Examiner.com (22-12-2009) http://www.examiner.com/x-33316-Boulder-Technology-Examiner~y2009m12d22-NASA-and-the-Front- Range NASA and the Front Range This morning Science Magazine.org reported that from Cape Kennedy, bringing the total number of Science Insider has learned President Barack Obama CU-Boulder alums to 15. , will ask Congress next year to fund a new heavy-lift an American who was born in India, received her launcher to take humans to the moon, asteroids, and doctorate in aerospace engineering from CU-Boulder the moons of Mars. The president chose the new in 1988 under Professor C.Y. Chow. Takao Doi, a direction for the U.S. human space flight program Japanese astronaut, did postdoctoral work at CU- Wednesday at a White House meeting with NASA Boulder in 1987 and 1988 with Professor Jean Koster Administrator Charles Bolden. NASA could receive and was an associate professor in the CU-Boulder an additional $1 billion in 2011 both to get the new engineering college from 1991 to 1995. launcher on track and to bolster the agency’s fleet of robotic Earth-monitoring spacecraft. The two are part of a six-person crew on a 16-day mission to study the sun’s outer atmosphere. The The current NASA plan for human exploration is crew will deploy and retrieve a satellite that will built around the $3.5 billion Constellation program, gather solar information, and conduct a number of which would provide a way to get humans to the microgravity experiments. Both Chawla, 36, and Doi, space station and beyond. NASA just won a $1 billion 43, entered the one-year NASA astronaut training boost from Congress for 2010 in a bill signed by the program at Houston’s Johnson Space Center. Kalpana president. The report has re-kindled debate within is the second woman astronaut from CU-Boulder. Congress, the aerospace industry, and the White Marsha Ivins, who also graduated from CU-Boulder House. President Obama chose from several options in 1973, has flown on four NASA presented to him by NASA, the Office of missions. Management and Budget, and the Office of Science and Technology Policy. Those options included Closer to the ground 10 years later in 2007, a team of keeping the budget flat and delaying a new launcher, scientists from the University of Colorado at Boulder building a heavy-lift launcher with an additional $1 and NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, billion for the agency, ramping up NASA’s annual Calif., used the Tropospheric Emission Spectrometer budget by $3 billion for an aggressive program, or on NASA's Aura satellite to gather data on water abandoning space flight altogether and reducing vapor in order to retrace the history of water over NASA’s budget. oceans and continents, from ice and liquid to vapor and back again. David Noone, an assistant professor The president’s decision to go with the second option in CU-Boulder's atmospheric and oceanic sciences is a major departure from his 2010 budget plan, but it department explained that by analyzing the may prove to be a positive direction for the Space distribution of the heavy and light molecules, the Science Industry right here in the Front Range. For team was able to deduce the sources and processes the few of you who may be thinking we couldn't be that cycle water, the most abundant greenhouse gas in further from NASA's traditional stomping grounds on Earth's atmosphere. the cape, the news has been full of the connections between NASA and Colorado, specifically The The team found that tropical rainfall evaporation and University of Colorado in Boulder. water "exhaled" by forests are key sources of moisture to the tropical atmosphere. "One might On Wednesday, Nov. 19, 1997, Two University of expect most of the water to come directly from the Colorado alumni made their first journeys into space , wet ocean," said Noone. "Instead, it appears that when NASA’s space shuttle Columbia blasted off thunderstorm activity over the tropical continents that will be used to explore the moon and Mars in the plays a key role in keeping the troposphere hydrated." future. The technology is expected to lead to a working "Interplanetary Internet," said Kevin Gifford, The team found that in the tropics and regions of a senior research associate at CU-Boulder's BioServe tropical rain clouds, rainfall evaporation significantly Space Technologies and a faculty member in the adds moisture to the lower troposphere, with typically aerospace engineering sciences department. 20 percent and up to 50 percent of rain there evaporating before it reaches the ground. "This "Communication between spacecraft and ground mechanism allows the atmosphere to retain some of stations has traditionally been over a single point-to- the water, which can be used later, for instance, to point link, much like a walkie-talkie," said Gifford. make clouds," Noone said. "Currently, space operations teams must manually schedule each link and generate appropriate In 2008, the largest research contract ever was commands to specify where the data is to be sent, the awarded to the University of Colorado at Boulder's, time it will be sent and its destination. As the number Laboratory for Atmospheric and Space Physics of spacecraft and links increase and the need to (LASP). LASP has been selected by NASA to lead a communicate between many space vehicles emerges, $485 million orbiting space mission slated to launch these manual operations become increasingly in 2013 to probe the past climate of Mars, including cumbersome and costly. There also are intriguing its potential for harboring life over the ages. CU- applications of the DTN technology on Earth. They Boulder's Laboratory for Atmospheric and Space include the tracking of livestock and wildlife, Physics, will design, build and operate the Mars enhancing Internet 'hot spot' connectivity in remote Atmosphere and Volatile Evolution mission, or rural areas in Third World countries, and tactical MAVEN. operations support for the U.S. military" he said.

The MAVEN science team includes three LASP And just a few weeks ago, the Wide-Field Infrared scientists heading instrument teams -- Nick Survey Explorer, or WISE, built by Ball Aerospace in Schneider, Frank Eparvier and Robert Ergun -- as Boulder, lifted off aboard a Delta 2 rocket 6:09 a.m. well as a large supporting team of scientists, on December 14th, 2009 from Vandenberg Air Force engineers and mission operations specialists. Base on the central California coast. The spacecraft MAVEN also will include participation by a number will spend a month checking out its instruments of CU-Boulder graduate and undergraduate students before scanning the sky for objects that give off in the coming years. Currently there are more than infrared light, or heat. Mission managers say the craft 100 undergraduate and graduate students working on will produce the most comprehensive map yet of the research projects at LASP, providing training for cosmos. Its discoveries will pinpoint targets for future careers as engineers and scientist said LASP's current and future spacecraft to study in greater detail Associate Director Bruce Jakosky, principal as funding becomes available. investigator for the mission. The upcoming year promises to bring Colorado even In June of 2009 NASA announced that The closer to the stars than ever before. In this economy University of Colorado at Boulder is working with that's something that the University and State coffers them to develop a new communications technology are very grateful for. now being tested on the International Space Station, which will extend Earth's Internet into outer space and across the solar system.

Called Disruption Tolerant Networking (DTN), the new technology will enable NASA to better communicate with international fleets of spacecraft