Leaders discuss nanotech market - NASA · PDF fileNASA Ames Center Director G. Scott Hubbard ... the external tank at 81.7 seconds after ... data-mining techniques to help Earth

National Aeronautics and Space Administration, Ames Research Center, Moffett Field, CA

Communication for the Information Technology Age

September 2003

amesnews.arc.nasa.gov

Leaders discuss nanotech market

NASA Ames Center Director G. Scott Hubbard (second from left) speaks with U.S. RepresentativeZoe Lofgren (third from left) at the recent nanotechonlogy conference held at NASA Ames. U.S.Representative Mike Honda (second from right) speaks with Meyya Meyyappan, the director of theCenter for Nanotechnology at Ames (far right). UC Santa Cruz Chancellor M.R.C. Greenwood isshown far left.

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To discuss the trillion-dollarnanotechnology market that experts be-lieve will be born from research at themolecular scale, almost 300 leaders, from

industry, academia and government,converged on Aug. 19 at Ames.

NASA co-hosted the Bay Area

Nanotechnology Forum with U.S. Rep-resentative Mike Honda, co-sponsor ofthe Boehlert-Honda NanotechnologyBill, H.R. 766.

"Though nanotechnology has itsroots in the 20th century, this exciting

NASA Administrator Sean O’Keefeaddressed “the NASA family” recently,providing his perspective on the Co-lumbia Accident Investigation Board’sfinal report and the agency’s future.

“This is one of the seminal momentsin our history,” O’Keefe said. “NASA isdefined by our tremendous successesand tragic failures. Each has always beenfollowed by an extensive discussion ofour charter and future directions. Wewill go forward now to do our best tomake this a much stronger organiza-tion.”

On Aug. 26, the CAIB issued itslong-awaited report on the causes of theloss of space shuttle Columbia and itscrew of seven on Feb. 1, 2003. The boardoffered 29 recommendations to NASAmanagement, 15 essential for “return toflight” and 14 deemed necessary to sup-port “continuing to fly.” In all, the boardlaid out 23 technical recommendationsand six organizational ones.

The board found the physical causeof the accident to be “a breach in thethermal protection system on the lead-ing edge of the left wing caused by apiece of insulating foam which sepa-rated from the left bipod ramp section ofthe external tank at 81.7 seconds afterlaunch and struck the wing in the vicin-ity of the lower half of reinforced car-bon-carbon panel number 8.” As Amesdirector and the only NASA member ofthe CAIB Scott Hubbard put it, “thefoam did it.”

The board found the organizationalcauses of the tragedy to be “rooted in thespace shuttle program’s history and cul-

Shuttle board cites physical, organizational problems-- O’Keefe embraces need for change in culture, practices

ture.” In the opinion of the board, theorganizational causes are “on a par withthe physical causes,” according toHubbard.

O’Keefe said that on Feb. 1, NASAmade a commitment to the families ofthe Columbia crew “to find the prob-lem, fix it and return to our explorationobjectives.” He said that the board’sexcellent work and detailed report ac-complished the first goal. Now, he said,“We must accept the report and complywith its recommendations.” The board“has given us a very, very valuable blue-print to move forward,” he stated. “Wehave gotten a pretty good head start.Now, we must choose wisely in select-ing options to comply with the board’s

recommendations.” O’Keefe acknowl-edged the technical issues and culturalfixes needed ensure that “it’s going to bea very long process.”

Hubbard joined the administratorat the ‘NASA Update’ and provided anexcellent overview and insight into theboard’s work, deliberations and conclu-sions. He said that the board had in-volved more than 400 engineers fromacross the agency, had looked at over30,000 documents, conducted more than200 interviews and had held 10 publichearings. He paid tribute to the 25,000people who recovered more than 84,000pieces of shuttle debris comprising al-most 40 percent of the vehicle’s weight.

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Center Director G. Scott Hubbard displaysthe recent CAIB report while responding tolocal reporters at a recent media roundtable.

Astrogram September 20032

NASA Ames’ Christopher Potterand research partners are using satellitedata to paint a detailed global picture ofthe interplay among natural disasters,human activities and the rise of carbondioxide in the Earth's atmosphere dur-ing the past 20 years.

According to a new scientific studythat recently appeared in the journalGlobal Change Biology, scientists usedsatellite observations to estimate theamount of leafy cover worldwide andsudden decreases in 'greenness.' Green-ness is a measure of the amount of chlo-rophyll in live plants.

"Green leaf cover is probably themost fragile and vulnerable piece ofEarth's ecosystem that scientists can eas-ily monitor during ecological distur-bances," said Potter, a scientist at thecenter and the principle author of thetechnical paper. His co-authors includePang-Ning Tan, Michael Steinbach andVipin Kumar, all of the University ofMinnesota, Minneapolis; StevenKlooster and Vanessa Genovese whowork at Ames and are from CaliforniaState University-Monterey Bay, Seaside,Calif. ; and Ranga Myneni, Boston Uni-versity, Boston.

"The new results come from a tech-nique called 'data mining,' which sortsthrough a huge amount of satellite andscientific data to detect patterns andevents that otherwise would have beenoverlooked," added Kumar, the prin-ciple investigator of a joint project of theUniversity of Minnesota, California StateUniversity and NASA Ames to developdata-mining techniques to help Earthscientists discover changes in the globalcarbon cycle and climate system.

The Earth's land cover is so vast thatmuch of it in the tropics and the tundrais inaccessible to regular ground obser-vations there, according to the study'sscientists.

"Many years of satellite observationsof remote areas have revealed com-pletely new pictures of ecologicalchanges and disasters, but we have hadto develop new formulas to clearly re-veal sudden changes in greenness overextensive areas," said Potter.

Detecting sudden changes fromlarge amounts of global data requiredthe development of automated tech-niques that take into account the timing,location and magnitude of such changes,according to Tan.

Researchers then matched abruptchanges in plant greenness with recordsof large wildfires or massive crop lossesto validate the study's conclusions. "Themajority of the potential disturbanceevents that caused carbon to go into theatmosphere occurred in tropical savanna

and shrub lands or in cold forest ecosys-tems," Klooster said.

Scientists define an ecological dis-turbance as an event that disrupts thephysical make-up of an ecosystem andhow it works for longer than one grow-ing season of native plants. Natural dis-turbances may include fires, hurricanes,floods, droughts, lava flows and icestorms. Other natural disturbances aredue to plant-eating insects and mam-mals and disease-causing microorgan-isms.

Human-caused disturbances couldhappen as a result of logging, deforesta-tion, draining wetlands, clearing, chemi-cal pollution and introducing non-na-tive species to an area, according to sci-entists.

"Ecosystem disturbances can con-tribute to the current rise of carbon diox-ide in the atmosphere," Potter said. Ninebillion metric tons of carbon may havemoved from the Earth's soil and surfacelife forms into the atmosphere in 18 yearsbeginning in 1982 due to wildfires andother disturbances, according to thestudy. A metric ton is 2,205 pounds,equivalent to the weight of a small car.In comparison, fossil fuel emission ofcarbon dioxide to the atmosphere eachyear was about seven billion metric tonsin 1990.

Some of the carbon dioxide that goesinto the air reenters the Earth's biospherewhen plants recover this gas during'natural recycling.'

Scientists used the advanced very-high-resolution radiometer aboard Na-tional Oceanic and Atmospheric Ad-

ministration satellites to measuremonthly changes in leafy plant coverworldwide. Boston University usedunique NASA computer codes to pro-duce global greenness values. Thesecodes removed interfering data fromatmospheric effects. When statisticsshowed there was much less greennessin specific areas that lasted more than ayear, scientists also found a high prob-ability of ecological disturbances.

"Watching for changes in the amountof absorption of sunlight by green plantsis an effective way to look for ecologicaldisasters," Potter said. "This study wasliterally a proof of concept because welearned how to use data mining to bringnew knowledge out of existing Earthobservation data," Klooster added.

Follow-up studies using muchhigher resolution satellite images arelikely to reveal more localized events,such as floods, hurricanes and majorlogging operations, according to thestudy's scientists. "This is important be-cause many natural disasters in remoteareas are not noticed and never re-corded," Potter explained.

"In the new era of worldwide car-bon accounting and management, weneed an accurate method to tell us howmuch carbon dioxide is moving fromthe biosphere and into the atmosphere,"Potter said. "Global satellite images gobeyond the capability of human eye-sight. All we need to do is look at thedata with the proper formulas to filterout just what we need," he concluded.

Data mining reveals a new history of natural disasters

BY JOHN BLUCK

Girvan displays latest technologiesIn an effort to bring the latest

technologies and best companies toNASA, the Girvan Institute of Tech-nology hosted an open house atNASA Ames in August. This was aprivate mixer, to ensure that NASAand other U.S. federal labs had ad-equate time to review the technolo-gies and to speak with the represen-tatives from the selected companiesregarding their latest technologicaladvancements.

New technologies were on dis-play from products for the sustaineddelivery of protein-based therapeu-tics, to cognitive robotics, to fiber-optic communications and high-per-formance print systems.

NASA photo by Dominic Hart

3Astrogram September 2003

Ames MERBOARD featured at SMC-IT conferenceThe Space Mission Challenges for

Information Technology 2003 (SMC-IT)conference was hosted at Ames in Julyby the NASA Jet Propulsion Labora-tory. As part of the program, a receptionwas held for industry participants wherethe Ames MERBoard was featured byJay Trimble of Code IC. Rich Pisarski,deputy chief of the Commercial Tech-nology Office, was also present to net-work with the industry representativesabout opportunities for partnerships.

Other employees from Ames whopresented at this conference were: AlGlobus of CSC, who spoke on the sub-ject of ‘scheduling Earth observing sat-ellites with evolutionary algorithms.’ Ja-son Lohn, of Code IC, discussed ‘evolv-able systems for space applications.’Kannan Rajan, of Code IC, spoke about‘MAPGEN: the mixed initiative plan-ning and scheduling for the Mars 2003mission. Robert Morris, of Code IC,

talked about ‘an integrated architecturefor science observations scheduling forfleets of Earth-observing spacecraft.’Guillum Brat, of Code IC, spoke on thesubject of ‘static analysis of the Marsexploration rover flight software.’ JoanWalton, of Code IC, talked about the‘collaborative information portal: MERand beyond’ and Bradley Betts, of CodeIC, discussed ‘a software framework toenhance training and operations of spacemissions.’

SMC-IT is the first forum to gathersystem designers, engineers, scientists,practitioners and space explorers for theobjective of advancing information tech-nology for space missions. The forumprovided an excellent opportunity forfostering technical interchange on allhardware and software aspects of ITapplications in space missions.

Joel Sperans, a 30-year veteran ofNASA, died on Aug. 10 at his home inAtherton, Calif. Despite the many pri-vations associated with his long ill-ness, Sperans retained, until the end,his wry humor and tenacious will tolive. He was 68 years old.

Sperans retired in 1995 as chief ofthe Space Projects Division at Amesafter a distinguished career in the man-agement of unmanned space flightprojects. He joined the successful Pio-neer Jupiter/Saturn mission team inthe late 1960s and was manager of sci-ence instruments development for theextremely productive Pioneer Venusmissions, which featured an orbiteraround the planet and five instru-mented penetrations to study Venus'atmosphere.

He was later appointed projectmanager for the Galileo Probe, whichprovided the first-ever direct analysisof Jupiter's gaseous atmosphere. Aschief of the Space Projects Division, heinitiated the Space Station BiologicalResearch Project at Ames while at thesame time overseeing a wide variety ofstudies for other potential future spaceprojects including a large airborne in-frared telescope project.

The only son of Russian immi-grants, Sperans graduated from theUniversity of Miami in 1956 and servedas an Army lieutenant in the Korean

War. He married the late Judith LynneReder in 1959. They were marrieduntil her death in 1993 and had twochildren together. In 1994, he mar-ried Joan C. Mesirov Rondell.

Sperans loved the outdoors; thislove extended from enjoying his gar-den at home to backpacking in theSierra. In the latter half of his life, hediscovered a love for internationaltravel, the south of France being afavorite destination.

A long-time resident of Atherton,Sperans was a quiet, self-effacing manwhose kindness, devotion to familyand great humor will be profoundlymissed.

Surviving Sperans are his wife,Joan C. Sperans of Redwood City;daughter Joanne Sperans Hartzell ofMenlo Park; son James RobertSperans; and two grandsons, OliverWolf Sperans and Nicholas JacobSperans, of Swarthmore, Pa. He isalso survived by two stepdaughters,Alexis Rondell Rhorer and GabrielleRondell.

