin implementing this new vision, our aeronautical innovators are evaluating their platform, DIP, and services at several airports in Texas. This initial stage is a building block for larger such demonstrations in the future.
“These digital services are being used in the live operational environment by our airline partners to improve efficiency of the current airspace operations,” Saxena said. “The tools are currently in use in the Dallas/Fort Worth area and will be deployed in the Houston airspace in 2025.”
The results from these digital tools are already making a difference.
Proven Air Traffic Results
During 2022, a NASA machine learning-based tool named Collaborative Digital Departure Rerouting, designed to improve the flow of air traffic and prevent flight delays, saved more than 24,000 lbs. (10,886 kg.) of fuel by streamlining air traffic in the Dallas area.
If such tools were used across the entire country, the improvements made in efficiency, safety, and sustainability would make a notable difference to the flying public and industry.
“Continued agreements with airlines and the aviation industry led to the creation and expansion of this partnership ecosystem,” Saxena said. “There have been benefits across the board.”
DIP was developed under NASA’s Airspace Operations and Safety Program.
Learn about NASA’s Collaborative Digital Departure Rerouting tool and how it uses information from the Digital Information Platform to provide airlines with routing options similar to how drivers navigate using cellphone apps. About the Author
John Gould
Aeronautics Research Mission DirectorateJohn Gould is a member of NASA Aeronautics' Strategic Communications team at NASA Headquarters in Washington, DC. He is dedicated to public service and NASA’s leading role in scientific exploration. Prior to working for NASA Aeronautics, he was a spaceflight historian and writer, having a lifelong passion for space and aviation.
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Last Updated Jul 12, 2024 EditorJim BankeContactJim Bankejim.banke@nasa.gov Related Terms
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