Aeronautics and Space Report

of the President

Fiscal Year

2009 Activities
Aeronautics

and

Space Report

of the 

President

Fiscal Year

2009

Activities
Aeronautics and Space Report of the President

The National Aeronautics and Space Act of 1958 

directed the annual Aeronautics and Space Report 

to include a “comprehensive description of the 

programmed activities and the accomplishments 

of all agencies of the United States in the field of 

aeronautics and space activities during the preceding 

calendar year.” In recent years, the reports have 

been prepared on a fiscal-year basis, consistent 

with the budgetary period now used in programs of 

the Federal Government. This year’s report covers 

activities that took place from October 1, 2008, 

through September 30, 2009.
Fiscal Year 2009 Activities

Table of ConTenTs

National Aeronautics and Space Administration 1

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Exploration Systems Mission Directorate 1

Space Operations Mission Directorate 10

Science Mission Directorate 18

Aeronautics Research Mission Directorate 25

Department of Defense 41

Federal Aviation Administration 45

Department of Commerce 51

Department of the Interior 81

Federal Communications Commission 103

U S Department of Agriculture 107

National Science Foundation 115

Department of State 125

Department of Energy 129

Smithsonian Institution 137

Appendices 149

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• 

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A-1 U S Government Spacecraft Record 150

A-2 World Record of Space Launches Successful in 

Attaining Earth Orbit or Beyond 151

B Successful Launches to Orbit on U S Vehicles 152

C Human Spaceflights 155

D-1A Space Activities of the U S Government—Historical Table of Budget 

Authority in Millions of Real-Year Dollars 156

D-1B Space Activities of the U S Government—Historical Table of Budget 

Authority in Millions of Inflation-Adjusted FY 09 Dollars 157

D-2 Federal Space Activities Budget 158

D-3 Federal Aeronautics Activities Budget 159

Acronyms 161
.
1Fiscal Year 2009 Activities

naTional aeronauTiCs and

spaCe adminisTraTion

NASA

Exploration Systems Mission Directorate

Advanced Capabilities Division

Advanced Capabilities

In fiscal year 2009 (FY 09), the Exploration Systems Mission Directorate’s (ESMD) 

Advanced Capabilities Division (ACD) provided critical research and technology 

products that reduced operational and technical risks for the flight systems being 

developed by the Constellation Program.1 These products addressed high-priority 

technology requirements for lunar exploration; risk mitigation related to astronaut 

health and performance; basic research in life and physical sciences using the 

International Space Station (ISS), free-flying spacecraft, and ground-based laboratories; and lunar robotic missions to gather data relevant to future human lunar missions.

Lunar Precursor Robotic Program

The Lunar Precursor Robotic Program (LPRP) developed and executed robotic 

missions to the moon to prepare for future human exploration. Precursor activities included topographical mapping, characterizing the distribution of lunar 

resources, and measuring the radiation and temperature environments on the 

1. President Barack Obama’s FY 11 budget request, announced in February 2010, cancelled the 

Constellation Program. However, the FY 10 Consolidated Appropriations Act prohibited the cancellation of Constellation while the 2010 NASA Authorization Act directed NASA to develop a new 

approach to human spaceflight. Parts of Constellation were carried into the development of the new 

program, but please note that this report reflects a historical approach to the data available at the time.
2Aeronautics and Space Report of the President

lunar surface. Data from Lunar Precursor Robotic Program missions were critical 

to the Constellation Program’s efforts to return humans to the moon and supported 

astronaut safety issues, landing site selection, and engineering requirements for 

lunar surface hardware.

The first lunar robotic mission was the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO), 

which provided detailed mapping for human landing site selection, valuable information about the lunar radiation and thermal environments, and the identification of lunar resource availability. A comanifested mission to LRO, the Lunar 

CRater Observation and Sensing Satellite (LCROSS), impacted a permanently 

shadowed crater on the lunar surface to investigate the possible presence of water 

and other volatiles.

During FY 09, LRO was successfully launched and the spacecraft was commis-

sioned in lunar orbit. All seven scientific instruments on board the spacecraft were 

activated and returned data. High-resolution optical and radar images of the lunar 

surface were acquired, including photos of the Apollo landing sites. The LRO 

spacecraft also measured extremely low temperatures in polar craters, mapped the 

distribution of hydrogen on the lunar surface, and determined the elevation of 

terrain features with its laser altimeter. After commissioning, the spacecraft was 

maneuvered into its mapping orbit to return data for one year.

The Lunar Mapping and Modeling Project (LMMP) completed formulation, sys-

tems requirements, and preliminary design audits in FY 09. The Project’s goals were 

to create a comprehensive data archive and portal for all lunar data, including data 

from LRO and previous missions, such as Lunar Prospector and the Apollo mis-

sions, for use by the Constellation Program mission planners for future human and 

robotic exploration. The lunar data will be presented via an intuitive, integrated, 

reliable set of mapping and modeling tools.

Human Research Program

The Human Research Program (HRP) investigates and mitigates the highest 

risks to astronaut health and performance in support of the National Aeronautics 

and Space Administration’s (NASA) exploration missions. The program’s primary 

goal is to develop and provide human health and performance countermeasures, 
3Fiscal Year 2009 Activities

knowledge, technologies, and tools that enable safe, reliable, and productive 

human space exploration.

During FY 09, HRP recommended potassium citrate as a renal stone countermeasure for ISS astronauts. Flight medical personnel can use potassium citrate 

as a mitigation strategy for the buildup of calcium in the urine that causes the 

development of renal stones during long-term exposure to microgravity. The recommendation was reviewed and approved for medical practice by the NASA Chief 

Health and Medical Officer.

HRP also completed two important food system studies in thermostabilized food 

and nutrient stability. The thermostabilized food study was a three-year accelerated 

shelf-life test of 13 thermostabilized food items to determine shelf life for extendedduration exploration. Egg products had a shelf life of zero months, indicating that 

thermostabilized processing cannot be used for egg products. Currently, egg products are freeze-dried, with a shelf life of approximately 12 months. Vegetable dishes 

had a shelf life of 12 to 50 months, while grilled pork chops and salmon were 

acceptable for 87 to 96 months. Shelf life values were extrapolated for NASA’s 

65 thermostabilized items. Results indicated that greater than 50 percent of the 

current menu items would have a shelf life of less than three years. These analyses 

suggested that new processing technologies will be needed to improve initial quality and extend the shelf life of food products for use in long-duration missions.

The nutrient stability study determined the stability of food and nutritional 

items, representative of the types and classes typically provided on space missions, 

after prolonged exposure to the spaceflight environment. Kits were exposed to 

space for a period of up to 19 months and returned to Earth for nutritional analysis. 

Results of the study indicated that long-duration storage has a much greater effect 

on nutrient stability than does spaceflight. This emphasized the need for improved 

packaging or other means to increase the shelf life of nutrients in the food system 

and mitigate time-related nutrient degradation.

HRP completed the Space Flight Human-System Standard Volume 2 and the 

Human Integration Design Handbook to support the development of Constellation 

space vehicles, including the Orion capsule. The handbook contains humansystem integration data and lessons learned from previous human programs. Its 
4Aeronautics and Space Report of the President

purpose is to aid interpretation of Volume 2 standards by providing guidance to 

space vehicle and habitat designers.

HRP completed behavioral health and performance studies during the Russian 

Academy of Sciences’ 105-day Chamber Study, late March through July, in partnership with the National Space Biomedical Research Institute (NSBRI). The 

isolation chamber study served as a simulation of a six-person ISS crew. Three 

studies sponsored by the National Space Biomedical Research Institute were con-

ducted: operational evaluation of a photic countermeasure to improve alertness, 

performance, and mood during night-shift work; objective monitoring of crew neu-

robehavioral functions and crew interactions; and autonomy during long-duration 

isolation and confinement.

HRP delivered a new model of the acute risks from solar particle events, devel-

oped in collaboration with the Department of Defense Special Weapons Agency 

(formerly the Nuclear Agency). The acute radiation risks body organ dose model 

predicts possible early health effects on crews from exposure to some historically 

large solar events possible on lunar and/or Mars missions. Based on model assump-

tions, exposure to these historical events would cause early moderate health effects 

to crewmembers inside a typical spacecraft or during extravehicular activities if 

effective shielding and medical countermeasure tactics were not provided.

HRP began several new ISS experiments during 2009, including the bisphos-

phonates experiment to examine a countermeasure for bone loss, an integrated 

cardiovascular experiment to measure the effects of microgravity on heart function, 

a maximum oxygen uptake (VO2 Max) experiment to measure changes to astronaut 

aerobic capacity, a functional task test to examine the ability of crews to carry out 

mission functions while transitioning from low gravity to partial gravity or 1 g-force, 

a Pro-K experiment to evaluate a dietary countermeasure for bone loss in astronauts, 

and a reaction self-test to examine astronaut performance while in space.