In addition to private family ser-vices, a celebration of Speran’s lifewill be held Sept. 14 at 3:00 p.m. at181 Greenoaks Dr., Atherton, Calif.The family asks that in lieu of flow-ers, donations be made in Sperans’name to the San Francisco Bay Chap-

ter Office of the Sierra Club, 2530 SanPablo Avenue, Suite I, Berkeley, CA94702-2000 Attn: Bill Walsh. The Website for the Sierra Club is located at:http://sierraclub.org or America’s Sec-ond Harvest, 35 E. Wacker Dr., #2000,Chicago, IL 60601

Former Galileo Probe project manager dies

Joel Sperans


Edward J. Hopkins (Hoppy), 1923- 2003, died at his home in San Carloson April 2 at the age of 80. Aftergraduating from Vanderbilt, he cameto Ames as an aeronautical researchengineer in the early 1940s, spendinghis entire NACA-NASA career atAmes, retiring in 1976.

Hopkin’s career started in the 7 x10 wind tunnel and continued therefor over 10 years. He then transferredto the unitary plan wind tunnels inthe mid 1950s. Much of his researchconcerned the study of airflow overwing-body configurations. His high-speed aerodynamic studies includedmeasurements of boundary-layerflows on the famed X-15. He was alsoa member of the team evaluating theU.S. supersonic transport in the 1960s.Hopkins was author or co-author ofmore than 40 technical reports andpapers.

Tours of the Computer HistoryMuseum’s visible storage exhibit areaare available for individuals. The dis-play spans history from pre-computingto supercomputing and reflects the as-tonishing development in technologyfrom gears to vacuum tubes to exoticsemiconductors. It features more than450 artifacts including the Honeywell‘Kitchen Computer,’ the Cray 1, theJohnniac and an Eniac rack.

Tours are available on Wednesday,Friday and Saturday at 1:00 p.m. and2:30 p.m. Tours last approximately onehour and 15 minutes. For more informa-tion, visit the Web at: http://www.computerhistory.org The mu-seum is located at 1401 N. ShorelineBoulevard in Mountain View. Tours arefree.

Space is limited. Sign up in advanceby calling (650)810-1013 or [email protected]

Computer museumexpands tour hours

Donald J. Graham, 1919-2002, diedat his home in Escondido at the age of 83.After graduating summa cum laudefrom the University of California at Ber-keley, he came to NACA Ames in theearly 1940s as an aeronautical researchengineer.

Graham’s entire career was spent atNACA-NASA Ames. He retired in the1970s. He rose to branch chief of theunitary plan 11-by- 11-foot wind tunnelin the later years of his career and at onetime served as mayor of Woodside.

‘Hoppy’ Hopkinspasses away

Former windtunnel employeepasses away

NASA Ames, in collaboration withthe Girvan Institute of Technology, ispresenting a half-day bioethics work-shop on Tuesday, Oct. 7 from 9:00 a.m.to 12:00 noon in the Moffett TrainingCenter, in Building 3.

This continuing education oppor-tunity will be of particular interest toprinciple investigators, research associ-ates, members of the human researchinstitutional review board and anyonein the wider Ames community con-cerned about ethical issues in investiga-tive medicine and the life sciences.

Three principle topics will be cov-ered in the course of the morning:

1) Ethical theory and a method- ology for bioethical decision- making;2) Research with human participants: historical review, underlying ethical theory and problematic areas; and3) Stem cell research: therapeutic possibilities and ethical controversies.The workshop will be led by Ernlé

W.D. Young, Ph.D., recently appointedchief, Office for the Protection of Re-search Participants at Ames. Young isalso professor of biomedical ethics emeri-tus in the Stanford University School ofMedicine.

Bioethics workshopscheduled

Carnegie Mellon UniversityRoboCamp-West students atthe recent graduationceremony held in August.After the graduation, studentsdemonstrated the robots tothe attendees at theceremony. The RoboCamp-West program exposes highschool seniors to robotics.They learn about vision-based,autonomous mobile robots(robots that have cameras).Each senior builds a three-wheel rover, called a 'TrikeBot.'Each rover has an articulatedcamera and infrared rangefinder. TrikeBots are remotelycontrolled using wirelesstechnology via a laptopcomputer that runs Javascripts created by thestudents, or preprogrammedtasks. NASA sponsored 20underrepresented minoritystudents with full scholarshipsprovided through the AmesEqual Opportunity ProgramsOffice.


CMU RoboCamp students graduate


George Williams of Code FEF at an Ames test site where groundingelectrodes are evaluated.

Thanks to a continuing volunteereffort by George Williams of Code FEF,Ames is participating in a national studythat may result in significant changes inthe country's electrical code and otherelectrical practices. He and others pro-vided labor on their own time and Amesprovided a plot of land for a test site.

Williams, a construction managerat the center, volunteered to establishthe test site for the National ElectricalGrounding Research Project at NASAAmes to measure how ground rods,grounding connections and electrodesmay deteriorate or change in local soilconditions over time. This is the kind ofdata that many other non-NASA testsites across the nation have been gather-ing for years. The study is part of amulti-year program that includes 16private, non-profit and public organiza-tions that are conducting tests at sevensites across the country.

"The nationwide study may welllead to changes in the national electriccode to coincide with local soil condi-tions," said Williams. "Depending onconditions, copper rods and connectorscan deteriorate over the years when cur-rent flows through them and to ground.A poor electrical ground may lead tounsafe or life-threatening conditionssuch as electrical shocks or structuralfires."

According to Williams, if ground-ing materials degrade, the quality ofelectrical power also may suffer, dam-aging sensitive electronic equipment orcausing problems with its operation.“The effort is at least a five-year pro-gram of monthly readings, to see howvarious grounding rod materials holdup in different soils and moisture lev-els,” said Williams, who volunteers someof his lunch breaks and non-work hours,to take readings. NASA Ames providedland where volunteers installed the lo-cal test site. Volunteers from privateindustry and non-profit organizationsgave parts, materials and labor to buildthe test facility at Ames in 2001.

The research project began in 1992,when the International Association ofElectrical Inspectors, Southern NevadaChapter, began testing grounding elec-trodes in Nevada. The Fire ProtectionResearch Foundation, Quincy, Mass.,later adopted the project and volunteerssoon added more test sites in New York,Virginia, Illinois and Texas. The pro-gram will continue for another five years,perhaps longer, according to engineers.Many of them give personal time to theproject.

"It happened in pieces," said TravisLindsey, who began the effort when heworked for the Clark County, NevadaBuilding Department. Early on, duringa local meeting of electrical inspectors,

they had "strenuous" discussions aboutgrounding and how tests could be madethat might affect the local code and solvegrounding problems, according toLindsey. "It was to be a small thing,three or four elec-trodes and this was1990," he recalled."But, by the timewe assembled acommittee and ac-quired land, mate-rial and volun-teers, we had fivesites on NevadaPower Companyland and ease-ments with about15 electrodes oneach nearly identi-cal site."

After the siteswere in operationfor a few years,Lindsey made aspeech to the Na-tional Fire Protec-tion Association inDenver in 1995. "One of the things I waspreaching was that it can't just be in LasVegas that people are having ground-ing concerns," Lindsey said. "After themeeting, I talked to people who pro-vided funds and support to increase theeffort," Lindsey explained.

"We offer our data to our consor-tium members, who are a cross-sectionof industry," he said. "They use the in-formation as they will. This means theywill use the information back in indus-try and it will affect people across thecountry," Lindsey added.

"Travis Lindsey is the heart and soulof this effort," Williams said. "If it hadn'tbeen for Travis, the project wouldn'thave worked."

"At NASA Ames, we've put about30 types and styles of grounding elec-trodes in the soil for long-term testing,"Williams said. "Most have three con-ductors that run back to three terminalboxes located at the edge of our site atAmes," Williams explained.

"The project's goal is to producequantifiable, scientific data for possibleuse by code writers, and for manufac-turers, designers, facility owners, insur-ers and inspectors of grounding elec-trode systems," according to an annualreport that the project issued. "Test re-sults may help to identify better ground-ing practices by matching the optimumperforming electrode type (minimumresistance, least corrosion) to the appro-priate environmental and soil condition,"the report continues.

Engineers want to provide uninter-rupted, high-quality connections to theground, or integrity--a safe route for

current to go to ground. "We want theelectricity to travel through the ground-ing system to the ground rather thanthrough a person and cause severe elec-trical shock," Williams said.

"We are trying to establish that dif-ferent grounding systems are needed toprovide adequate grounding in differ-ent kinds of soil conditions," Williamsexplained. "Sand, in desert areas, forexample, is much less conductive thanwetter, rocky soils and so a differentclass of grounding material or systemmay be needed to enhance the path toground."

One of the tests underway at NASAAmes provides direct current (DC) fromsolar panels and batteries to groundedelectrodes. "The copper industry wantsto find out how current affects coppergrounding systems," said Williams. Inextreme cases, over time, ground wireshave broken down and failed.

Lindsey, retired from the ClarkCounty, Nevada, Building Department,is the project's technical director. In ad-dition to NASA Ames, project membersand sponsors include or have included:AEMC Instruments; Megger (AVO In-ternational); Central Hudson Gas andElectric; Clark County, Nevada, Build-ing Department; Copper DevelopmentAssociation, Inc.; Central Hudson Gasand Electric-Empire State Electrical En-ergy Research Council; Erico, Inc.; FCIElectrical; Harger Lightning Protection;Lightning Eliminators and Consultants,Inc.; Los Angeles Department of Waterand Power; Lyncole XIT Grounding; Na-tional Fire Protection Association; Un-derwriters Laboratories, Inc.; VirginiaDominio Power and many unnamedindividual donors. Williams works inAmes' Facilities Engineering Branch.

Ames volunteers may change nation’s electrical code

BY JOHN BLUCK


Water released from Lake Vostok,deep beneath the south polar ice sheet,could gush like a popped can of soda ifnot contained, opening the lake to pos-sible contamination and posing a po-tential health hazard to NASA and uni-versity researchers.

A team of scientists that recentlyinvestigated the levels of dissolved gasesin the remote Antarctic lake found theconcentrations of gas in the lake waterwere much higher than expected, mea-suring 2.65 quarts (2.5 liters) of nitrogenand oxygen per 2.2 pounds (1 kilogram)of water. According to scientists, thishigh ratio of gases trapped under theice will cause a gas-driven "fizz" whenthe water is released.

"Our research suggests that U.S.and Russian teams studying the lakeshould be careful when drilling becausehigh gas concentrations could make thewater unstable and potentially danger-ous," said Dr. Chris McKay of CodeSST. McKay is lead author of a paper onthe topic published in the July issue ofthe 'Geophysical Research Letters' jour-nal.

"We need to consider the implica-tions of the supercharged water verycarefully before we enter this lake," saidDr. Peter Doran, a co-author and associ-ate professor of Earth and Environmen-tal Sciences at the University of Illinoisat Chicago.

Lake Vostok is a rich research sitefor astrobiologists, because it is thoughtto contain microorganisms living un-der its thick ice cover, an environmentthat may be analogous to Jupiter's moon,Europa. Europa contains vast oceanstrapped under a thick layer of ice. Rus-sian teams are planning to drill intoLake Vostok's 2.48 mile (four kilome-ter) ice cover in the near future, and aninternational plan calls for sample re-turn in less than a decade.

An important implication of thisfinding is that scientists expect oxygenlevels in the lake water to be 50 timeshigher than the oxygen levels in ordi-nary freshwater lakes on Earth. "LakeVostok is an extreme environment, onethat is supersaturated with oxygen,"noted McKay. "No other natural lakeenvironment on Earth has this muchoxygen."

The research also suggests that or-ganisms living in Lake Vostok may havehad to evolve special adaptions, such ashigh concentrations of protective en-zymes, in order to survive the lake'soxygen-rich environment, the research-ers say. Such defense mechanisms mayalso protect life in Lake Vostok fromoxygen radicals, the dangerousbyproducts of oxygen breakdown thatcause cell and DNA damage. This pro-

cess may be similar to that of organismsthat scientists theorize may once havelived on Europa, whose ice layer andatmosphere are thought to contain ra-diation-produced radicals and oxygen.

"We expect to find that the organ-isms in Lake Vostok are capable of over-coming very high oxygen stress," saidco-author Dr. John Priscu, a geo-biolo-gist at Montana State University inBozeman.

Priscu heads an international groupof researchers that will deploy a remoteobservatory at Lake Vostok within threeyears and return samples within 10 years.

The team also determined the ratiosof gases in the lake. The scientists dis-covered that the air-gas mixture there,besides dissolving in the water, also istrapped in a type of structure called a'clathrate'. In clathrate structures, gasesare enclosed in an icy cage and look likepacked snow. These structures form atthe high-pressure depths of Lake Vostokand would be unstable if brought to thesurface.

Lake Vostok is located 2.48 miles(four kilometers) beneath the East Ant-arctic Ice Sheet. The lake, and more than70 other lakes deep beneath the polarplateau, are part of a large, sub-glacialenvironment that has been isolated fromthe atmosphere since Antarctica becamecovered with ice more than 15 millionyears ago. Scientists theorize that LakeVostok probably existed before Antarc-tica became ice covered and may con-tain evidence of conditions on the conti-nent when the local climate was sub-tropical.

For images and further informationabout plans to return research samplesfrom Lake Vostok, visit the Web at: http://salegos-scar.montana.edu/

The paper's authors also include K.P.Hand of Stanford University and Dr.D.T. Andersen of the SETI Institute.

The research was jointly funded byNASA and the National Science Foun-dation.

Ames is officially rolling outMacintosh Operating System 10 (MacOS X.) The Mac OS X rollout is a projectthat is undertaken by Code JT and theAmes CIO to facilitate and coordinatethe Ames portion of the agency-wideeffort to upgrade Apple computers toMac OS X.

The purpose of the project is toofficially roll out Mac OS X for Ames,invite collaboration and participationby the center Mac OS experts and bringtogether key staff members to outlinethe approach, process, resources andschedule of events and milestones.

The three major goals and mile-stones of the Mac OS X rollout are:

1) Systems administrator preparation • Involves policy evaluation, Ames Mac OS X configuration guide creation and system administration training. •A ‘Launching Mac OS X to Ames key IT and support staff’ townhall meeting was held on Aug. 20. The meeting

was held to prepare and inform system administrators of the OS X upgrade.

• Outreach event: Pre-OS X rollout overview for system administrators, developers

scheduled for Sept. 29. 2) End-user orientation

(beginning in September): • Outreach event: end-user orientation scheduled for Sept. 30. • Training: Ames Training Office, Code JH, and ODIN will provide lecture halls with presentation and demos and classroom style with hands-on training.

3) Center rollout (September 2003/April 2004) •Track conversation status by organization, report to CIO and provide support

where critically required to meet milestonesStay tuned for centerwide e-mails

for event details.The following resources are also

available on the Web: The projectWeb site is loated at: http://osx.arc.nasa.gov and includes news,resources, bug tracker and deploy-ment help. The Ames Mac supportgroup Web site is at: http://msg.arc.nasa.gov and includes tips,news and events and the Ames Train-ing Office Web site is at: http://ameshr.arc.nasa.gov/training.htmland lists training opportunities, con-tacts and training resources.

Researchers find Antarctic lake water will fizz like a soda

Ames rolls out Mac OS X

BY KATHLEEN BURTON


Ames researcher Tammy Nguyen passes awayTammy Thientam Nguyen passed

away at the age of 42 on Aug. 13 after atragic scuba diving accident in Monterey.She is a beloved mother of two sons, Vanand Le Nguyen, and the loving daugh-ter of Sieng Nguyen and Gam Pham.

Nguyen was critically injured whenshe became entangled in kelp whilescuba diving off the Monterey Coast onSaturday, Aug. 9. Despite exhaustiveefforts by her fellow divers, she wasunderwater without access to oxygenfor some time before being released tothe surface. Nguyen was an experi-enced diver in excellent health and physi-cal condition.

Nguyen overcame many obstaclesin her life. In 1975, she arrived in theUnited States, a young teenage refugeefrom Vietnam. She lived on her own inReno, Nev., working odd jobs to have aplace to stay and complete high school.After high school, she struggled to earna living, raise a family and receive aneducation. During this time, she ownedand operated a nail salon in Los Altosand was recognized, in 1988, by the LosAltos Town Crier as Los Altos' Out-standing Female Entrepreneur. Addi-tionally, Nguyen helped other familymembers move to the United States fromVietnam and continued to support herparents upon their arrival.

Nguyen joined the NASA Ames Fa-tigue Countermeasures Group throughthe San José State University Founda-tion, Code IHS, in 2000 as a researchassociate. She received both herB.A.(1998) and her M.A.(2001) degreesin experimental psychology from SanJosé State University with an emphasisin stress-related factors and quality ofsleep. She was applying to doctorateprograms in psychology.

She was an extraordinary individualwho had a very high potential for scien-tific research, specifically focusing onthe effects of sleep loss and night workon human neurobehavioral functioning,circadian rhythms, fatigue and alertnessof airline pilots. Nguyen was a memberof the Aerospace Human Factors Asso-ciation, the Aerospace Medical Associa-tion (AsMA), the Sleep Research Societyand the Western Psychological Associa-tion (WPA). Based on her research,Nguyen co-authored numerous ab-stracts and papers in peer-reviewed jour-nals and presented research findings atnumerous scientific meetings includingthe annual meetings of the AssociatedProfessional Sleep Societies, AsMA andWPA. Nguyen had also received awardsfor Who's Who Among American Uni-versities and Colleges in 2000 and theInez and Donald Burdick Scholarship

Award in 2000. In addition to scientificresearch, Nguyen also had an activerole in the Fatigue CountermeasuresGroup's educational training work-shops, which provide information to-ward increasing the awareness of fa-tigue-related issues within the aviationcommunity and how to manage thoseissues.

In addition to Nguyen's professionalscientific work, she was active in com-munity affairs, providing counseling toat-risk students at various junior highand high schools under a volunteer pro-gram of the San José Juvenile ProbationDepartment. Respected for her supportand involvement in the local publicschools, Nguyen recently served as aninterview committee member for a prin-cipal position at Franklin-McKinleySchool District in San José.

Receiving a quality education wasone of Nguyen's greatest wishes for hertwo sons, ages 12 and 19. Her oldestson, Van, is beginning his sophomoreyear at UC Davis working to achieve anengineering degree while the youngestentered the 8th grade this Fall. Both sonsare straight ‘A’ students. Anyone wish-ing to contribute to their education fundcan drop off a check made payable to the‘Van and Le Nguyen Benevolent Ac-count’ with Sandy Bowman of the Fa-tigue Countermeasures Group in Build-ing 262, Room 196; M/S 262-4; ext. 4-6435 or mail a check directly to:

Van and Le Nguyen Benevolent Accountc/o Washington MutualSanta Cruz Financial Center730 Ocean St.Santa Cruz, CA 95060Nguyen's research skills, intellect,

tenacity, analytic ability and thorough-ness made her an invaluable member ofthe NASA Ames Fatigue Countermea-sures Group, making very importantcontributions. Nguyen's enthusiasm,laughter, confidence and knowledge willbe truly missed by family, friends andcolleagues.

BY TERRY ALLARD AND MELISSA MALLIS

Tammy Nguyen

The Ames Exchange is pleased toannounce the seventh annual chilicook-off will be held Thursday, Oct. 9from 11 a.m. until 1 p.m.

The chili cook-off has proven to bevery popular and successful in the past.We expect it to be no different thisyear.

All Ames personnel are invited toform teams, try out their special chilirecipes and compete for trophies ineach of the four categories. The ex-change will provide a total of $50 perofficially entered team (to a maximumof 20 teams) to help defray the costs ofpreparing adequate supplies for yourrecipes to feed small samples to thepotentially hundreds of expected at-tendees. Teams are encouraged to ex-ercise creativity in recipes, presenta-tion, condiments, team naming and

other related areas.For information about entering the

contest and to submit the requiredpaperwork, contact Julia Horner at e-mail: [email protected] or callext. 4-4017.

This year’s event will also includethe band Daddy O, a carnival mid-way, face painter and balloon artist,and the ever-popular dunk tank.

At this event, chili sampling is freefor all NASA employees, contractorsand other on-site personnel and visi-tors. Each taster will be given thechance to cast his or her vote for the‘Peoples Choice’ award. A select panelof judges will choose the other catego-ries. Trophies will be presented to thewinning team in each category. Prizesare in the form of trophies only; thereare no cash prizes for this event.

Exchange seventh annual chilicook-off scheduled at Ames Oct. 9


Under the Ames Safety AwardsProgram (ASAP) II, Ames recognized98 employees for their outstanding ac-complishments in improving health andsafety. ASAP II was established to rec-ognize employee actions, behavior and/or job performance that result in im-proved health and safety conditions atthe center.

There are four levels of awards, tierfour being the highest level of achieve-ment. The ASAP II board evaluateseach nomination and selects the tier levelthat most represents the actions and ac-complishments of that nomination.

The highest individual awards giventhis quarter were to Leonard Hee for hiswork to ensure safety of human testsubjects where there may be risk of elec-trical shock and to Robert Walker forreducing noise levels at the interstellarsimulation chamber in Building N-245.Ateam of 24 individuals was recognizedfor its work to mitigate legionella haz-ards from the water system, and a teamof six individuals was recognized for itswork to re-evaluate confined space haz-ards in the wind tunnels. The names ofthe awardees are listed below.

Tier Level 3 – Individual awardsLeonard HeeRobert Walker

Tier Level 3 – Team awardsLegionella Remediation Team:Stan PhillipsDaniel HangJohn SteenHerb HickmanDavid KingJay LeungShawn PumaCraig MartinPhil TingJenny VodvarkaLynne KeswaniPeter WanRoger MillerMike NorrdinKelly KasserAriel VitaliSteve FrankelGladys ChandlerTony WongPeter ChanGreg AltbergRamon BacklitTom BiggsManny Castillo

Code FO Confined Space Action Team:Dan BuftonScott NikodymFrank KmakLeroy WilkinsonMorrow WhitcombPhillips Stich

Tier Level 2 – Individual awardsMark HightowerKenneth KonoGrace Ann WeilerJames Heineck

Tier Level 2 – Team awardsCode FM Safety Committee:Ryan ChristiansonBob DornMarty GalinskiGarry HallockShawn MeszarosDamon FlansburgRichard Swain

Tier Level 1 – Individual awardsJohn SegretoKelly KasserVito ParadoJeanie HowardJoan McCulloughKaren BunnMyesha Domino

Tier Level 1 – Team awardsSOFIA Lower Flexible Door Technical Support Team:Don LefforgeTom GilertsonDouglas KrauseDavid VanSickleGarry BoubFelipe UgaleGarret NakashikiRobert BergerGary ParolaJim LeskoJohn TorresMarty Galinski

Ron HovlandTerry Bland

International Space Station Test Bed Centrifuge Code FE Design Team:Phil CanlasDan KalcicDan DittmanMark MallinsonJames WilliamsPeter Graube

James HanrattyBoris Ilinets

Systems Engineering Division Code FE Safety Committee:Ron ManciniKim WagenbachRebecca AverillJohn SegretoKevin CareyJerry WangJim Daniel

NASA Astrobiology Institute Central Team:Wendy DolciRosalind GrymesDavid MorrisonKrisstina WilmothJeni JoinerKaye FariaPatricia GregoryDarlene GaddEdward GoolishLisa FaithornDaniella ScaliceJanet MorrisonJulie FletcherK. Estelle DodsonShige AbeMarco BoldtMadelyn Edwards

Each of these employees and teamswas nominated by their colleagues fortheir outstanding actions and accom-plishments in improving health andsafety conditions at Ames.

Rememberingthose who losttheir lives in thetragic events ofSept. 11, 2001

Ames’ second quarter safety awards presented


Presidential Rank and NASA Honor Awards 2003 givenThe 2003 Presidential Rank and

NASA Honor Awards ceremony forAmes was held in July. Ames presentedPresidential Rank and NASA honorawards to the 30 employees who hadbeen selected for individual awards andto the managers of the 17 groups whichhad been selected for the NASA GroupAchievement Award.

Ingrid Desilvestre has been ap-pointed executive assistant to CenterDirector Scott Hubbard as of Aug. 24,2003.

Desilvestre began her career withNASA in 1987 as an international pro-grams specialist, supporting coopera-tive activities with the then SovietUnion. During the next 15 years, sheworked in a series of highly demand-ing positions requiring exceptionalcommunication skills and the ability towork in rapidly changing environ-ments in both international and na-tional arenas. Her assignments in-cluded negotiations and interactionsin highly sensitive areas with high-level government, academic and in-dustry officials. She also advised se-nior NASA managers on foreign de-velopments and opportunities of inter-est to NASA. Desilvestre drafted andnegotiated numerous internationalagreements that achieved well-definedprogrammatic or budgetary benefitsto NASA.