Exploration Technology Development Program

The Exploration Technology Development Program (ETDP) developed new 

technologies that will enable NASA to conduct future human and robotic explo

-

ration missions with reduced mission risk and cost. ETDP’s primary customers 

were the designers of flight systems in the Constellation Program. ETDP matured 
near-term technologies to enable the first flight of Orion and developed long-lead 5

technologies needed for lunar exploration missions. ETDP worked to reduce the 

risk of infusing new technologies into flight projects by maturing them to the level 

where they can be demonstrated in a relevant environment.

During FY 09, ETDP conducted airplane flight tests of terrain-relative navigation sensors for the lunar lander’s autonomous precision landing system. The optical sensors were designed to image features on the lunar surface during the lander’s 

descent phase and compare the features with an on-board terrain map to determine 

the lander’s position along its trajectory. This technology would assist the crew during piloted landings and allow unpiloted cargo landers to autonomously navigate to 

a landing site near a lunar outpost.

ETDP continued the development of a deep-throttling, liquid oxygen–liquid hydrogen rocket engine for the lunar lander’s descent stage. A series of engine firings were 

conducted to demonstrate stable operations of the engine at low-thrust levels. A prototype 5,500–pound force (lbf) thrust liquid oxygen–liquid methane engine for the 

lander’s ascent stage was also tested. This engine could help reduce the risk for future 

exploration missions since methane is a non-toxic propellant that does not require 

special ground handling procedures. Also, it could be produced from the atmosphere 

of Mars to reduce the mass of propellant that must be launched from Earth.

Two prototype systems for producing oxygen from the lunar regolith were field 

tested in Hawaii. The chemical composition of the volcanic soil in Hawaii is similar 

to that of the lunar regolith. Both systems used a similar process in which the soil 

was heated to a high temperature inside a reaction chamber, and then hydrogen 

gas was passed through it. The hydrogen reacted with the oxygen in the soil to 

form water vapor. The water vapor was then condensed and split into hydrogen and 

oxygen using electrolysis. These in-situ resource utilization systems would reduce the 

amount of consumables needed to sustain the life support systems at a lunar outpost.

To help assemble a lunar outpost, ETDP developed and tested a new type of 

lunar rover called the Tri-ATHLETE—a large, six-legged rover with wheels that 

can walk or roll over rough terrain. It stands about 20 feet tall when the legs are 

fully extended and can split into two halves. Each half has three legs, which can 

operate independently. The two halves of the Tri-ATHLETE can work together 

to lift a large payload module off the lunar lander and transport it to the outpost 
6 assembly site. The Tri-ATHLETE demonstrated offloading a habitat module at the 

Desert Research and Technology Studies (RATS) field test in Arizona.

During the field test, ETDP also demonstrated an improved version of the Lunar 

Electric Rover (LER). The second-generation Lunar Electric Rover had two airlock 

interfaces in its crew cabin so that it could dock with other rovers; it also had a 

retractable dust cover to protect the spacesuits attached to the rear of the crew 

cabin. A laser navigation sensor developed by the Canadian Space Agency was 

tested on the rover during the field test.

ETDP made progress in the development of advanced energy storage technology. 

A new lithium-ion battery with higher energy density was developed for the Lunar 

Electric Rover to increase its driving range. A new type of fuel cell that used capillary forces to wick away the water produced was demonstrated in the laboratory. 

These “non-flow through” fuel cells are more robust than conventional fuel cells 

because they do not require a pump to remove the water. In a conventional fuel 

cell, the pump uses some of the power generated and could be prone to failure.

The ETDP Fission Surface Power Systems project tested key components of a 

nuclear power system for a lunar outpost, including a two-kilowatt Stirling power 

conversion system integrated with a liquid metal coolant loop and an annular 

linear induction pump to circulate the coolant using electromagnetic forces. 

A high-temperature radiator was also tested. The project is working toward a 

non-nuclear demonstration of an integrated fission surface power system using 

a reactor simulator.

In partnership with the NASA Engineering Safety Center (NESC), ETDP 

completed the fabrication of an all-composite crew module for Orion and began 

structural testing. Composite materials could reduce the module’s mass and manufacturing costs. An alternate concept for the Orion launch abort system called the 

Max Launch Abort System (MLAS) was successfully flight tested at Wallops Flight 

Facility. Unlike the Orion launch abort system, the Max Launch Abort System 

vehicle does not require additional rocket motors to stabilize it during flight and 

reorient it during recovery. Instead, it is passively stabilized using drag fins. The 

crew module is reoriented using drogue parachutes.

The Electronic Nose instrument that is designed to monitor atmospheric 

contamination events on the ISS completed six months of continuous on-orbit 
operations. ETDP also delivered to the ISS Program a more comprehensive atmo- 7

sphere analyzer called the Vehicle Cabin Atmosphere Monitor. This instrument is 

a Gas Chromatograph-Mass Spectrometer, capable of measuring the full complement of atmospheric constituents.

International Space Station Research

With the deployment of additional research facilities and increased crew time, the 

International Space Station (ISS) and the Space Shuttle offer more opportunities to 

conduct research in life and physical sciences in microgravity.

In FY 09, the Fluids and Combustion Facility (FCF), which includes the Combustion 

Integrated Rack (CIR) and the Fluids Integrated Rack (FIR), was installed on the 

ISS and commissioned. Experiments to study the combustion of small droplets were 

performed using the Multi-User Droplet Combustion Apparatus on the Combustion 

Integrated Rack. The Light Microscopy Module was integrated with the Fluids and 

Combustion Facility to allow the characterization of fluids, colloids, and two-phase 

media. Experiments in combustion, fluids’ behavior in microgravity, and materials sciences were successfully conducted using both U.S. and international partner facilities.

Many plant, microbiology, cellular biology, and animal science research investigations were conducted using the ISS, Space Shuttle, and free-flyer platforms. These 

research investigations provided new insight into the effects of microgravity on 

microbial virulence, plant growth, and animal biology.

In order to continually utilize these facilities on the ISS and other microgravity research platforms, new openly solicited, peer-reviewed investigations in fluid 

physics, combustion sciences, cellular biology, microbiology, and plant and animal 

research were selected.

Constellation Systems Division

Constellation Program

In accordance with the Authorization Acts of 2005 and 2008, NASA’s 

Constellation Program (CxP) focused on the next generation of spacecraft for 

human exploration beyond low-Earth orbit (LEO). Since its inception in 2005, 

CxP has made tremendous strides toward achieving the goal of extending human 
8 presence in space. Likewise, 2009 was an exceptional year for the CxP, marked by 

the successful conclusion of program- and project-level major design reviews as 

well as the completion of high-profile and important testing. In August 2009, CxP 

passed a significant milestone when NASA granted approval for CxP to proceed 

from Key Decision Point I, which allowed the program to proceed toward the next 

milestone of transitioning the program into the implementation phase.

There were five Initial Operational Capabilities projects within the highly 

integrated (or “tightly coupled”) CxP: Ares I, Orion, Ground Operations, Mission 

Operations, and Extravehicular Activity. The Ares I Project completed the initial First 

Stage Development Motor 1 test firing, which demonstrated significant risk reduction 

for the Ares I launch vehicle. The test firing was also a significant project milestone as 

it marked the first test of full-scale flight hardware in the development of the Ares I. 

The Ares team also successfully conducted three Ares I First Stage parachute tests 

during 2009. The parachute tests tested the rocket’s deceleration system, designed to 

slow the rapid descent of the spent first-stage motor. All parachute systems performed 

as designed, and all hardware was recovered from the drop zone without damage.

Project Orion completed its internal project Preliminary Design Review in 

August 2009 and proceeded with detailed designs. Critical Design Review was 

planned for spring 2011. The procurement of components for engineering development units was initiated, and excellent progress was made on test hardware fabrication, such as the Ground Test Article. The Pad Abort 1 test was planned for spring 

2010, and the assembly of the flight test vehicle was nearly completed. Static test 

firings of all three solid rocket motors, part of the launch abort system, were successfully completed. Project Orion also made substantial progress in construction 

of the Systems Environmental Test Facility at Plum Brook Station, Ohio, where 

Orion systems level qualification testing will be performed. Orion also completed 

a key facility renovation on Kennedy Space Center’s Apollo-era Operations and 

Checkout Building on January 26, 2009. This marked the activation of the High 

Bay Facility—the culmination of a two-year renovation led by Lockheed Martin, 

with investments from the state of Florida, to prepare the facility to support the 

manufacturing of the new Orion crew exploration vehicle.

The Ground Operations Project made significant progress in facility modifications for the Constellation Program. The Ground Operations Project completed 
the construction of three new 600-foot lightning masts at Launch Pad B to protect 9

the new Ares I rockets and implemented key modifications to the Shuttle launch 

pad to support the future Ares launches. The Ground Operations Project also 

began the fabrication of the new Ares I Mobile Launcher (ML), stacking the first of 

10 tiers of the new launch tower on the launcher. Having the tower on the Mobile 

Launcher (reminiscent of Apollo launch towers) will facilitate a clean pad concept.

Commercial Crew and Cargo Program Office

Commercial Crew and Cargo Program Office FY 09 Highlights

Administered by the Commercial Crew and Cargo Program Office, the Commercial 

Orbital Transportation Services (COTS) project progressed toward its goal of demonstrating an orbital capability to service the ISS and encourage a commercial market 

for ISS resupply. During FY 09, NASA maintained two unfunded and two funded 

Space Act Agreements (SAAs) with private companies. Unfunded SAAs included 

PlanetSpace and Sierra Nevada Corporation (formerly SpaceDev); funded SAAs 

included Space Exploration Technologies (SpaceX) and Orbital Sciences Corporation 

(Orbital). SpaceX made significant progress, completing qualification testing of the 

Dragon capsule, the Merlin rocket engines, and launch vehicle structures, as well as 

the construction of its Cape Canaveral launch facility. During 2009, SpaceX developed and flew the Dragon Eye, a proximity operations sensor that will be used to 

guide the Dragon capsule to the ISS. The SpaceX COTS Ultra High Frequency 

Communication Unit was also flown to, and physically integrated into, the ISS, providing a future communications link between the ISS and the Dragon Capsule.

Additionally, SpaceX began manufacturing flight hardware to be used for the 

first NASA demonstration mission, planned for 2010. SpaceX experienced delays 

that are common within the aerospace community and that resulted in the renegotiation of milestones related to the NASA demonstration missions.

NASA’s other funded SAA partner, Orbital, also made significant progress by 

completing its COTS system preliminary design review, major element critical 

design reviews, and ISS Safety Review Panel review, in addition to groundbreaking 

at its Wallops Flight Facility launch site. The Orbital systems-level critical design 

review is planned for early fiscal year 2010 (FY 10).
10 SpaceX plans to conduct orbital demonstrations in 2010, and Orbital plans to 

conduct its ISS demonstration mission in 2011.

Space Operations Mission Directorate

Space Shuttle/International Space Station (Integrated)

FY 09 was a milestone in the history of the ISS program, the year when the 

majority of major construction activities on board the ISS were completed. The 

final set of truss and solar array elements (which now stretch as wide as a football field) were installed. So, too, were the final pieces of the Japan Aerospace 

Exploration Agency’s (JAXA) Kibo laboratory module, which completed the 

International Partners’ (IP) laboratories. During FY 09, the ISS supported over 100 

research experiments station-wide, including 50 U.S. experiments, involving over 

400 scientists, even while station construction was rapidly underway. In May, the 

station crew size doubled to six, allowing more crew time for research. By the end 

of FY 09, the ISS was 81 percent complete, with an on-orbit mass of over 689,500 

pounds. The ISS International Partnership celebrated eight years of continuous 

human presence in space on November 2, 2008, as well as the 10th anniversary of 

the launch of Zarya, the first ISS element on orbit, on November 20, 2008.

For the past 11 years, NASA has applied the full capabilities of the Space Shuttle 

to the mission for which this unique vehicle was originally conceived—the assembly 

of a large, advanced research station in low-Earth orbit, one that can serve as a critical international way station for further missions beyond low-Earth orbit. In FY 09 

alone, the Space Shuttle lofted nearly 150,000 pounds of hardware, equipment, and 

supplies to the ISS and hosted 16 spacewalks over four highly successful missions at 

the station. An additional three spacewalks were performed by the ISS crew from the 

Russian Pirs airlock. The Space Shuttle’s four ISS assembly flights were punctuated by 

another historic mission in FY 09—the fifth servicing mission to the Hubble Space 

Telescope (HST) in May 2009, a mission marked by some of the most intense and 

intricate extravehicular activity (EVA) work in the history of space exploration.

Crew exchanges continued in FY 09, with the launch of Soyuz 17S TMA-13 from 

Baikonur Cosmodrome, Kazakhstan, on October, 12, 2008, carrying Expedition 
18 crewmembers Mike Fincke and Yuri Lonchakov, as well as spaceflight partici- 11

pant Richard Garriott. Soyuz 16S TMA-12 left the ISS on October 23, 2008, and 

landed safely, carrying returning Expedition 17 crewmembers Sergei Volkov and 

Oleg Kononenko and spaceflight participant Garriott.

The crew of Space Shuttle Endeavour flew the first Shuttle mission of the fiscal 

year with the launch of STS-126 to the ISS on November 14, 2008. There were two 

primary goals for the mission: to deliver equipment and supplies that would enable 

an increase of the ISS crew capability from three to six and to repair the station’s 

starboard Solar Alpha Rotary Joint (SARJ). Preparing the ISS to permanently host 

six crewmembers was vital to bringing the full research capabilities of the station 

online. To that end, the 124th Space Shuttle flight carried over 32,000 pounds of 

hardware aboard the Multi-Purpose Logistics Module Leonardo, including crew 

quarters, wastewater reclamation hardware, a galley, a toilet, exercise equipment, 

and other equipment needed for a doubling of the ISS crew. Leonardo also carried 

hardware to repair the SARJ over a series of four spacewalks. The SARJ (a ten-footdiameter, wagon-wheel-shaped gear mechanism on the starboard truss) had been 

locked in a stationary position since the joint mechanisms were found to be contaminated with debris in 2007. Locking the starboard solar arrays prevented further 

damage until the repair could be effected but also meant that the starboard arrays 

could not track the sun during the station’s orbit and, therefore, could not provide 

all the electrical power the ISS laboratories would require. Replacing the Trundle 

Bearing Assemblies on the SARJ allowed the starboard solar arrays to once again 

rotate and track the sun. The SARJ repair again demonstrated that a well-trained, 

prepared, and adaptable team of astronaut crews and ground controllers provides 

the ultimate in flexibility and capability in space—a lesson that will serve the U.S. 

and the IP well as NASA continues to explore beyond low-Earth orbit. STS-126 

also served as a taxi flight, bringing NASA astronaut Sandra Magnus to the ISS 

and returning Expedition 17/18 flight engineer Greg Chamitoff back to Earth.

The hardware delivered by Endeavour included the Water Recovery System portion of the station’s Regenerative Environmental Control and Life Support System. 

The Oxygen Generator had been delivered earlier. This system, besides being 

necessary to support six-crew operations by reducing the need for water resupply 

from the ground, is critical to future long-duration spaceflight beyond low-Earth 
12 orbit where water resources and resupply opportunities are severely constrained. 

After activation and a safety check of the water processing and analysis systems, 

the first drink of on-board reprocessed urine occurred on May 20, 2009. With the 

Regenerative Environmental Control and Life Support System operational, the 

ISS will be capable of meeting about 78 percent of its oxygen and water needs 

through reclamation and reprocessing. Space exploration provides an opportunity 

to demonstrate these kinds of revolutionary technologies in an extremely demanding operational environment.

With the starboard SARJ successfully repaired on STS-126, the STS-119 mission 

was clear to proceed with the delivery and installation of the Starboard 6 (S6) truss 

and solar arrays, the last piece of the ISS backbone completing the ISS electrical 

power system. The 31,060-pound Starboard 6 truss is the size of a school bus and 

completely filled Space Shuttle Discovery’s cargo bay at launch on March 15, 2009. 

Based on operational experience and lessons learned from previous flights, deployment of the two 115- by 38-foot solar arrays proceeded without incident. With eight 

solar array wings now fully deployed, the ISS became one of the brightest objects 

in the sky. The ISS solar arrays can supply about 708,000 kilowatt-hours of electrical power per year, enough to meet the electrical needs of about 50 Houston-area 

homes. STS-119 also served as a crew rotation flight, carrying Japanese astronaut 

Koichi Wakata to the ISS to relieve Expedition 18 flight engineer Sandra Magnus.

On March 26, 2009, 18 Soyuz TMA-14 was launched from Baikonur Cosmodrome 

carrying Expedition 19 crewmembers Gennady Padalka and Michael Barratt, as 

well as spaceflight participant Charles Simonyi. Expedition 18 crewmembers Mike 

Fincke and Yuri Lonchakov and spaceflight participant Simonyi returned to Earth 

on 17 Soyuz TMA-13 on April 7, 2009, without incident. On May 27, Expedition 20 

crewmembers Roman Romanenko, Frank De Winne, and Robert Thirsk lifted off 

from Baikonur on 19 Soyuz TMA-15. Two days later, on May 29, 2009, they docked 

with the ISS, beginning six-crewmember ISS operations. This also marked the first 

time that all five ISS International Partner agencies were represented on-orbit at 

the same time.

One of the most anticipated Space Shuttle missions of the year was the STS-125 

mission to the HST, launched on May 11, 2009. The primary objective of Space 

Shuttle Discovery and her seven-member crew was to carry out the fifth and last 
HST servicing mission, upgrading and refurbishing the 19-year-old telescope with 13

new equipment and new scientific instruments. Four spacewalking astronauts conducted five EVAs during the mission, each lasting between seven to eight hours, on 

five consecutive days, often using real-time fixes to complete complex tasks. The 

crew installed the new Wide Field Camera 3, which allows the HST to take largescale, extremely clear and detailed pictures at ultraviolet and infrared wavelengths, 

a dramatic improvement over all previous HST cameras. They installed the Cosmic 

Origins Spectrograph, which can observe faint, faraway light sources that provide 

clues to the evolution of galaxies and the origin of stellar and planetary systems. 

The STS-125 crew also performed a tune-up on the venerable instrument, replacing old gyroscopes, batteries, and a fine guidance sensor, which locks onto stars as 

part of the telescope’s extraordinarily accurate pointing and tracking system.