In 1999, she became NASA's Spain

representative in Madrid. In this role,she had oversight of NASA's inter-ests in the Madrid Deep Space Com-munications Complex. She served asthe liaison between the complex, theJet Propulsion Laboratory and NASAHeadquarters. She led negotiation ofthe U.S.-Spain agreement for the com-plex that resulted in a major tax con-cession from the European Union.

Desilvestre earned a bachelor ofarts degree in political science andhistory from Wellesley College, and amaster of international affairs degreefrom Columbia University's Schoolof International and Public Affairs,with specialization in internationalpolitical economy and western Eu-rope.

Spain awarded Desilvestre theAeronautical Cross in 2001 and in1998 she was awarded the NASAExceptional Service Medal.

Her office is located in Building200, room 232, mail stop 200-1A. Hertelephone extension is 4-6202.

Desilvestre appointed executive assistant

Public Service GroupAchievement AwardMoffett Training and Conference Center (MTCC) Team

Group Achievement AwardAdvanced Aircraft Program Technology Development and Flight Test TeamAmes Freedom to Manage TeamCRYSTAL-FACE Science TeamEnvironmental Impact Statement TeamGlobal Hawk Wind Tunnel Test TeamIncrement-4 Project TeamInvestigation Organizer TeamLegionella Treatment Plan Development TeamMail Services Center TeamNASA Ames Research Center Export Compliance Office TeamNASA Ames Support Team for Mars Exploration Rover (MER) Entry Descent and Landing (EDL)NASA Public Key Infrastructure GroupRotorcraft Aircrew Systems Concepts Airborne Laboratory (RASCAL) TeamUAV Coffee Harvest Optimization Project TeamUAV Real Time Fire Response Experiment TeamUH-60 Individual Blade Control Team

Exceptional Service MedalGary J. AtkinsDaniel A. HeacockKelly J. KasserMaria-Elena LopezRoger A. MillerNicola MuscettolaJohn R. RayHuy K. TranCharles E. Wade

Exceptional Achievement MedalMichael S. CraigLaura W. DotyPatricia C. MorrisseyAmber K. SuttonKevin R. Wheeler

Exceptional AdministrativeAchievement MedalFemy D. McGrath

Exceptional TechnologyAchievement MedalKarl D. BilimoriaDavid A. Stewart

Outstanding Leadership MedalDwight L. BaloughDenny S. ChausseeDennis CunninghamDavid J. Des MaraisJolen FloresMichael J. GreenRosalind A. GrymesWilliam S. HindsonMichael R. LandisJ. Victor Lebacqz (to be presented at NASA Hqs)

Presidential Rank ofDistinguished ExecutiveNancy F. Bingham

Exceptional ScientificAchievement MedalFarid Salama

Public Service MedalJuan Perez-MercaderLinda Vrabel

Vic Lebacqz, acting associate administrator,Office of Aerospace Technology at NASAHeadquarters (left) shares a light moment withother award recipients at the recent PresidentialRank and NASA Honor Awards 2003.

NASA photo by Tom Trower


Online course to be broadcast from Mars analog

The online ‘Searching for Aliens 101’class will be broadcasted live from RioTinto. Pictured here is thetelecommunications equipment.

‘Searching for Aliens 101’ will beoffered as an online, one-unit course at

San José State University this comingfall. Perhaps a few liberties have beentaken with the course title, but the sub-ject matter of the class is essentially justthat.

For the last couple of months, NASAhas been working hand-in-hand withthe Centro de Astrobiologia (CAB) andInstituto Nacional de TecnicaAerospacial (INTA) while drilling foranaerobic bacteria in Rio Tinto, a sparselypopulated region in Spain. The Earthhas an unusually high concentration ofiron in Rio Tinto; so high, in fact, that thewater actually runs red in certain spots.The high iron concentration has createdunique biological conditions in the re-gion--conditions so unique that NASAis using it to test drill equipment boundfor Mars in 2009. While the atmosphereof Mars makes the support of oxygen-demanding life impossible, the exist-ence of subterranean, anaerobic bacte-ria is a possibility. Not exactly ‘E.T.’ or‘the Predator’ but aliens nonetheless.

Starting on Sept. 29, NASA andINTA scientists will deliver a total ofeight online lectures for students attend-ing a one-unit class at San José StateUniversity. While online courses are cer-tainly not unprecedented, the onlineMars course is the first of its kind--neverbefore has an online course been broad-cast from such a remote location.

“The course will bring NASA sci-ence and engineering into the classroomlike never before,” said Matt Sorgenfrei,a NASA employee working on theproject at Ames. “Students will actuallybe able to see scientists doing work inthe field as it is happening,” he said.

The eight lectures, which will besplit by four NASA scientists and four

INTA scientists, will start at 7 a.m. (PST)and last for approximately one houreach. The last 15 minutes of each classwill be saved for student questions ar-riving via a scrolling chat window(s).The course could contain practice quiz-zes after every lecture and will culmi-nate in an online exam and an essay.NASA hopes to attract 100 registeredstudents to the class and has swallowed80 percent of the registration fee (mak-ing the registration cost $44) in an effortto meet this goal.

While the lectures will be gearedtoward the registered students, NASAhopes to get as many people auditing aspossible. The online lectures are open tothe general public and will be kept inarchives for those unable to view themas they happen.

NAS division secretary passes awayBY RYAN TIFFANY

You had to be quick to get pastValerie Steele. Among her duties as sec-retary for the NASA AdvancedSupercomputing (NAS) Division office,Val managed the constant stream of staffwanting ‘just a minute’ with divisionmanagers. While she effectively juggledher bosses’ schedules, occasionally she’dlet you slip by if you gave her that plead-ing look she couldn’t resist. Sadly, Steelepassed away unexpectedly on July 8from a brain hemorrhage.

Steele was born on March 14, 1951in East Port, Maine, where parents Danieland Lorraine raised Steele, her sisterand four brothers. The family are mem-bers of Maine’s Algonquin-Passamaquoddy tribe.

After graduating from high schoolin Maryland, Steele began to work in thecredit department at Jordan Marsh De-partment Store, followed by two yearsas a hairdresser. Steele was then off toBoston to work as an administrativeassistant at the New England College ofOptometry, where she worked for 10years. Later, after a short real estate ven-ture, Steele served as administrative as-sistant at Exceptional Parent magazine.

At a ski weekend in New Hamp-shire, Steele met and later fell in lovewith Jeff Steele. They married in May1981 and had two daughters, Nicole andLaura.

Jeff’s work soon brought them fromMassachusetts to California. She andJeff started their own business calledClean Sweep, where they specialized inhelping owners sell the contents of theirhomes and preparing them for sale. Ajob at Moffett Field eventually led to herposition in the NAS Division at Ames.

Steele’s soft spot for animals broughtmany critters through her home. Friendsoften joked that the county animal shel-ter lost business because of Steele’s open-door policy. Cats, dogs, hummingbirds,

ducks—you name it, Steele took care ofthem all.

She is remembered by friends asoften thinking of others before herself.At Ames, she was always first in line toorganize barbecues and holiday parties.She was really enthusiastic when it cameto brewing up a mean pot of award-winning chili at Ames’ annual cook-off.

Steele is greatly missed by herfriends and coworkers here at Ames. Ata memorial service held in Campbell onJuly 13, Rev. William Johnson shared aprayer that fittingly reflected Steele’slove of nature. According to Indian leg-end, “a wish that is whispered on thewings of a butterfly will be carried si-lently to the heavens and granted, forthey are the messengers of the GreatSpirit.” The prayer reads, in part: “Blessme with the ability of a butterfly tocreate and instill the feeling of wonder,passion and excitement towards all ofyour living creatures.”

Family members appreciate dona-tions made to the Humane Society Sili-con Valley, 2530 Lafayette Street, SantaClara, CA, 95050.

The online Mars course, along withseveral other educational programs be-ing designed at Ames and other NASAcenters, provides NASA with a venue toshare its technology and informationwith both educational institutions at alllevels and the general public. Those in-volved in creating the course hope to setoff a chain reaction spawning severalothers. Soon, perhaps online courses fea-turing scientists in the field will be com-monplace both nationally and globally.After all, watching how scientists planon searching for extra-terrestrial life cer-tainly sounds more exciting than a wholehost of other electives.

For more Information, visit: http://robotics.nasa.gov/courses/fall2003

Valerie Steele


The collapsed-structure training facility at Ames, which was used duringthe recent disaster response exercises, provides an excellent and realisticlearning experience for ‘first responders.’

Search-and-rescue teams at the recenttraining exercise at Ames.

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On Wednesday, Oct. 8, at 7 p.m.,the Silicon Valley Astronomy Lec-ture Series will present a non-techni-cal illustrated talk, given by DavidDes Marais of NASA Ames on ‘TheMars Exploration Rover Mission: Fol-lowing the Water.’

Des Marais, a member of the sci-ence operations working group forthe mission, will describe the plansfor landing two advanced rovers onthe surface of the red planet in Janu-ary. Both rovers will have instru-ments on board that can act as ‘robotgeologists,’ searching for evidence ofpast water on our neighbor planet.

The talk will be held in theSmithwick Theater, at Foothill Col-lege, on El Monte Road and Freeway280,in Los Altos Hills. The event isfree and open to the public. Parkingon campus costs $2. Call the serieshot-line at (650) 949-7888 for moreinformation.

The event is co-sponsored byNASA Ames, the Foothill CollegeAstronomy Program, the SETI Insti-tute and the Astronomical Society ofthe Pacific

Astronomy lectureseries presents

More than 30 search-and-rescue ex-perts took part in a 6-day, 70-hour train-ing exercise at NASA Ames in late Au-gust. The final exercise -- responding toa simulated collapsed-structure incidentinvolving weapons of mass destruction-- included more than 75 rescue special-ists, heavy equipment operators, haz-

ardous material response specialists,emergency communications specialists,emergency medical technicians and ca-nine search teams.

"We are very proud of our disasterassistance team's accomplishments andservice to the public in previous na-tional disasters," said NASA Ames Di-rector G. Scott Hubbard. "We're hon-ored that the collapsed-structure facilityat NASA Ames was used for trainingemergency first-responders from all overthe country."

Members of the NASA Ames Disas-ter Assistance and Rescue Team (DART)have responded to disasters such as theLoma Prieta and Northridge earth-quakes, the Oklahoma City bombing,and the Sept. 11, 2001, collapse of thetwin towers at New York City’s WorldTrade Center.

"This was an opportunity for in-vited observers to experience first-handwhat rescue specialists think and feelwhen they work in a collapsed struc-ture," said Robert J. Dolci, director ofemergency services at NASA Ames."Can you imagine the oppressive feel-ing of crawling through a tiny tunnelcarved through twisted concrete andsteel? Do you know what it's like to notknow if the next space you enter willhave enough oxygen left to keep youalive? To wonder if you'll have to re-cover more bodies before you find yourfirst live victim?" Dealing with these

thoughts and feelings, and staying fo-cused on the task at hand, are issuesrescue specialistsmust face whenworking in a col-lapsed structure,Dolci added.

In addition tothe training exer-cises, NASA Amesand NASA's JetPropulsion Labo-ratory (JPL), Pasa-dena, Calif., dis-played a variety ofNASA-developedtechnologies ofpotential impor-tance to urbansearch and rescue."We wanted to usethis opportunityto highlight howimportant tech-nology develop-ment is to theemergency responder, and to better un-derstand technology needs and priori-ties to make the emergency responsetask safer and more effective," Dolci said.Many of the participating rescue spe-cialists expressed considerable interestin and enthusiasm for the technologiesbeing showcased.

Building on knowledge gained fromresponding to the World Trade Centerdisaster and in light of the difficultiesposed by weapons of mass destructionin the collapsed-structure environment,DART officials also used the weeklongexercise to update future collapsed-structure training classes.

The final exercise took place atDART's unique collapsed-structuretraining facility near Bldg. N-267. Thesite includes a large concrete rubble pilewith built-in voids and rooms, a simu-lated concrete collapsed structure, a 30-foot-long twin-engine aircraft 'crashed'into a portion of the collapsed structure,and large concrete loads for lifting andmoving. Other features include a haz-ardous materials field training facility,high-angle rescue training towers, andconfined-space and trench-rescue train-ing props.