With mission STS-127 and the delivery of the Kibo Japanese Experiment Module 

Exposed Facility, installation of the IP laboratories on the ISS is complete. The 

Kibo Exposed Facility can accommodate up to 10 research experiments exposed 

to the space environment providing physical, electrical, and data communications 

support. Experiments can be handled by the Kibo robotic arm and brought inside 

or taken outside of the ISS through the Kibo airlock. Launched on July 15, 2009, 

Space Shuttle Endeavour also delivered a pallet of large spare parts to the ISS 

(including a space-to-ground antenna, a linear drive unit, and a pump module), as 

well as six replacement batteries for the station’s oldest solar array. STS-127 also 

served as a test of the DragonEye navigation sensor system being developed by 

SpaceX of Hawthorne, California. DragonEye will be used by the SpaceX Dragon 

cargo vehicle for proximity operations around the ISS when SpaceX begins demonstrating a commercial resupply capability to the ISS in FY 11. In addition to these 

critical outfitting and testing objectives, STS-127 set a record for the largest group 

of people ever to live and work in space at the same time. Tim Kopra replaced 

Japanese astronaut Koichi Wakata as a permanent crewmember aboard the ISS, 

and the thirteen members of the Endeavour and ISS crew worked together to prepare the ISS for research and operations in the post-Shuttle era.

With STS-127 having finished construction on the last of the IP research modules, the crew of Space Shuttle Discovery on STS-128 focused on outfitting the ISS 

for sustained operations and an intensified program of scientific research. Launched 
14 on August 28, 2009, STS-128 delivered nearly seven tons of equipment and hardware carried inside the Multi-Purpose Logistics Module Leonardo. Research 

capabilities delivered on STS-128 included the Materials Science Research Rack, 

a second Minus Eighty-Degree Laboratory Freezer for the ISS, and the Fluids 

Integrated Rack. STS-128 also carried the Combined Operational Load Bearing 

External Resistance Treadmill (COLBERT), along with other crew habitability 

hardware. Three spacewalks totaling approximately 19.5 hours involved a wide 

variety of repair, replacement, and experiments-tending tasks outside of the ISS. In 

addition, STS-127 was the last ISS crew rotation scheduled for the Space Shuttle, 

with Flight Engineer Nicole Stott replacing Expedition 20 crewmember Tim Kopra.

On September 10, 2009, JAXA launched its first H-II Transfer Vehicle (HTV) 

carrying about six tons of supplies and equipment to the ISS. About a week 

later, the transfer vehicle was captured by the ISS robotic arm and berthed to 

ISS Node 2, Harmony. This was the first free-flight capture by the ISS robotic 

arm. Among the cargo were two experiments transported in the HTV unpressurized pallet. The experiments were removed and transferred to the Kibo External 

Facility by the coordinated use of the ISS robotic arm and the Japanese robotic 

arm on Kibo. Additional cargo resupply was provided in FY 09 by four Russian 

Progress flights.

In FY 09, progress continued to be made toward establishing a National 

Laboratory on the ISS. A Space Act Agreement was signed in December 2008, 

with Ad Astra Rocket Company to study the demonstration of their Variable 

Specific Impulse Magneto-plasma Rocket (VASIMR) on the ISS. A workshop 

was conducted in February 2009 under the Memorandum of Understanding 

(MOU) with the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Agricultural Research Service 

(ARS) to identify the top ten areas for ARS scientific investigation. Initial plant 

and animal genesis experiments were flown in fall 2008. The National Institutes 

of Health issued a call for ISS-based research proposals in March 2009, with a 

workshop held in June 2009. Astrogenetix made further progress in vaccine development with a salmonella target vaccine undergoing application for Food and 

Drug Administration classification as an investigational new drug. Additional 

Astrogenetix National Laboratory Pathfinder experiments on STS-119, -125, -128, 

and -129 surveyed four candidate bacterial pathogens for vaccine development, 
including Methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus Aureus (MRSA). NASA also 15

released an Announcement of Opportunity (AO) in August 2009 for use of ISS 

National Laboratory facilities by private-sector U.S. companies, as well as academic 

and research institutions. The AO will be continuously open through 2014.

FY 09 was also an important year for Space Shuttle transition and retirement 

activities. NASA’s first priority continued to be a focus on maintaining the capabilities needed to safely complete the Shuttle manifest. The last Space Shuttle 

Main Engine (SSME) scheduled for flight, SSME-2061, was tested at the Stennis 

Space Center and delivered to the Kennedy Space Center on August 6, 2009. 

Production on the last five Space Shuttle External Tanks (ET), including the last 

ET-138, continued at the Michoud Assembly Facility (MAF) in Mississippi. As 

NASA prepares to retire the Space Shuttle, the Agency also continues to transition workforce, technology, facilities, and operational experience from this remarkable vehicle to a new generation of safer, even more capable systems. Preparations 

progressed throughout FY 09 for the Ares I-X test flight, which utilized the former 

Apollo and Space Shuttle Launch Pad LC-39B, as well as Space Shuttle personnel 

and processing facilities. In addition, NASA continued to focus on the critical role 

played by its highly skilled contractor and civil service workforce. Efforts included 

sharing a skilled workforce among the Space Shuttle, Constellation, and ISS programs; working with the Space Shuttle prime contractors on retention issues; and 

performing regular surveys of the Space Shuttle civil servant workforce and line 

management to identify and address emerging workforce issues.

SCaN

In FY 09, NASA’s Space Communications and Navigation (SCaN) Program 

Office continued to provide the highly reliable space communication capability that is indispensable to all of NASA’s space missions. The three networks 

SCaN operated and managed—the Near Earth Network, the Space Network (the 

Tracking and Data Relay Satellite System), and the Deep Space Network (DSN)—

met the communications needs, such as Earth monitoring and support of deep 

space exploration missions, of a wide range of customers, both internal and external to NASA.
16 SCaN achieved major progress during the fiscal year toward consolidating all 

NASA space communications assets into a single integrated network by completing an Architecture Definition Document (ADD) for NASA’s space communications architecture. This document will drive the integration of SCaN’s three 

networks while providing the flexibility and added capability required for all of 

NASA’s science and exploration missions for the next 20 to 25 years, as directed in 

the NASA Authorization Act of 2005.

SCaN also implemented a number of efficiency initiatives to reduce the costs 

of operation and maintenance of the NASA communications networks and to 

leverage the savings into the buildup of capabilities and the rejuvenation of the 

aging SCaN infrastructure. These initiatives focused on leveraging technology to 

migrate the burden of operations to the machine rather than people. This included 

more reliance on remote operations and better technology to enable operators to 

handle more than one link at a time. This would allow for fewer people controlling 

and managing the assets. Additionally, reliance on remote operations enables a 

reduction in the number of operators required at each site. Instead of three shifts 

per site, NASA is moving toward three shifts per network, in which an operator at 

one site can operate and manage the assets at all sites for that particular network 

at the first phase. During the second phase, and upon completion of networks 

integration activities, an operator can then operate and manage the assets at all 

sites for all NASA networks at the same time and from a single location. SCaN has 

expended great effort to consolidate and harmonize technology across all NASA 

assets, which will result in fewer people required to maintain the hardware and 

software, leading to greater cost efficiencies and improved services.

During FY 09, SCaN completed all studies and plans for the rejuvenation of 

all its assets and has initiated procurement activities to replace the aging DSN 

70-meter antennas, as well as the Space Network ground site, which also suffers 

from outdated and obsolete technology.

NASA initiated a new Disruption Tolerant Networking project, aimed at starting the buildup of an “Interplanetary Internet” by 2015. A first flight test and demonstration of the new Internet-like communications technique was conducted over 

deep space data links in October 2008, using NASA’s Deep Impact spacecraft in 

orbit around the sun.
SCaN continued its strong interagency cooperation and has been a driving force 17

toward interoperability and compatibility among various national and international 

space communications systems. This will ensure better international cooperation 

and cross support among space agencies, as well as better usage of assets nationally.

Launch Services

The Launch Services Program (LSP) successfully managed the launch of five 

missions on expendable launch vehicles (ELVs) during FY 09. Three of the five 

missions were launched from the East Coast’s Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, 

Florida, including Kepler on a Delta II on March 6, 2009; the dual-manifested 

Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter/Lunar CRater Observation and Sensing Satellite 

on an Atlas V on June 18, 2009; and the Space Tracking and Surveillance System 

(STSS) Demonstrators (DEMO) on a Delta II on September 25, 2009. Additionally, 

two Delta II’s were launched from the western range at Vandenberg Air Force 

Base, California: NOAA-N on February 6, 2009, and STSS Advanced Technology 

Risk Reduction (ATRR) on May 5, 2009. The STSS missions were launched on 

behalf of the Missile Defense Agency. On February 25, 2009, the Orbiting Carbon 

Observatory (OCO) satellite, also launched from the West Coast on a Taurus II, 

was lost in the southern Pacific near Antarctica. For each mission, NASA competitively procured launch services from domestic commercial companies. To find out 

more about these and other NASA science missions (except for STSS ATRR), see 

the Science Mission Directorate section in this report.

Also in FY 09, the ISS Program Commercial Resupply Services (CRS) contract was 

issued. Contract terms and deliverables are included for the Launch Services Program 

(LSP) evaluation of the launch vehicles to be used to resupply the space station. The 

LSP has begun initial technical exchanges with SpaceX under the CRS contract. 

Furthermore, two SAAs have been established by the LSP: the first is for Taurus II and 

the second with ATK for its SLV A and B small launch vehicles. Technical exchanges 

between LSP and ATK have been initiated in FY 09 as a result of this SAA.

In 2009, the Rocket Propulsion Test (RPT) Program continued to maintain the 

Agency’s ability to safely test rocket propulsion systems by evaluating requirements 

and focusing resources to complete those requirements. To assure the accuracy 
18 of the requirements, the RPT has maintained close coordination with the Space 

Shuttle Program, the Constellation Program, and the Department of Defense.

Science Mission Directorate

NASA’s Science Mission Directorate (SMD) successfully launched five new space 

and Earth science missions designed to improve our understanding of solar processes, 

Earth, the universe, and the history of the solar system. The Science Mission Directorate 

has four divisions: Astrophysics, Planetary, Heliophysics, and Earth Science.

On October 19, 2008, the Interstellar Boundary Explorer (IBEX) mission was 

successfully launched on a Pegasus rocket. IBEX is detecting, for the first time, the 

edge of the solar system to study galactic cosmic rays and energetic particles from 

beyond the solar system that pose health and safety hazards for humans exploring 

beyond Earth’s orbit. As the solar wind from the sun flows out beyond Pluto, it 

collides with the material between the stars, forming a shock front. IBEX contains 

two neutral atom imagers that are designed to detect particles from the termination 

shock at the boundary between the solar system and the interstellar space. IBEX 

makes these observations from a highly elliptical orbit that takes it beyond the 

interference of Earth’s magnetosphere. IBEX is a Heliophysics Division mission.

On October 22, 2008, India launched its first lunar explorer, Chandrayaan-1, 

carrying two NASA science instruments. The spacecraft entered lunar orbit on 

November 8, 2008. NASA’s Moon Mineralogy Mapper (M3) surveyed mineral 

resources of the moon, and the Miniature Synthetic Aperture Radar (Mini-SAR) 

mapped the moon’s polar regions looking for ice deposits in the permanently 

shadowed craters. Recently, scientists using NASA’s Mini-SAR on Chandrayaan-1 

were able to look inside two of the moon’s coldest, darkest craters, at its north 

and south poles. The floors of the craters, Seares near the moon’s north pole and 

Haworth crater at the south pole, are not visible from Earth. However, by using the 

Mini-SAR radar on the Chandrayaan-1 spacecraft, scientists are able to map and 

search the insides of the craters for water ice. More analysis will assist scientists to 

determine if buried ice deposits exist in the permanently shadowed craters near 

the moon’s poles. M3 results were featured on the cover of the October 23, 2009, 

edition of Science. M3 is part of the Planetary Division’s Discovery Program.
Another noteworthy mission in the Planetary Division’s Discovery Program 19

is the MErcury Surface, Space ENvironment, GEochemistry, and Ranging 

(MESSENGER) mission. The planet Mercury orbits deep within the sun’s gravity 

well. Although the planet can be as close as 51 million miles from Earth, getting the 

spacecraft into orbit around Mercury depended on an innovative trajectory using 

the gravity of Earth, Venus, and Mercury itself to slow and shape the spacecraft’s 

descent into the inner solar system. On its 4.9-billion-mile journey to become the 

first probe to orbit the planet Mercury, MESSENGER has flown by Earth once (in 

2005), Venus twice (in 2006 and 2007), and Mercury twice (both times in 2008).

During the two Mercury flybys, MESSENGER’s cameras captured more than 

1,200 high-resolution and color images of the planet—unveiling another 30 

percent of Mercury’s surface that had never before been seen by spacecraft and 

gathering essential data for planning the overall mission after orbit insertion in 

2011. The second flyby provided an opportunity for several of the MESSENGER 

Educator Fellows, master science educators, to share the experience and excitement 

felt by the scientists and engineers. Besides being there for the closest approach, the 

Fellows were also able to listen to the discussions of the data from the flyby. With 

the use of Web 2.0 and social media networking, the Fellows reported, in real time, 

to their school districts and students about their experiences.

On January 15, 2009, a team of NASA and university scientists using data from 

the Keck Observatory reported the first definitive detection of methane in the 

atmosphere of Mars to indicate that the planet is still alive in either a biologic or 

geologic sense. Methane—four atoms of hydrogen bound to a carbon atom—is the 

main component of natural gas on Earth. It is of interest to astrobiologists because 

organisms release much of Earth’s methane as they digest nutrients. If microscopic 

Martian life is producing the methane, it likely resides far below the planet’s surface, where it is still warm enough for liquid water to exist. Liquid water, as well 

as energy sources and a supply of carbon, are necessary for all known forms of life. 

It will take future missions, like NASA’s Mars Science Laboratory, to discover the 

origin of the Martian methane. One way to tell if life is the source of the gas is by 

measuring isotope ratios. Isotopes are heavier versions of an element; for example, 

deuterium is a heavier version of hydrogen. In molecules that contain hydrogen, 

like water and methane, the rare deuterium occasionally replaces a hydrogen atom. 
20 Since life prefers to use the lighter isotopes, if the methane has less deuterium than 

the water released with it on Mars, it is a sign that life is producing the methane.

On February 6, 2009, NASA launched the NOAA-N Prime spacecraft for the 

National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA). NOAA-N Prime is 

the last in the Television Infrared Observation Satellite (TIROS) series of NOAA 

satellites that observe Earth’s weather and the environment. NOAA-N Prime carried a suite of instruments to provide critical global data for weather and climate 

predictions. The NOAA-N Prime spacecraft will continue to provide a polar-orbiting 

platform to support (1) environmental monitoring instruments for imaging and 

measuring Earth’s atmosphere, its surface and cloud cover, including Earth radiation, atmospheric ozone, aerosol distribution, sea surface temperature, and vertical 

temperature and water profiles in the troposphere and stratosphere; (2) measurement of proton and electron flux at orbit altitude; (3) data collection from remote 

platforms; and (4) the Search and Rescue Satellite-Aided Tracking system.

Like its predecessors, NOAA-N Prime provided global images of clouds and 

surface features and vertical profiles of atmospheric temperature and humidity for 

use in numerical weather and ocean forecast models, as well as data on ozone 

distribution in the upper part of the atmosphere and near-Earth space environments—information used by marine, aviation, power generation, agriculture, and 

other communities. NOAA-N Prime was also part of the international satelliteaided search and rescue program.

On February 24, 2009, the Orbiting Carbon Observatory (OCO) satellite mission was lost in a launch failure when the payload fairing of the Taurus launch 

vehicle failed to separate during ascent. A payload fairing is a clamshell-shaped 

cover that encloses and protects a payload on the pad and during early flight. 

Fairings are a standard component of expendable launch vehicles, and they are 

always jettisoned as soon as possible after a launch vehicle has achieved an altitude 

where aeroheating is no longer a risk to the satellite. On this OCO flight, the fairing should have been jettisoned shortly after Stage 2 ignition. However, the fairing 

remained attached for the remainder of the flight. The OCO satellite was separated 

from the Stage 3 but was contained within the still-attached fairing. Failure to 

shed the fairing prevented the satellite from reaching its planned orbit, resulting in 

atmospheric reentry. Aeroheating and reentry loads most likely caused the breakup 
and/or burnup of OCO. Any surviving pieces were dispersed in the Pacific Ocean 21

near Antarctica. OCO was an Earth Sciences Division mission.

On March 5, 2009, NASA launched the Kepler Space Telescope. The Kepler 

spacecraft is the first designed to detect Earth-like planets, potentially capable of hosting life, as they circle distant suns. Kepler is designed to detect planets as they pass in 

front of their stars, which causes a tiny dip in the stars’ light. This is called the “transit 

method” of finding planets. Transits are only seen when a star’s planetary system is 

nearly perfectly aligned with our line of sight. For a planet in an Earth-size orbit, the 

chance of it being aligned to produce a transit is less than one percent. However, Kepler 

will stare at one huge area of the sky in the constellations Cygnus and Lyra over several years. Over the lifetime of the mission, the Kepler spacecraft will simultaneously 

measure the variations in the brightness of more than 100,000 stars every 30 minutes, 

searching for the tiny “winks” in light output that happen when a planet passes in 

front of its star. The effect lasts from about an hour to about half a day, depending 

on the planet’s orbit and the type of star. Kepler is an Astrophysics Division mission.

On May 11, 2009, the NASA Shuttle Atlantis went into space to service and 

repair the Hubble Space Telescope (HST). The HST Servicing Mission #4 allowed 

astronomers to release stunning new images from Hubble’s operating science 

instruments. Spacewalking astronauts brought the orbiting observatory to a new 

apex of scientific performance. Astronauts installed two new instruments, the Wide 

Field Camera 3 and the Cosmic Origins Spectrograph, and repaired the Advanced 

Camera for Surveys and Space Telescope Imaging Spectrograph circuit boards. 