Many of the participants were fromthree of California's eight urban search-and-rescue teams, who are consideredto be some of the best in the country,Dolci said. Other participants came fromDelaware, North Carolina, Washingtonstate and Washington, D.C. Nearly all ofthe participants previously have takenpart in the annual collapsed-structurerescue class at NASA Ames as studentsor instructors.

NASA Ames, JPL and CaliforniaTask Force 3, sponsored by the Menlo

DART sponsors training for top national disaster respondersPark, Calif., Fire Protection District,sponsored this year's final scenario. More

information about DART is available at:http://dart.arc.nasa.gov

BY ANN SULLIVAN


discipline will come to maturity duringthis century and will revolutionize ourway of life more than any other technol-ogy preceding it," said Center DirectorG. Scott Hubbard. "Those of us whocome together here today realize thatthe R&D community is on the verge ofsignificant scientific discovery and soonwill help bring the nanotechnology revo-lution front and center in the lives of allwho inhabit this planet."

Nanotechnology is the creation ofmaterials, devices and systems throughthe control of matter on the nanometerscale. A nanometer is one-billionth of ameter. Scientists say nanotechnologycould lead to changes in almost every-thing, from computers and medicine toeven automobiles and spacecraft.

"Nanotech represents the 'next bestthing' to come after the great high-techboom that is the basis of our regionaleconomy, and it is important that we doall that we can to ensure that as the fieldgrows, the Bay area shares in thatgrowth," Honda said. "A visit to NASAAmes in early 2002 was when I firstbecame very excited about the potentialof this new technology and began tofocus on both the funding and policyissues related to nanotechnology,"Honda explained.

U.S. Representative Zoe Lofgren, aco-sponsor of H.R. 766, said that thelocal economic situation is "grim in thisarea where one-third of households haveexperienced layoffs" in recent years. Shesaid that she and Honda have seen theSilicon Valley transform into a high-technology center because of invest-ments. The National Science Founda-tion (NSF) predicted that the worldwidemarket for nanotechnology products andservices could reach $1 trillion by 2015,according to Honda.

"Just as computers have transformedthe way our society operates over thelast 30 years, nanotechnology standsready to transform our future," said U.S.Representative Anna G. Eshoo in a state-ment read to the crowd by Hubbard.

"As part of our pursuit of NASAaeronautics and space programs, NASAAmes is working to fuse informationtechnology, biotechnology andnanotechnology R&D," Hubbard ex-plained. "This will facilitate NASA'sability to achieve the nation's goals inaeronautics and space. We can reducethe cost of space exploration, bring backbetter information and help determinewhether there is life beyond our planet,"

Hubbard said.The agency's first priority is to use

nanotechnology research to further themission of America's space program,according to Hubbard. "In doing so,America will be stronger as space travelbecomes easier," Hubbard stated.

"NASA's interest in nanotechnologyis that it will result in stronger materials,ultra-small electronic devices, perhapseven intelligent spacecraft. Miniaturiza-tion also may well enable new spacemissions with lower-weight parts re-quiring less power and fuel," Hubbardsaid.

TheBoehlert-Honda Bill, H.R. 766,passed the U.S. House of Representa-tives by a vote of 405 to 19 in May. TheU.S. Senate also has a nanotechnologybill. Honda said he expects the Houseand Senate will work out a compromiseversion.

"We are now waiting for the Senateto act on its own nanotechnology bill,which differs slightly in its details fromthe House bill," Honda said. "PresidentBush has expressed his support, how-ever, so I expect the bill to come to theSenate floor for approval when we re-turn this fall, a compromise to be workedout, and the bill to be signed by thepresident," Honda explained.

"The largest chunks of the fundingin the bill will either be directed to pro-grammatic efforts of the agencies (tocenters and projects at the national labsrun by the Department of Energy andfacilities such as NASA'snanotechnology center here at Ames) orbe distributed through peer reviewedgrant competitions (NSF), which aca-demic researchers are quite familiarwith," Honda said.

Some nanotechnology advances thatscientists expect will benefit NASA in-clude integrated nanosensors that willcollect, process and communicate mas-sive amounts of data, said MeyyaMeyyappan, the director of the Centerfor Nanotechnology at Ames, who pre-sented a major talk during the forum.He predicted that 'nano' will enablehigher transmission frequencies to in-crease bandwidth, and permit at least 10times more data to be sent from space-craft and other scientific platforms toresearchers.

Nanotechnology will impact com-puting and data storage, materials andmanufacturing, health and medicine,energy and environment, transportation,

national security and space exploration,according to Meyyappan

Following the talk by Meyyappan,experts conducted four panel sessions:the federal labs panel, including NASA,Lawrence Livermore National Labora-tory, Sandia National Laboratories,Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory;the industry panel, including HewlettPackard, Intel, Solectron, Agilent andChevronTexaco Technology Ventures;the University panel, including Stanford,University of California-Berkeley, Uni-versity of California-Santa Cruz, andSanta Clara University and finally a Bayarea resources panel, including JointVenture Silicon Valley, Silicon ValleyManufacturing Group, Northern Cali-fornia Nanotechnology Initiative, andthe Bay area Science and InnovationConsortium. Joe Natoli, San José Mer-cury News publisher, introduced theEarly Stage Nanotechnology Companykeynotes: Dr. Stephen Empedoceles ofNanosys and Dr. George Gruner ofNanomix.

Michele Senders, field representa-tive from Sen. Dianne Feinstein's office,moderated the federal labs panel. Dr.Eric Werwa of U.S. Representative MikeHonda's Washington office moderatedthe industry panel. Adrienne Bousian,the Northern California director of Sen.Barbara Boxer's office, led the univer-sity panel. The Bay area resources panelalso made presentations, and was mod-erated by Heather Barbour, principleconsultant for the Joint Committee forPreparing California for the 21st Cen-tury, California State Assembly. Dr.M.R.C. Greenwood, chancellor of theUniversity of California, Santa Cruz,served as master of ceremonies.

Forum co-sponsors included theNorthern California NanotechnologyInitiative; the city of Sunnyvale, Calif.;the city of Mountain View; city of PaloAlto; the North Valley Job Training Con-sortium, Sunnyvale; the Bay Area Sci-ence and Innovation Consortium; theJoint Venture Silicon Valley Network;and the Silicon Valley ManufacturingGroup.

More information about NASAnanotechnology can be found on theWeb at: http://www.ipt.arc.nasa.gov

Additional information about theforum and some presentation notes areavailable on the Internet at:www.bayareananoforum.org

Leaders discuss nanotechnology market

BY JOHN BLUCK

continued from front page


It is of the utmost importance thatall of us at Ames do everything in ourpower to ensure the safety and securityof the people who work at and visit ourcenter, and to protect the institution’sproperty, facilities, operations, functionsand products.

To that end, Director Scott Hubbardand I have delegated frontline responsi-bility for maintaining the safety and se-curity of the center to the professionalmen and women of the Ames’ Protec-tive Services Office. However, they can-not fulfill their mission without the com-plete cooperation, understanding andsupport of every one of us.

Understandably, sound and pru-dent security measures often result inminor inconveniences to our daily lives.One obvious example is the rigoroussecurity screenings that we are now re-quired to undergo prior to boarding anaircraft at any of our nation’s airports.After the tragic events of September 11,2001, however, most travelers wouldagree that, while it is inconvenient, se-curity screening is a necessary and pru-dent measure to ensure the safety ofcommercial airline passengers.

Similarly, we must bear in mindthat, as employees and contractors ofthe U.S. Government working on a fed-eral facility, we too have an extraordi-nary level of threat. As the world wit-nessed at the Alfred P. Murrah buildingin Oklahoma City and at the Pentagonin Washington, D.C., any and all federalemployees and facilities are potentialtargets of individuals wishing ill willagainst the United States.

Like our nation’s airports and otherfederal facilities, Ames has implementedsecurity measures that may, on occa-sion, cause inconvenience to our dailyroutine. One such measure is the center’s‘inspection program.’ This program isdesigned to prevent the introduction toAmes property of weapons or danger-ous materials capable of causing injuryor damage to persons or property. Itmight interest you to know that the in-spections (conducted pursuant to Title14 Code of Federal Regulations, Part1204) have prevented 21 illegally pos-

sessed firearms and dozens of other dan-gerous weapons from entering our in-stallation this year alone.

Employees are reminded that, pur-suant to federal regulations and as clearlyposted at each entry point to NASAAmes, “entry into, continued presenceon, or exit from, this installation is con-tingent upon your consent to inspectionof person and property.”

Another critical function performedby the law enforcement officers of theProtective Services Office is enforcementof the center’s traffic rules and regula-tions. Already this year there have beenover 47 reported vehicle accidents onMoffett Field. Moreover, during thepast few years, Ames has experiencedseveral very serious traffic accidents,including a fatality resulting from run-ning a stop sign, a pedestrian hit by avehicle while in a cross walk resulting ina fractured pelvis and a vehicle roll-overdue to excessive speed in a turn. Yourcompliance with the traffic rules andregulations is vital for your safety andthat of your fellow workers at the center.

It should be noted that qualifiedand trained special agents and officersof the Protective Services Office aregranted statutory authority to carry fire-arms and make certain arrests pursuantto 42 United States Code, Sections 2456and 2456a. They serve as the ‘first re-sponders’ to 9-1-1 calls for all law en-forcement-related matters on the instal-lation. Just recently, these agents andofficers were part of a coordinated re-sponse to the theft of an automobile andan alleged assault and battery. In per-forming their critical role of ensuringthe safety and security of the center,these individuals need the cooperationof all those they strive to protect.

Recently, it has come to my atten-tion that instances have occurred whereemployees have failed to comply withthe directions of our law enforcementofficers, including failure to pull overfor the red lights and siren of a patrolvehicle. This is not acceptable and thisbehavior will not be tolerated. The se-nior management of this center fullyexpects all employees to comply withany appropriate direction of a NASAspecial agent or security/law enforce-ment officer issued in the performanceof their official duties.

The men and women of the Protec-tive Services Office place themselves inpotential danger on a daily basis to guar-antee our safety and security as well asensuring that the agency and the centercan fulfill its mission. It is the expecta-tion of Ames management that they re-ceive the cooperation and respect of ev-ery one of us within the Ames family.

We thank you for your assistanceand support on this important matter.

A message from the deputy directorHubbard said that the board be-

lieves NASA must change its approachrequiring the need “to prove that it issafe, not prove that it is unsafe.” He saidthe board found that, in NASA, therewas a “belief that past success guaran-tees future success.” Hubbard observedthat, in the first 50 years of aviation, onemillion airplanes were built, whereas inthe first 50 years of space exploration,there have been only 4,500 launches.“We are still in the infancy of spaceexploration,” he pointed out.

In a news conference with nationalmedia representatives on Aug. 27, Ad-ministrator O’Keefe said, “We got thepoint,” acknowledging that NASA needsto examine its procedures and the “waywe do business.”

“This is a very different NASA to-day than it was on Feb. 1,” O’Keefe said,noting that he has almost completelyrebuilt the senior management teamsince his arrival at NASA about 18months ago. Still, there must be “long-term institutional changes and a new setof values,” he acknowledged. “Safety iseveryone's responsibility,” he reiterated.

We must be as resolute and coura-geous as the crew’s families have been,O’Keefe concluded. “We will go for-ward with great resolve to follow” theboard’s blueprint to make human spaceflight safer, he promised. He added thatshuttle flights will only resume “whenwe are fit to fly.”

Later that week back at Ames,Hubbard met with local reporters in amedia roundtable to address issues andanswer questions. He stressed that theboard’s intent was “to create a frame-work for a national debate on the futureof space exploration.” Representativesfrom local ABC and NBC televisionbroadcast affiliates, the San FranciscoChronicle, the San Jose Mercury News,the Mountain View Voice, and KCBSand KQED radio were on hand to en-gage in a dialogue with the Ames direc-tor. Earlier in the day, Hubbard hadappeared live, in studio, on San Fran-cisco KRON TV’s morning show.

One final thing Hubbard made clearto everyone was that, despite the exten-sive set of recommendations, the boardfound far more good things withinNASA than problems. “The board feltvery strongly that the unique explora-tion that we do justifies the risk,”Hubbard said, “as long as we under-stand it and mitigate it.” Indeed, as hehad observed at the earlier update withNASA employees, “The board supportsthe exploration of space. The board sup-ports continuing to fly the shuttle.”