Another instrument, the Near Infrared Camera and Multi-Object Spectrometer, 

returned to operation during Hubble’s three months of calibration and testing. As a 

result of the astronauts’ work, new spectacular images and space science discoveries 

from the Hubble Space Telescope will help to rewrite science textbooks. Equipped 

with new eyes and fresh technology, Hubble Space Telescope will work for years 

to come to answer the profound questions of modern astronomy. Hubble is an 

Astrophysics Division mission, and its servicing was accomplished via a partnership with NASA’s Space Operations Mission Directorate.

On May 14, 2009, Herschel and Planck space observatories were launched into 

space together from Kourou, French Guiana, aboard an Ariane 5 rocket. Both of 

these are European Space Agency (ESA) missions with significant U.S. contributions.
22 The mission of the Herschel Space Observatory, a collaborative project between 

NASA and ESA, is to discover how the first galaxies formed and how they evolved 

to give rise to present-day galaxies like our own. Herschel has the largest mirror ever built for a space telescope at 3.5 meters in diameter, designed to collect 

long-wavelength radiation in the far-infrared and submillimeter portion of the 

electromagnetic spectrum from some of the coldest and most distant objects in the 

universe. It will be able to observe dust-obscured and cold objects that are invisible 

to other telescopes. Additional targets for Herschel include clouds of gas and dust 

where new stars are being born, disks out of which planets may form, and cometary 

atmospheres packed with complex organic molecules.

Specifically, the Herschel Space Observatory’s principal objectives are to help 

scientists study and understand (a) how galaxies formed and evolved in the early 

universe and the nature of enormously powerful galactic energy sources; (b) the 

formation, evolution, and interrelationship of stars and the interstellar medium in 

the Milky Way and other galaxies; (c) chemistry in our galaxy; and (d) molecular 

chemistry in the atmosphere of Mars and our solar system’s comets and giant planets, as well as the nature of comet-like objects in the Kuiper belt beyond Neptune.

While Herschel is an ESA-led mission, NASA made significant hardware contributions for the Heterodyne Instrument for the Far Infrared (HIFI) and Spectral 

and Photometric Imaging Receiver (SPIRE) instruments and developed the NASA 

Herschel Science Center, which provides Herschel data to all U.S. scientists. For 

HIFI, NASA provided local oscillators and mixers for bands five and six; and 

amplifiers, isolators and multiplier diodes for bands one through four. For the 

SPIRE instruments, NASA provided five Bolometer detector arrays, cold readout 

electronics, RF filters, and harnesses.

Planck is also a collaborative project between NASA and ESA. The Planck 

spacecraft orbits a distant point, called the second Lagrange point (L2) of our Earthsun system, about 1.5 million kilometers (930,000 miles) away. Planck will give us 

the best view yet of the early moments of cosmic history. Planck will make the most 

precise measurements to date of tiny variations in the universe’s oldest light, called 

the cosmic microwave background, created more than 13 billion years ago. That is, 

the Planck mission will measure the cosmic microwave background over a broad 

range of wavelengths to an unprecedented accuracy. Planck is expected to provide 
answers to many fundamental questions about the early history and evolution of 23

the universe. Scientists hope to find data in order to (a) set tight constraints on 

cosmological parameters, (b) study the ionization history of the universe, (c) probe 

the dynamics of the inflationary era, and (d) test fundamental physics.

The mission will refine our estimates of the size, mass, age, composition, geometry and fate of the universe—whether it will collapse in on itself or expand forever. NASA played important roles in the mission’s development and will provide 

important contributions to data and science analyses. While Planck is also an 

ESA-led mission, NASA made significant hardware contributions. NASA provided 

cryogenic low-noise amplifier technology and radiometer expertise for the Low 

Frequency Instrument (LFI), spider web and polarization-sensitive bolometers for 

the High Frequency Instrument (HFI), cryocooler compressors, and a cryocooler 

cold end.

The Geostationary Operational Environmental Satellite (GOES) program, 

which began in 1974, is a program of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric 

Administration (NOAA) of the U.S. Department of Commerce. NOAA funds and 

manages the program and determines the need for satellite replacement. NASA 

acts as NOAA’s acquisition agent to design, develop, and launch GOES satellites. 

After a satellite is launched and checked out by NASA, the spacecraft is turned 

over to NOAA for its operation.

On June 27, 2009, NASA launched the GOES-O spacecraft. Forecasting the 

approach of severe storms for more than 25 years, GOES spacecraft remain an 

essential cornerstone of weather observation and forecasting. Atmospheric phenomena are tracked, ensuring real-time coverage of events such as severe local 

storms, tropical hurricanes, and cyclones—meteorological events that directly 

affect public safety, property, and economic health and development.

The GOES spacecraft operate as a two-satellite constellation in geosynchronous orbit above the equator and observe 60 percent of Earth. They measure 

Earth’s atmosphere, its surface, its cloud cover, and the solar and geosynchronous 

space environment, and they provide a platform for the Imager, Sounder, Solar 

X-Ray Imager, and space environment monitoring instruments. The system also 

supports land- and ocean-based Data Collection Platforms, transmits Imager 

and Sounder data, relays Low Rate Information Transmission data, relays GOES 
24 variable reformatted Imager and Sounder data (these data will improve knowledge 

of exactly where severe weather events are located), relays Emergency Managers 

Weather Information Network broadcasts, and participates in the international 

Cospas-SARSAT Search and Rescue Satellite-Aided Tracking system.

In September 2009, according to sensors on NASA’s Advanced Composition 

Explorer (ACE) spacecraft, galactic cosmic rays hit a space age high. In 2009, cosmic ray intensities increased 19 percent beyond anything seen in the past 50 years. 

The cause of the surge is solar minimum, a deep lull in solar activity that began 

around 2007. Researchers have long known that cosmic rays go up when solar 

activity goes down. In 2009, solar activity was as weak as it had been in modern 

times, setting the stage for a perfect storm of cosmic rays.

Galactic cosmic rays come from outside the solar system. They are subatomic 

particles—mainly protons but also some heavy nuclei—accelerated to almost light 

speed by distant supernova explosions. The sun’s magnetic field is our first line 

of defense against these highly charged, energetic particles. At times of low solar 

activity, this natural shielding is weakened, and more cosmic rays are able to reach 

the inner solar system.

In late September 2009, NASA’s IBEX spacecraft made it possible for scientists 

to construct the first comprehensive sky map of our solar system and its location 

in the Milky Way galaxy. The new view will change the way researchers view and 

study the interaction between our galaxy and sun. The sky map was produced with 

data that two detectors on the spacecraft collected during six months of observations. The detectors measured and counted particles referred to as energetic neutral 

atoms. The new map revealed the region that separates the nearest reaches of our 

galaxy, called the local interstellar medium, from our heliosphere—a protective 

bubble that shields and protects our solar system from most of the dangerous cosmic radiation traveling through space. For the first time, we are looking beyond 

the sun’s atmosphere and beginning to really understand our place in the galaxy.

On October 7, 2009, NASA planned, developed, and carried out a White House–

hosted “Star Party” in which President Obama and his family joined astronomers, 

scientists, NASA senior officials, and 150 elementary and middle school students. 

Participants learned about crater formation on the moon and viewed Jupiter and 

its four Galilean moons, as well as distant stars and nebulae in our galaxy. The 
White House astronomy event provided live-streamed video, a host of telescopes, 25

and several hands-on activities that could be replicated at museums and science 

centers across the country.

In fall 2009, NASA funded and launched the first series of flights in a six-year campaign to study changes to Antarctica’s sea ice, glaciers, and ice sheets. Using NASA’s 

DC-8 and other aircraft, Operation Ice Bridge will repeatedly study selected key targets that are most prone to change; provide essential data on changes in ice elevation; 

and help bridge the data gap until NASA’s Ice, Cloud, and Land Elevation Satellite-II 

is launched. The first Operation Ice Bridge airborne campaign over Greenland and 

the Arctic Ocean occurred earlier this year. Arctic flights will resume in spring 2010.

Aeronautics Research Mission Directorate

Research by NASA’s Aeronautics Research Mission Directorate (ARMD) continued to contribute directly to aeronautics breakthroughs for the benefit of the 

broad aeronautics community and in support of NASA’s goals for both human 

and robotic space exploration. ARMD oversees long-term, cutting-edge fundamental research in traditional and emerging disciplines for the purpose of generating 

innovative concepts, tools, and technologies that enable revolutionary advances in 

future aircraft and the airspace in which they will fly. Our world-class capability is 

built on a tradition of expertise in aeronautical engineering and its core research 

areas, including aerodynamics, aeroacoustics, materials and structures, propulsion, 

dynamics and control, sensor and actuator technologies, advanced computational 

and mathematical techniques, and experimental measurement techniques.

ARMD’s robust research portfolio addressed the challenges of transforming our 

Nation’s air transportation system to meet growing capacity needs and also supported the Agency’s space exploration vision.