BY DAVID MORSE

continued from front page

CAIB cites


Remotely piloted airplane to monitor grapes


A small, unmanned aerial vehicle(UAV) recently made test flights overthe world's largest vineyard in Califor-

nia to prepare for nighttime frost stud-ies early next year.

The UAV--a remotely piloted air-craft--is bigger than a model airplanebut smaller than a light plane. NASAAmes, university and industry teamsare testing the UAV, its imaging andother data-collecting systems, as well aspreparing the test team. The test flightstook place over San Bernabe Vineyard,which is located just west of King City,Calif., and midway between Salinas andPaso Robles, about 50 miles from thetwo.

"We are developing wireless opera-tion of a new sensing device that willremotely gauge temperature and otherconditions while flying over the grapes,"said Stanley Herwitz, director of theClark University UAV ApplicationsCenter at NASA Research Park, at NASAAmes. He also is a professor of Earthscience from Clark University, Worces-ter, Mass.

Remote sensing is the use of sensorsby satellites and aircraft to take imagesof parts of the Earth's surface in manywavelengths, some beyond the reach ofthe human eye. This technology enablesscientists to quickly deduce surface con-ditions over a wide area, the equal ofhundreds of hours of observation on theground.

“Even though management has sig-nificant historical experience in tempera-

ture monitoring, it is a very impreciseprocess," said San Bernabe's chief oper-ating officer, Claude Hoover. "Given the

high cost and potential limited resourceavailability for frost protection, improv-ing the accuracy and timeliness of infor-mation can have significant economicbenefit,” Hoover explained. Frost dam-age can decrease annual grape yields bymore than 50 percent, according toHoover. Such a decrease would amountto a loss in revenue of more than$12,000,000 for this vineyard alone.

"The flight window over the vine-yard will be from midnight to 6 a.m.PST," Herwitz said, describing nextyear’s mission. "Fixed flight lines overthe vineyard will be flown repeatedly.The imagery will be downlinked to ourground station that will be establishedin the vineyard data management officelocated less than 100 meters from thevineyard's private airstrip," he added.

The UAV airplane will transmit ther-mal images and global positioning sys-tem (GPS) information to be overlaid onirrigation maps, showing how the smallUAV can help grape growers monitorfrost in large areas of vines. "The perimage delivery time to the vineyardmanager will be within 15 minutes ofacquisition," Herwitz said.

This technology also may be usefulfor monitoring orchards and other frost-sensitive crops. The UAV's infrared cam-era systems are calibrated to read outtemperature directly. Thermal imagesfrom the UAV showing temperature

trends and rates of change will helpvineyard managers to make key deci-sions about the timing of irrigation treat-ments.

"In contrast to UAV sensors,handheld or vehicle-mounted, frost-monitoring systems are labor intensive,"Herwitz said. "It simply is not possibleto have a work force distributed over a20-square-mile stretch of vineyard, suchas San Bernabe’s, throughout the night.Work fatigue at night is a compoundingissue. In addition, sampling on theground is restricted to road networks,and, as a result, fails to sample high-riskzones in the field interiors," he explained.

Once more, stationary ground-based sensors that make up frost alarmnetworks are limited in number andrequire labor-intensive maintenance,according to Herwitz. "These ground-based sensors also are vulnerable to dis-turbance and degradation by farm op-erations, wild animals such as rodentsand exposure to the weather."

"Fee-based Web site weather dataare not specific to the geographic unitsfor where frost control measures mightbe needed," he added.

Smaller UAVs, like the one flownduring the recent grape test missions,cost less than larger UAVs. In addition,recent advances in navigation systemsmake small UAVs easier to fly. A wire-less computer local area network (LAN)operating in the unlicensed 900 MHzradio band will provide instrument con-trol and data downlink of images andother information at up to a 75-kilome-ter (almost 50-mile) range. A portableradar system was another importantcomponent used during the mission tomonitor the activity of other aircraft fly-ing in the vicinity of the tests in thenational airspace.

Researchers will share the results oftheir March-to-May 2004 UAV frost-detection mission at the annual meetingof the California Vintners' Association."The long-term commercial significanceof our new technology is its potentialvalue to the wine vineyard communitythroughout the north and central coastregions of California, which are subjectto extremely variable seasonal frost con-ditions," Herwitz said. The technologyalso may be good for use in other grapeand orchard regions, such as Washing-ton and Oregon, Herwitz concluded.

BY JOHN BLUCK

The unmanned aerial vehicle mission team shown here with the UAV.


New UAV center dedicated at NASA Research Park

The new unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV)applications center dedicated at NASA Amesin August is shown above. It will be used toconduct collaborative research anddevelopment, leading to enhanced scientificand commercial use of UAVs for high-resolution imaging in the FAA-controllednational airspace system.

Stan Herwitz and Robert Higgins unveiling the UAV Applications CenterClark University sign in August.

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artNew and exciting uses for un-

manned aerial vehicles (UAVs) will bethe focus of a new applications centerthat was dedicated in August at NASAResearch Park (NRP).

The dedication was the official open-ing of the renovated historic Bldg. 18,which was once used by the U.S. Navy.The building’s third floor, which servedas a weather center for the Navy formany years, is where the UAV Applica-

tions Center is now housed.The Ames jazz band provided a fes-

tive mood for the occasion as peopletoured various displays on all three floorsof Bldg. 18. More than 200 people at-tended events inside and outside thebuilding.

Displays included UAV airframes,payloads, tracking antennas, and a run-ning music video documenting the UAVcoffee mission over Hawaii last yearduring harvest time. Among the UAVpayloads on display were the thermalsensor for an upcoming UAV fire mis-sion, the hyperspectral imager for theUAV vineyard mission, and the twodigital imaging pods that flew on thesolar-powered Pathfinder-Plus UAVover Hawaii. The small gas-poweredBat UAV from MLB, Inc. and a small,solar-powered UAV from AC Propul-sion, Inc., were on display outside Bldg.18.

"The UAV Applications Center em-bodies one of our major goals - to en-courage NASA, governments, academiaand industry to work together," said G.Scott Hubbard, director of NASA Ames."By combining our knowledge, coop-erative efforts like this one create greatopportunities for inventing even bettertechnology," he added.

Hubbard was one of the keynote

speakers at the dedication, in additionto Clark University President JohnBassett and Nancy Budwig, theuniversity's dean of research. PaulColeman, president of the Girvan Insti-tute of Technology, Moffett Field, alsospoke. Girvan is a non-profit corpora-tion chartered to foster public-privatepartnerships for NASA.

"The main objective of the new cen-ter is to demonstrate both the research

and commercialuses of UAVsequipped withsensors," said Dr.Stan Herwitz, di-rector of the newcenter at NRPand professor ofEarth sciencefrom Clark Uni-versity located inWorcester, Mass."Although UAVsnow must havespecial permitsfrom the FederalAviation Admin-istration to fly inconventional airspace, UAVs maywell be treated byair traffic control-lers like conven-tionally pilotedaircraft in the fu-

ture. Our research takes that into ac-count," Herwitz added.

"The success of the UAV coffee mis-sion last summer in Hawaii enabledClark University to establish the UAVApplications Center," Herwitz ex-plained. His team received a groupachievement award from NASA for theUAV coffee demonstration project thatthe team conducted in Hawaii in 2002.

"I gave the UAV ApplicationsCenter’s first honorary award to RobertHiggins for his significant contributionsthat helped us immensely in conductinga successful mission." Higgins is a re-tired contractor who worked for the Eco-system Science and Technology Branchat Ames for more than 20 years. “ Youcan't find a more reliable guy,” Herwitzsaid.

For several years, the scientists andengineers of the Ecosystem Science andTechnology Branch at Ames and its part-ners have been developing technologiesto monitor wildfires, floods, crops andvarious regions on Earth using an arrayof remotely piloted aircraft. The newUnmanned Aerial Vehicle ApplicationCenter will bring together NASA, othergovernment agencies, universities, stu-dents and industry to further developUAV technologies and applications.

"We plan to provide new, challeng- BY JOHN BLUCK

ing educational opportunities and trans-fer innovative technology to the market-place," Herwitz said. One of the compo-nents of the educational plan is to bringuniversity students to the UAV center toanalyze aerial images and other UAV-acquired data.

The U.S. Forest Service is interestedin learning how to use UAVs to monitorwildfires, according to Herwitz. "We areworking to enhance remote-sensing ca-pabilities by UAVs functioning like mo-bile satellites," he explained. Remotesensing is the use of sensors by satellitesand aircraft to take images of parts of theEarth's surface in many wavelengths,some beyond the reach of the humaneye. This technology enables scientiststo quickly deduce surface conditionsover wide areas. Long-duration UAVmissions will provide data equivalent tohundreds of hours of observation on theground.

UAVs also may be used for home-land security, monitoring disaster emer-gency response or any other airborneuse that involves near real-time datatransfer to end users.

A UAV aircraft designer is nowhoused on the second floor of Bldg. 18 inthe NASA Research Park.

More information about the UAVcenter is on the Web at: http://www.uav-applications.org


Recycling is easy at Ames

Left to right: Blue is for mixed paper andwhite is for white paper. Far right is thecontainer for recycling glass, plastic andaluminum bottles.

At Ames, we recycle the followingitems:

• Aluminum, glass and plastic containers• Batteries• Cardboard• Chemicals• Toner cartridges• White and mixed paper• Books, wood, scrap metal and other commodities for recycling or for reuse

Aluminum, glass andplastic containers

Code JFS has begun a pilot programfor the collection of glass, plastic andaluminum beverage containers only.Look for the blue plastic recycling binnear your work area. New buildings arebeing added to the program weekly, butif collection containers have not yet beenplaced in your building, notify JeanneJarvis at ext. 4-5672 for schedule infor-mation. One container will be used forthe collection of plastic, glass and alumi-num cans with the commodities beingseparated after collection.

BatteriesBatteries are considered to be a ‘uni-

versal waste.’ Here at Ames, they arerecycled through our hazardous wasteprogram. To recycle batteries:

1. Fill out Form A - the hazardous waste/material pickup request form; and2. Submit the form to PAI

Corporation at M/S: 221-10. PAI will pickup the batteries and send them for

recycling.3. All batteries should be labeled with a universal waste label.

A sampling of the types of batteriesthe hazardous waste program currentlyaccepts includes: alkaline, mercury,lithium, magnesium, nicad and lead acid.

CardboardCardboard recycling collection

cages are located in over 50 placesthroughout Moffett Field. The collec-tion cages are collected once a week or asneeded or requested. Full cardboardcages are collected and transported tothe cardboard baler where they are baled,banded and staged for pickup byWeyerhaeuser Paper Company.

•Acceptable cardboard: Put only clean, broken down and flattened cardboard in these containers and close container lids to keep cardboard contained and dry.

• Unacceptable cardboard: Waxed cardboard or cardboard that had previously contained food (pizza boxes, etc.) can not be added to cardboard collection cages.

ChemicalsChemical items that are still in the

original containers, unopened and ingood condition may be donated to theAmes Chemical Exchange (ACE) if:

1. They are labeled. Fill out Form A,the hazardous waste/material pickuprequest form and check the box ‘reuse’under handling instructions. Visit theInternet at: http://q/qe/forms/chem_pickup_Form-A.pdf to downloadthe form;

2. Place items at the pickup locationused for your hazardous waste. Do notlabel containers with yellow ‘hazard-ous waste’ labels; and then

3. Submit the form to PAI at M/S:221-10. PAI will pick up and deliver theitems to the appropriate storage facility.These items will be added to the ACElist.

Toner cartridgesUsers can recycle empty toner car-

tridges by using the original carton andaffixing manufacturer’s (enclosed pre-addressed return label) to the originalpackaging after sealing. In the eventthat no label is available, then seal andwrite ‘recycle’ or ‘used’ on the carton.Place carton containing empty cartridgesnext to either paper recycling set-up ordelivery point for pickup. The emptycartridges are then returned to manu-facturers.

White and mixed paperA paper recycle collection setup con-

sists of one stand, one white bag forwhite paper and one blue bag to holdmixed paper. Put only white paper inthe white recycle bags and mixed col-ored paper in the blue bags. Do not mixthe two types of paper together. Pleasefollow the ‘acceptable/unacceptable’guidelines when sorting paper for recy-cling. The center also provides a sensi-

tive, privacy act material paper pickupand shred service. Shredded paper mustbe either put into sealed clear bags orregular plastic bags labeled ‘shreddedpaper.’

Acceptable white paperWhite letterhead, copy machine

paper, white tablet paper, misc. com-puter paper, laser print paper, misc.white paper, staples and paper clips areokay.

Acceptable mixed paperPost-it notes, colored paper, white

and pastel envelopes (windows okay),coated papers (fax, brochures, no gluedbindings), carbonless forms and file fold-ers, paper ream wrappers, magazinesand newspapers, shredded paper, largequantities of paper for recycling, such aspaper from office moves, phone books,etc.

Nonacceptable in paperCarbon, phone books, cardboard,

rubber bands, metal fasteners, foodwrappers and paper towels.

Miscellaneous itemsCode JFS also collects books, wood,

scrap metal and other commodities forrecycling or for reuse. For questionsabout these materials or any other notlisted here, call Jeanne Jarvis at ext. 4-5672.

For more information about usedchemicals or batteries, call DanWinningham at ext. 4-0927. For all otherrecycling questions, call Jeanne Jarvis atext. 4-5672 or visit the Web at: http://q/qe/p2/Recycling/


Code FM helps SOFIA ‘open her doors’…and SOFIA will open many new doors in astronomical research

SOFIA upper rigid door assembly fixture: clockwise from left are key CodeFM technicians Felipe Ugale, Doug Krause, Ron Hovland, Terry Bland,Gary Parola and Don Lefforge.

BY GERALD MULENBURG

The Ames Aeronautics and Space-flight Hardware Development Division(Code FM) was recently selected to as-semble two major components of theStratospheric Observatory for InfraredAstronomy (SOFIA) telescope door sys-tem, the upper rigid door (URD) and theaperture assembly.

When NASA modifications are com-plete, the Boeing 747 SOFIA aircraft willbe a unique airborne observatory carry-ing a 2.5-meter diameter infrared tele-scope giving researchers the opportu-nity to explore the universe beyond thecapability of the former Ames KuiperAirborne Observatory on the Boeing C-141 aircraft. SOFIA is being made pos-sible by a diverse group of contributorsincluding Ames’ R&D Services Direc-torate, which is playing a major role indeveloping three major operating com-ponents that provide the telescope withaccess to the high-altitude atmosphereduring flight. The proven success of thecombined Code FE and Code FM designand fabrication team in completing theSOFIA lower flexible door (LFD) was asignificant factor in the selection of Amesfor the follow-on URD and aperturework, in addition to Code FM’s uniquecapability and competitive cost. The LFDwas delivered to L3 Communications atWaco, Texas, where the 747 modifica-tions are underway.

In conjunction with the LFD, thefunction of the URD and aperture is toprovide the opening for the telescope tothe atmosphere, enabling researchers tomake their observations. The URD willbe a crucial part of the 747 fuselage andwill shield the telescope from the out-side air during takeoff and landing andduring flight to and from stargazingaltitude. The URD is a top priority forSOFIA and has to comply with strictFAA standards and the challenges thatcome with flying at or above 41,000 feetand must be installed before flight testscan begin. When completed, the URDwill be 16 feet long by 14 feet wide. Thephotograph shows the size of the fixturethat will be used to assemble the URDwith the key Code FM technicians as-signed to this task.

Precision operation during openingand closing of the URD requires that themaximum overall deviation in its di-mensions cannot exceed 0.030 of an inchin the assembled configuration. To putthis into perspective, the deviation acrossthe entire length and width of the doorcan only be slightly more than the thick-ness of a mechanical pencil lead. Achiev-ing this tight tolerance on such a largeobject is a difficult but extremely impor-tant task requiring time-consuming ef-fort to ensure accurate alignment dur-

ing assembly ofthis importantpiece of hardware.The Code FMteam is chargedwith the task of as-sembling hard-ware that is notonly somethingthey have not pre-viously done, it’ssomething no onehas ever done!One of the projectm a n a g e m e n tteam commentedthat, “all the guysin the [Code FM]shops are doing anexcellent job andare very commit-ted to SOFIA’ssuccess. The sup-port from the shops has been phenom-enal and without these guys there would

Students displayed their science posters atthe recent summer science day postersession.

BY CONNIE WONG

Science poster session is big successIn July, Ames hosted the seventh

annual summer science day poster ses-sion. The event highlighted 36 postersmade by students.

The summer poster session wasdesigned to excite and educate the nextgeneration of scientists and engineers.It gave student interns and employeesat Ames a chance to see what the stu-dents working here were involved in.

Emily Holton of Code SLR, orga-nized the event this year, under theguidance of the Gravitational ResearchBranch. “Many students, particularlyhigh school students, will never havean opportunity to attend a national/international science meeting,” saidHolton. “Also, many students focustheir opportunity and don’t have anopportunity to talk and learn aboutproject experiences of other students atAmes.” Holton was thrilled with theturn-out at this year’s event. About 80people participated in the poster ses-sion. “Anytime I see enthusiastic stu-dents talking to each other, I am happy.I was particularly happy to see othergroups in Ames participating that hadnot participated previously.”

Like many other people there,Holton was walking around looking atall the interesting posters. “I abso-lutely enjoyed each and every poster. Ifound all the topics interesting and thestudents very knowledgeable about

their subjects.” All the posters werecolorful, filled with pictures and veryinformative. They were all laid outnicely with hypotheses, purposes,background information, conclusions,future works and facts, which made

them easy to understand. Some post-ers included visual images, and ex-amples of their projects. The 36 post-ers all fell under six categories: ad-vanced techniques/ instrumentation/materials; unique facilities: design anddevelopment; altered gravity; funda-mental biology; astrobiology and in-formation technology.

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be no SOFIA doors.”


Event CalendarAmes Amateur Radio Club, third Thursday of each

month, 12 noon, N-T28 (across from N-255). POC:Michael Wright, KG6BFK, at ext. 4-6262.

Ames Ballroom Dance Club. Classes on Tuesdays.Begin classes at 6:15 p.m. Higher-level class meets at5:15 p.m. Held in Bldg. 944, the Rec. Center. POC:Helen Hwang, [email protected].

Ames Bowling League, Palo Alto Bowl on Tuesdaynights. Seeking full-time bowlers and substitutes.Questions to sign up: Mike Liu at ext. 4-1132.

Ames Child Care Center Board of Directors Mtg,every other Thursday (check Web site for meeting dates:http://accc.arc.nasa.gov), 12 noon to 1:30 p.m., N-215,Rm. 212. POC: Tom Maier, ext 4-3643.

Ames Contractor Council Mtg, first Wednesdayeach month, 11 a.m., N-200, Comm. Rm. POC: AnitaFogtman, ext. 4-4432.

Ames Diabetics (AAD), 1st & 3rd Weds, 12 noon to1 p.m., at Ames Mega Bites, Sun room. Support groupdiscusses news affecting diabetics. POC: Bob Mohlenhoff,ext. 4-2523/e-mail at: [email protected].

Ames Federal Employees Union (AFEU) Mtg, thirdWednesday of ea. month, 12 p.m. to 1 p.m., Bldg. 19, Rm1042. Info: http://www.afeu.org. POC: Marianne, ext. 4-4055.

Ames Mac Support Group Mtg, third Tuesday of ea.month, 11:30 a.m.to 1 p.m., Bldg. N262, Rm 180. POC: Julieext. 4-4694 or Tony ext. 4-0340.

Ames Model Aircraft Club, flying radio-controlled aircraftat the north end of Parsons Ave. on weekend mornings. POC:Mark Sumich, ext. 4-6193.

Ames Sailing Club Mtg, second Thursday of ea. month(Feb through Nov), from 11.30 a.m. -1 p.m. in the specialevents room in the Ames Visitor Center in N-223. All arewelcome. POC: Jeff Smith, ext. 4-2586.

Environmental, Health and Safety InformationForum, first Thursday of each month, 8:30 a.m. to 9:30a.m., Bldg. 221/Rm 155. URL: http://q.arc.nasa.gov/qe/events/EHSseries/ POC: Julie Morsellino at ext. 4-6810.

The Hispanic Advisory Committee for ExcellenceHACE Mtg, first Thurs of month in N255 room 101C from11:45 a.m. to 12:45 p.m. POC: Eric Kristich at ext. 4-5137and Mark Leon at ext. 4-6498.

Jetstream Toastmasters, Mondays, 12 p.m. to 1p.m., N-269/Rm. 179. POC: Cathy Payne at ext. 4-0003.

Nat'l Association of Retired Federal Employees,(NARFE), Former and current federal employees. Your onlycontact with Congress. Join to protect your federalretirement. Chptr #50 meets the first Fri. of each month atHomeTown Buffet, 2670 El Camino (at Kiely), S. Clara, 11a.m., lunch $6.70. POC Earl Keener (408) 241-4459 orNARFE 1-800-627-3394.

Native American Advisory Committee Mtg,fourth Tues each month, 12 noon to 1 p.m., Bldg. 19, Rm1096. POC: Mike Liu at ext. 4-1132.

Precautionary warning given regarding compact disksCatastrophic compact disk (CD)

media failures (shattering), while for-merly rare occurrences, are becomingmore common as CD drives increase inspeed. A 52x or faster drive may spin thedisk at 12,000 revolutions per minute ormore. Even under normal circum-stances, this can create a great deal ofstress on the polycarbonate base of theCD. However, if there are existing mi-cro-fractures in the disk or an imbalancein the spinning of the disk in the drive,shattering can sometimes result. Al-though manufacturers are currentlypursuing ways to address this problem(including tighter disk specifications,new clamping mechanisms and rein-forced drive doors), there are a numberof safety measures that you can takeright now.

• When purchasing CD-R media,select high-quality media, rather than‘no-name’ value-priced media. This willimprove data integrity over time in ad-dition to reducing the risk of shattering.

• When applying labels to CD-Rmedia, try to make sure that the labelsare centered and not wrinkled. This willhelp the CD to spin true in the drive.Also, do not ‘stack’ labels whenrepurposing disks.

• Some high-speed drives default toa slightly lower speed and offer a ‘turboboost’ feature to increase speed to themaximum. Do not enable this feature.For instance, many 48x drives default to40x and have a hardware or softwareswitch to increase the speed to 48x. Thetime saved by moving from 40x to 48x isquite small, while the risk of data loss ismuch higher.

• Use care in handling your disks.Extreme flexing of disks when pullingthem out of cases is a common cause ofmicro-fractures that can later lead toshattering.

• The most vulnerable area of a diskis the clear inner ring around the center

hole. Take a quick look at your disksbefore you put them in a drive to makesure that there are no visible cracks orabrasions in this area. If there are, do notput the disk in a high-speed drive! Ei-ther discard it or find a lower-speeddrive that you can use to pull the data offof the disk.

• Do not move the drive while thedisk is spinning.

• Last, but not least, many com-puter users install their CPUs on top of

their desks. This places the CD drive atapproximately eye level resulting in anunacceptable risk to the user should adisk failure occur. We recommend that,where possible, the CPU should be in-stalled below the desktop and to the sideof the users legs. If the CPU must re-main on the desktop, it should be ar-ranged so that the front of the CD drivedoes not face the user or any other per-son.

Safety Week 2003 events setThis year’s Safety Week celebra-

tions are scheduled for Sept. 16 - 18.The result will be an action-

packed week recognizing Ames’ com-mitment to assuring mission successthrough safety.

The week-long celebration kick-off begins at 9:00 a.m. on Tuesday,Sept. 16 in the main auditorium, Build-ing N201. Ames Center Director G.Scott Hubbard will give the introduc-tory remarks. He will be followed bythe keynote speaker, Bryan O’Connor.All employees are encouraged to at-tend.

On Wednesday, Sept. 17,Hubbard and Deputy Center Direc-tor Allen Flynt will present the 2003ASAP II awards to this year’s recipi-ents. This will be followed by an icecream social.

Thursday, Sept. 18, is Stand-down Day. All center employees areencouraged to take time off from theirregular duties and attend the day’s

activities. From 11:00 a.m. to 1:00p.m. will be the safety street fair onDurand Road. There will be healthand safety-related booths, vendors,free chair massages, music by theAmes Jazz Band and refreshments.

Also on Thursday, the Fall FunRun and Walk will be held between11:30 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. The start-ing line for the fun run will be nearthe Fitness Center on DeFrance Aveand finish on Durand Road.

There will be special safety andhealth training classes offered eachday. Visit the Web at: http://www.q/qh/SafetyWeek2003/SafetyWeek2003a.htm and followthe link to register for classes.