ARMD’s research in FY 09 included the following:

• 

• 

Research that supports the Next Generation Air Transportation System 

(NextGen).

Research in key areas related to the development of advanced aircraft 

technologies and systems, including those related to aircraft safety, environmental compatibility, and fuel efficiency.
26 • Foundational research across a number of core competencies that supports 

aeronautics and space exploration activities.

ARMD continued a robust fundamental research program well aligned with 

the principles, goals, and objectives of the National Aeronautics Research and 

Development (R&D) Policy and directly supported the development of NextGen. 

ARMD research focused on improving airspace capacity and mobility and improving aviation safety and aircraft performance while reducing noise, emissions, and 

fuel burn. Additionally, ARMD focused on five strategic objectives.

(1) Conduct high-quality, cutting-edge research that benefits the constituents 

of the entire aeronautics community.

(2) Openly disseminate the results of all research to the widest practical and 

appropriate extent, consistent with national security and foreign policy, 

through archival publications (such as books, technical papers, technical 

memoranda, and peer-reviewed journal articles), conference proceedings, 

and NASA publications.

(3) Pursue a coordinated approach to managing the Nation’s research, development, test, and evaluation (RDT&E) infrastructure. For example, ARMD’s 

continued cooperation with the Department of Defense (DOD) through 

the National Partnership for Aeronautical Testing resulted in the development of guiding principles for determining priorities and consistent pricing.

(4) Foster intellectual partnerships with industry and academia by means of 

comprehensive acquisition methods including SAAs and the NASA 

Research Announcement (NRA) that allows full and open competitive 

research awards. ARMD had 385 total NRA research efforts in FY 09, 

funded at over $70 million. Of these, nine NRAs were new efforts initiated 

in FY 09, representing $5.3 million. ARMD has 78 SAAs in place across 

all programs.

(5) Continue strong partnerships with other Government agencies and organizations, especially the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA), Joint 

Program and Development Office (JPDO), and DOD. 

As a member agency of the JPDO, NASA, along with its partner agencies, 

continued to plan and coordinate the development of the Next Generation Air 

Transportation System (NextGen). The NextGen portfolio includes large-scale 
investments, research, and operational changes that will profoundly impact the 27

capabilities of the Nation’s air transportation system. This includes developments 

in air traffic control, airspace management, satellite-based navigation, security 

(both at the airport and in the air), digital communications, net-centric operations, 

and changes in the way aviation weather information is gathered and disseminated 

throughout the system. In addition, NextGen offers a new approach to managing 

the environmental impact of aviation. For example, several air traffic procedures 

currently in use provide more efficient aircraft trajectories that reduce the amount 

of fuel aircraft burn during flight. These directly reduce emissions and noise. 

Over the longer term, gains provided by satellite-based navigation systems will offer 

more efficient routes that reduce the amount of time aircraft spend in flight. Other 

research undertaken by NASA included engine systems and aircraft designs that 

will lead to a substantial reduction in fuel burn and pollutant emissions.

In FY 09, ARMD executed a robust research portfolio that addressed challenges 

of the future air transportation system, including expanding capacity needs, environmental issues, efficiency, safety, and mobility challenges. As a major highlight 

illustrating this progress, NASA researchers, in collaboration with San Jose State 

University, Perot Systems and the FAA, successfully completed a series of humanin-the-loop experiments that explored advanced concepts and technology for 

separation assurance—safe separation between aircraft, a key research need for 

NextGen. Such technology is critical to relieving air traffic controller workload, 

a primary constraint on airspace capacity. By automating fundamental air traffic 

control functions, such as conflict detection and resolution, researchers believe 

that automation could manage separation. These experiments, which involved 

six professional controllers and 20 professional pilots, examined the performance 

of controllers, pilots, and separation-assurance automation during nominal and 

dramatically increased (doubled and tripled) traffic demand through a complex 

airspace sector in the FAA’s Indianapolis Air Route Traffic Control Center. 

Researchers provided varying levels of automation support to the controller and 

pilot subjects, including automated conflict detection, automated strategic conflict 

resolution, and automated tactical conflict resolution. The test scenarios included 

routine operations and off-nominal situations such as data communication failures 

and aircraft blunders toward proximate traffic.
28 Initial results showed that even under conditions of heavier-than-normal simulated air traffic, using automated separation-assurance technology resolved more 

than 99 percent of potential traffic conflicts without substantially increasing controller workloads. While further investigation will validate the underlying technology and procedures, such concepts hold the promise of dramatically increasing the 

capacity of our air transportation system, thereby facilitating the economic growth 

that comes with improved mobility of people and goods about the country.

The following sections describe additional technical accomplishments of the 

ARMD programs during FY 09.

Fundamental Aeronautics Program

The goal of the Fundamental Aeronautics Program is to conduct cutting-edge 

research that will produce innovative concepts, tools, and technologies to enable 

revolutionary changes for air vehicles that fly in all speed regimes. The Program 

focused on achieving technological capabilities necessary to overcome national 

challenges in air transportation including reduced noise, emissions, and fuel consumption; increased mobility through a faster means of transportation; and the 

ability to ascend/descend through planetary atmospheres. These technological 

capabilities will enable design solutions for the performance and environmental 

challenges of future air vehicles. The Program developed technological capabilities 

that range from basic knowledge of underlying physical phenomena to the understanding of system-level interactions. The Program also had significant emphasis 

on the development of tools for advanced multidisciplinary design and analysis 

capabilities to realize integrated technology advances in future aircraft and to 

guide its research and technology investments.

The Program structure was organized by flight regime and encompassed research 

in the four areas of Subsonic Fixed Wing, Subsonic Rotary Wing, Supersonics, and 

Hypersonics. The Subsonic Fixed Wing project addressed the challenge of making 

future aircraft quieter and cleaner to meet stringent noise and emissions requirements resulting from the expected growth in the air transportation system (two to 

three times higher capacity by 2025). These aircraft must also meet challenging 

performance requirements to provide greater efficiency with reduced fuel burn. 

The Subsonic Rotary Wing project addressed the technical barriers that constrain 
rotorcraft from reaching widespread use in civil aviation. These barriers include 29

improved range, speed, payload capacity, fuel efficiency, and environmental acceptance. The unique ability of rotorcraft to operate independent of a runway could 

greatly expand access to air travel. The Supersonics project conducted research 

to address the efficiency, environmental, and performance barriers that prevent 

practical supersonic cruising over land. The Hypersonics project focused on airbreathing technologies for the first stage of a highly reusable two-stage-to-orbit 

launch system. It also researched technologies for hypersonic entry and descent 

of very heavy payloads into planetary atmospheres to enable a high-mass Mars 

entry system.

The following examples illustrate significant accomplishments of each project. 

The Subsonic Fixed Wing project, in partnership with several other Government 

agencies, industry, and academia, completed an alternative fuels experiment in 

which a 100 percent Fischer-Tropsch synthetic fuel was tested as well as a 50/50 

blend of the synthetic fuel and conventional jet fuel. The experiment evaluated the 

effect of the fuels on aircraft emissions and emissions chemistry. Results indicated 

that the fuels reduced the particulates and aerosols in the emissions. However, 

some engine seal leakage occurred with use of the 100 percent synthetic fuel. The 

project also completed a database of alternative fuels and fuel blends, including 

their standard properties.

The Subsonic Rotary Wing project, in partnership with the Army and industry, tested an Individual Blade Control (IBC) main rotor to assess the potential 

improvement in rotor performance and reduction in vibration and noise. The 

Individual Blade Control dynamic actuators allowed ±3 degrees of blade pitch to be 

input to each blade at up to 7 per revolution frequency. Preliminary results from the 

test showed a reduction in power and an increase in lift-to-drag as well as reduced 

in-plane noise and multi-parameter hub loads. Additionally, the project tested a 

variable speed transmission and obtained data for comparison with computational 

modeling of the system. Results indicated that the computational predictions for 

the operational parameters are within 10 percent of the measured parameters. Such 

validated computational modeling capabilities will help enable the future design of 

quieter, more efficient rotorcraft with propulsion/rotor systems capable of optimized 

rotational speeds for hover and forward flight.
30 The Supersonics project completed a number of activities that contributed to 

the development of new capabilities to design and analyze supersonic vehicles that 

achieve high fuel efficiency with low sonic boom. New adjoint-equation-based 

fuselage-wing shaping tools were developed from existing computational methods 

that were validated against wind tunnel data. Knowledge-based design tools for 

fuselage and engine nacelle shaping to reduce boom or drag levels were either developed or improved. A new computational and experimental study of the effects of 

engine exhaust plume on sonic boom and efficiency was completed. An initial multifidelity design system for the conceptual design of supersonic aircraft incorporating 

jet plume effects and sonic boom target optimization was made operational. Further 

data on sonic boom, lift, and nozzle effects were gathered using the F-15 research 

aircraft and large-wing tunnel facilities. Each of these accomplishments will enable 

future design and development of supersonic vehicles with high efficiency and low 

sonic boom.