For more information, call JimWeller at ext 4-2303 or [email protected] or call Jen-nifer Chan at ext 4-5602 or e-mail:[email protected]


Ames ClassifiedsAds for the next issue should be sent to

[email protected] and must be resubmitted foreach issue. Ads must involve personal needs or items; (nocommercial/third-party ads) and will run on a space-available basis only. First-time ads are given priority. Adsmust include home phone numbers; Ames extensions andemail addresses will be accepted for carpool and lost andfound ads only. Due to the volume of material received,we are unable to verify the accuracy of the statementsmade in the ads. Caveat emptor!

Housing

Transportation

Miscellaneous Exchange Information

Beyond Galileo N-235 (8 a.m. to 2 p.m.)ext. 4-6873

Ask about NASA customized gifts for specialoccasions. Make your reservations for Chase Park

Mega Bites N-235 (6 a.m. to 2 p.m.)ext. 4-5969

Visitor Center Gift Shop N-223(10 a.m. to 4:00 p.m.) ext. 4-5412

NASA logo merchandise, souvenirs, toys, gifts andeducational items.

Open 7 days a week, 7:00 a.m. to 10 p.m. Ratesfrom $40 - $50.

Vacation Opportunities

Check web site for discounts to local attractions,http://exchange.arc.nasa.gov and click on tickets.

Information about products, services andopportunities provided to the employee and contractorcommunity by the Ames Exchange Council. Visit theweb site at: http://exchange.arc.nasa.gov

Lake Tahoe-Squaw Valley Twnhse, 3bd/2ba-equipped, balcony view, horseback riding, hiking,biking, golf, river rafting, tennis, ice skating and more.Call (650) 968-4155, [email protected]

South Lake Tahoe cottage w/wood fireplace, hottub. Rates $50 to $130 per night. Call (650) 967-7659or (650) 704-7732.

Vacation rental, Bass Lake, 4 mls south of Yosemite.3bd/1.5 ba, TV, VCR, MW, frplc, BBQ, priv. boat dock.Sleeps 8. $1,050/wk. Call (559) 642-3600 or (650) 390-9668.

Big Sur vacation rental, secluded 4bd/2ba house incanyon setting. Fully eqpd kitchen. Access to priv.beach. Tub in patio gdn. Halfway between Carmel andBig Sur. $175/night for 2; $225 for 4 and $250 formore, plus $150 cleaning dep. Call (650) 328-4427.

Incline Village: Forest pines, Lake Tahoe condo, 3bd/2 ba, sleeps 8. Fireplc, TV/VCR, MW, W/D, jacuzzi,sauna, pool. $120/night low season; $155/night highseason. $90 cleaning fee and 12% Nevada room tax.Charlie (650) 366-1873.

Tahoe Donner vacation home, 2 bd/2ba. trees,deck, sun, fun. Access to pools, spa, golf, horsebackriding, $280 wkend, $650 week. Call (408) 739-9134.

Pine Mountain Lake vacation home. Access to golf,tennis, lake, swimming, horseback riding, walk to beach.Three bedrooms/sleeps 10. $100/night. Call (408) 799-4052 or (831) 623-4054.

NASA Lodge (N-19) 603-7100

Tickets, etc...(N-235, 8 a.m. to 2 p.m.)ext. 4-6873

See daily menu at: http://exchange.arc.nasa.gov

Car Pool

Astrogram deadlines

All Ames employees are invited to submitarticles relating to Ames projects and activities forpublication in the Astrogram. When submittingstories or ads for publication, submit your mate-rial, along with any questions, in MS word by e-mail to: [email protected] on or be-fore the deadline.

Deadline: Publication:Sep 26 Oct 2003Oct 24 Nov 2003

Hoffmanmemorial set

Got a bunch of old books clut-tering up your office, living room orgarage? Have CDs you don't listento or movies you'll never watchagain? Then donate them to theAmes Child Care Center (ACCC)fundraiser and receive a tax dona-tion receipt at the same time!

The ACCC accepts all books,CDs, VHS tapes, DVDs and soft-ware for adults and for kids. Itemscan either be dropped off at theACCC across from Gate 17 or pick-up can be arranged by emailing MayaPopovic [email protected] or call-ing her at (650) 988-6993.

Looking forused books...

To hear the centerwide statusrecording, call (650) 604-9999 forinformation announcements andemergency instructions for Amesemployees. You can also listen to1700 KHz AM radio for the sameinformation.

Ames emergencyannouncements

Room with large closet in 4 bd/2 ba home in excellent,quiet Mtn View area close to Ames. W/D, microwave,fireplace, wired for cable modem. Tidy person andnonsmoker. Easy access to Ames, 85, 237, & 101. $475plus dep. plus share utils. Avail. Sept. 1. Call (650) 964-1900.

For rent: Large 2 bd/1-1/2 ba apartment in 4-plex w/wireless Internet access included. Sunnyvale, close toAmes. $1,100/mo. N/S. Call (408) 739-3303.

For rent: 2 bd/1ba in Sunnyvale, upstairs unit, 3 milesfrom Ames, near Bernardo and El Camino, $1,200/mo. Call(650) 570-5244, Margaret.

Roommate opportunity in 2bd/2bd beautifullyfurnished condo, close to Ames. $680. Swimming pools,tennis courts. Easy going, prof’l male. Bedroom andseparate bath can be furnished or not. Kirt (650) 714-1562.

‘90 Mercury Sable GS station wagon, brown, 151kmls., ABS, A/C, pwr. locks/windows, radio/cassette, hitch,$1,850 or B/O, avail. after Aug. 28, prefer e-mail:[email protected] or call (650)-328-7407.

‘94 Ford F150 extended cab; low mileage, Drakerack, new brakes, toolbox, dual tanks, trlr pkg;one owner.KBB: $8,600; $7,000 or B/O. Sal Rositano (408) 238-5310.

’95 Plymouth Grand Voyager, minivan, V6 auto. AC112K mls, $3,700. Moving sale. Call (650) 938 0928 or e-mail [email protected].

‘96 VW Jetta GLS, A/C, 8-speaker stereo, powersteering, sun/moon roof, run excellent, body in good shapew/ minor wear and tear, first owner, $2,000 or B/O. Call(650) 625-1325.

‘99 Ford Contour SE, excellent 65K mls. $5,000 orB/O. Call (650) 940-7603.

Car pool from Pleasanton. Call Natalio Mingo at ext. 4-1776 or e-mail [email protected], or Deepak Kulkarni atext. 4-4869 or e-mail [email protected]

Ladies 10 spd bicycle, nds new tires $25; empty beerbottles, 20 oz. used once in priv. micro brewery, 4 cases,$5; Sony 53" RPTV, KV series, one of three picture tube isbad, free. Dresser, 72" w/two mirrors. $50. Jose (408) 205-2722 or [email protected]

Pro women's ice skates, size 7, white boot, newlysharpened Sheffield Pro Model blades. Exc. cond. andcomes w/blade covers. $150 or B/O. Call (650) 424-8138.

Air conditioner, portable (wheels), refrigeration type,Toyotomi, exc. cond, cools one room, 7200 BTU, 115v,$495 (over $1,000 new). Sm. window type air cond.,Quasar, 5000 BTU, $80. Dan (925) 933-8706 (H) or (650)867-3958 (cell).

27" screen Magnavox TV. Great condition. $125.Esther (650) 961-2732.

Computer desk plus hutch, cherry veneer, like-new,built-in keyboard and CD rack. $150. Call (408) 817-6727.

Moving sale. Sofabed (futon, white), $100; kitchentable, $50; coffee table, $10; two floor lamps, $4 ea. Call(650) 938 0928 or e-mail [email protected].

Graco 2-speed electric baby swing. White enamelfinish w/blue trim. Great cond. $20. Call (408) 295-2160.

Disneyland discounted tickets for 6 adults and 3children. Call (408) 257-2513.

Gray shop vacuum cleaner on rollers, 5 gal. capac.Hose, attchmnts. Pwrful, lightweight! $30 Brother P-Touch labeler battery/AC plug, uses 1/4"-3/4" tape. PT-320$20. ALCATEL Speed Touch BC DSL modem w/installation,drivers disk, man’l, wall attchmnts, $30. Iomega Zip drive(ext’l), Mac. 100mb. SCSI connection, w/driver disk, disks,case, $20. Kevin (408) 723-2115.

Reliable 19.’ Mitsubishi TV, $50. Call (650) 960-3798.

DUAL-CPU computer, P2/333MHz, w/integ. U/WSCSI, sound, AGP slot and SVGA monitor. $110. Mike(510) 278-2601.

A memorial get-together inhonor of Larry Hofman, whopassed away June 9, is planned forMonday, Sept. 15 at 3 p.m. in theMTCC Ballroom.

Please join your friends, col-leagues and Larry's family in thismemorial. Contact Pat Elson at e-mail: [email protected] formore information


National Aeronautics and SpaceAdministration

Ames Research CenterMoffett Field, CA 94035-1000

Official BusinessPenalty for Private Use

PLEASE RECYCLEPrinted on recycled and recyclable paper with vegetable-based ink.

FIRST CLASS MAILPOSTAGE & FEES PAID

NASAPermit No. G-27

The Ames Astrogram is an official publication ofAmes Research Center, National Aeronautics andSpace Administration.

Editor-in-Chief...............................David Morse

Managing Editor............................Ann Sullivan

Editor, Layout and Design............Astrid Terlep

You can reach the Astrogram Office at:[email protected] or by phone at(650) 604-3347.

Art auction, exhibition to benefit ACCCOn Thursday evening, Oct. 2, the

Ames Child Care Center (ACCC) in-vites you and your guests to view and

acquire distinct art lithographs, etch-ings, watercolors and oil paintings.Additional art pieces such as beadedpurses and unique clocks will also beavailable. Art by masters as well as artby lesser-known but equally excitingartists from around the world will be ondisplay. Each piece of art is beautifullycustom framed and ready to hang. Comeearly, examine the art, question the gal-lery staff on hand, and, at the sound ofthe gavel, all are yours for the bidding.

The art auction will be held at theMoffett Training and Conference Cen-ter in the ballroom of Building 3. Artwill be available for preview at 4:30 p.m.and the auction will begin at 5:30 p.m.Local wines and hors d'oeuvres will alsobe available. Raffle and door prizes willbe given away during the auction. A $10

donation, to be paid at the entrance, willprovide you with a commemorativewineglass, your first pour of wine,

punch, hot andcold horsd'oeuvres and adoor prize ticket.Additional winewill be availablefor purchase bythe glass andbottle.

P r o c e e d sfrom the art andwine sales will beused for facility

improvements at the ACCC. All arewelcome. Visitors who are not affiliatedwith Ames will need to present theirdriver's license in order to enter the cen-ter. Non U.S. citizens will need to con-tact Sally Miller at ext. 4-5411 or e-mailher at: [email protected] for specificinformation on how to enter the center.

All checks for art purchased will bemade payable to the ACCC. Visa,MasterCard, Discover and American Ex-press will also be accepted. Additionalinformation on the ACCC and the artauction fundraiser is on the Web at:http://accc.arc.nasa.gov/events/auction03.html. Work by particular art-ists (any artists) or particular pieces ofart can be requested by also contactingMiller.

Travel Managernews: Super Users

A Travel Manager super user grouphas been formed, with representativesfrom many organizations. Super usersare able to assist emloyees to learn theproper use of Travel Manager. For a listof super users, visit the Web at: http://ifmp.arc.nasa.gov/tm-su.html.

The Travel Manager team has gath-ered data from July voucher paymentsand determined it takes an average ofsix business days for a traveler to receivereimbursement from the date theysigned their voucher. Travelers can ex-pedite the payment process by quicklysubmitting their receipts to the traveloffice after management review.

Remember to submit a print out ofyour travel voucher with your receiptsto the travel office, mail stop 203-13.Vouchers will not be paid until receiptsare received in the travel office.

FYE Process for travel documents:The split-year travel document processat Ames requires two travel authoriza-tions accompanied by two travel vouch-ers, one for each fiscal year. A job aidinstructing how to prepare split-yeartravel documents are on the Travel Man-ager Web site at:www.travelmanager.arc.nasa.gov, lo-cated under ‘training materis.’

To assist with fiscal year closures,submit all your FY03 vouchers beforeSept. 30. And, a reminder that accord-ing to travel regulations, travelers mustsign their travel vouchers.

Documents

Leaders discuss nanotech market - NASA · PDF fileNASA Ames Center Director G. Scott Hubbard ... the external tank at 81.7 seconds after ... data-mining techniques to help Earth