The Hypersonics project completed the Inflatable Reentry Vehicle Experiment 

(IRVE-2) for Mach 6 atmospheric reentry. This successful experiment demonstrated flexible thermal protection system technology for support of high-mass 

planetary atmospheric entry. Additionally, the project completed the development of a secure, Web-based collaborative environment for the carbon matrix 

composite (CMC) user community. This advanced material is critical for future 

hypersonic air vehicle designs that are able to withstand 3,000°F. The Web-based 

collaborative environment, for use by researchers and engineers within NASA, 

other Government agencies, industry, and academia, fosters an online dissemination of engineering methodologies for fabrication, analysis, and design of ceramic 

composite materials and components. It also provides access to a material property 

database for a number of material systems.

Fundamental Aeronautics Program personnel presented their technical plans 

and research results in numerous forums and technical conferences in FY  09. 

These forums and conferences included meetings held collaboratively with other 

Government agencies and technical conferences sponsored by a variety of technical societies, including the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics 

(AIAA), the American Society of Mechanical Engineers (ASME), and the 

American Helicopter Society (AHS). Program research teams were recognized for 
their contributions to advancing the technology state of the art, including receiv- 31

ing the AHS Howard Hughes Award for outstanding improvement in fundamental 

helicopter technology. Fundamental Aeronautics researchers were awarded several 

patents and were selected by their peers to join the ranks of Fellow and Associate 

Fellow in various technical societies.

Aviation Safety Program

The Aviation Safety Program built upon the unique safety-related research capabilities of NASA to develop innovative algorithms, tools, concepts, and technologies that will improve the intrinsic safety attributes of current and future aircraft 

and overcome aircraft safety technological barriers that would otherwise constrain 

the full realization of NextGen.

The Aviation Safety Program consisted of four projects. The Aircraft Aging and 

Durability (AAD) Project addressed the challenge of improving the operational 

resiliency of future aircraft structures and advanced materials against aging-related 

hazards. The Integrated Intelligent Flight Deck (IIFD) Project conducted research 

to ensure the proper integration of the human operator in a highly automated 

and complex operational environment. The Integrated Resilient Aircraft Control 

(IRAC) Project sought to prevent loss-of-control incidents through better modeling of upset flight conditions (from a variety of causes, including icing and structural degradation) and adaptive control methods. The Integrated Vehicle Health 

Management (IVHM) Project addressed the challenge of using a prognostic 

approach to vehicle health management, in particular the integration, processing, 

and effective use of large amounts of data across highly integrated and complex 

flight-critical systems.

During FY 09, the AAD Project developed a process to increase the capability for 

superalloy turbine engine disks to run at higher temperatures than previous state-ofthe-art designs while maintaining required high stress and cycle life. This process will 

allow safe, durable operations under the conditions required for future engine designs. 

The final spin test to validate the performance will be conducted during FY 10.

The IIFD Project assessed multi-modal presentation formats and interaction methods for uncertainty display concepts and virtual visual environments. 

Simulations demonstrated statistically significant reductions in communication 
32 errors, mental workload, and flight technical error, as well as increases in usability 

and situation awareness. These factors were measured using multi-modal presentation formats and interaction methods in NextGen terminal area operations as 

compared to a baseline of current flightdeck systems in current air traffic terminal 

area operations.

The IRAC Project developed and evaluated concepts for online integrity monitoring for adaptive control systems through simulation tests. Simulation results 

demonstrated that failure of the adaptive control can be detected at least 99 percent of the time with lower than one percent false positive rate. In developing 

adaptive control systems, it is critical that safeguards must be put in place to prevent the automation itself from being the cause of new unforeseen failures.

The IVHM Project developed an innovative methodology for on-board estimation of aircraft engine performance parameters. Simulation results demonstrated 

that this technique provides improved performance estimation results, significantly 

exceeding the 10 percent estimation accuracy improvement metric. Real-time onboard models such as these can be directly utilized by prognostics and health management applications to improve aircraft safety.

Researchers for the Aviation Safety Program presented nearly 300 conference 

papers in FY 09 and published over 100 peer-reviewed journal papers and books. In 

addition, Program researchers filed 14 invention disclosures. As a result of work done 

under the Program, the Agency signed 34 software licenses and usage agreements.

Airspace Systems Program

The Airspace Systems Program directly addressed air traffic management needs 

of increasing capacity and efficiency of NextGen. The Program consisted of two 

projects, NextGen-Airspace and NextGen-Airportal. Each project made major 

contributions to air traffic needs of the future through the development of concepts 

and technologies for en route, transitional, terminal, and surface operations. Both 

projects remain highly integrated through close attention to information management at critical transition interfaces in the national airspace system.

The NextGen-Airspace Project conducted a number of simulations, demonstrations, and analyses to examine concepts and technologies aimed at enhancing 

air traffic operations in en route and approach airspace. Researchers successfully 
completed a study of trajectory analysis for service provider–based (i.e., the FAA is 33

the service provider) automated separation assurance with time-based metering (i.e., 

separation based on time, not distance, between aircraft). The study was conducted 

at increased traffic levels without any reduction of baseline metering accuracy or separation violations. The objective was to simultaneously consider conflict resolution 

algorithms and time-based constraints while providing safe separation. Researchers 

developed, validated, and implemented algorithms for an integrated solution and 

conducted initial real-time, high-fidelity evaluations. The results indicated that the 

integrated separation assurance/time-based metering system outperformed its standalone separation assurance predecessor, with integrated success rates of 94.5 percent 

and 89.4 percent at current traffic and doubled traffic respectively.

An evaluation of traffic flow management capability, developed by an NRA 

award recipient and in conjunction with the FAA, was shown to reduce arrival 

delays at San Francisco International Airport through improved scheduling using 

fog dissipation probabilities and predictions and advanced optimization algorithms. 

A collaborative field test at the FAA Air Traffic Control System Command Center 

to assess the benefits at San Francisco International Airport is planned for 2010.

The NextGen-Airportal Project developed and validated algorithms, concepts, 

and technologies to increase throughput of the runway complex and achieve high 

efficiency in the use of airport resources, such as gates, taxiways, runways, and final 

approach airspace. Aircraft movement on the airport surface is highly constrained 

and subject to high degrees of scheduling uncertainty, which makes planning difficult for controllers. In addition, inefficient taxi operations, such as long departure 

queues, result in excess fuel burn and adverse environmental impact. During FY 09, 

the Project developed algorithms to generate robust, optimized solutions for surface 

traffic planning and control, as well as an environmental planner to consider constraints in the optimization process. The evaluations included scenarios for both 

nominal and off-nominal conditions under increased airport traffic density and 

considered environmental constraints and aircraft operator schedule preferences. 

The results indicated that an optimization process for surface traffic movement can 

reduce taxi-time and engine-on time relative to current-day operational procedures. 

Savings of about 19 percent in fuel burn for simulated, optimized taxi operations 

were realized with increased traffic density of 1.5 times current day levels.
34 NASA and the FAA also continued to collaborate on the four Research 

Transition Teams (RTTs) to accelerate concepts and technology to further maturity. 

These RTTs include Efficient Flow into Congested Airspace (EFICA), Dynamic 

Airspace Configuration (DAC), Flow-Based Trajectory Management (FBTM), and 

Integrated Arrivals/Departures/Surface Management (IADS). The goal of the RTTs 

is to ensure that research and development needed for NextGen implementation are 

identified, conducted, and effectively transitioned to the implementing agency. In 

FY 09, each RTT developed a Plan for Implementing the Common Vision, identifying 

distinct Research Transition Products (RTPs), along with descriptions of NASAprovided elements, NASA research milestones, maturity, transition date, and the 

FAA intended use. In addition to the planning, NASA and the FAA collaborated 

on a number of development activities as part of the RTTs. For the EFICA RTT, 

NASA conducted a Human-in-the-Loop (HITL) 3D-Path Arrival Management 

(3D-PAM) field trial at the Denver Air Route Traffic Control Center. This assessed 

real-world descent trajectory uncertainty during arrival phase of flight. For the DAC 

RTT, NASA produced a white paper on the corridors-in-the-sky concept, identified 

research issues and further studies, and completed a Human-in-the-Loop simulation on Adaptable Airspace. On the FBTM RTT, NASA and the FAA conducted 

a simulation to examine capabilities, roles and responsibilities; communication 

and coordination; and information and decision support tool needs for trajectory 

management. For the Integrated Arrival/Departure/Surface RTT, NASA developed 

an approach for joint FAA/NASA testbed activities and the integration of NASA 

North-Texas Research Station (NTX) facility with FAA testbeds.

Researchers for the Airspace Systems Program published over 171 conference 

papers in FY 09, 35 of which were peer-reviewed and five of which received Best 

Paper awards at conferences sponsored by the AIAA, the USA/Europe Seminar 

on Air Traffic Management Research and Development, and Digital Avionics 

Systems. In addition, researchers published 14 NASA Technical Memorandums/

Technical Reports/Contractor Reports.

Aeronautics Test Program

The Aeronautics Test Program (ATP) ensures the continuous availability of a 

portfolio of NASA-owned ground and flight test capabilities, which are strategically 
important to meeting national aerospace program goals and requirements. Within 35

ATP, the Aeronautics Ground Test Facilities Project provides facility operations 

support to ensure facility and staff availability and user price stability; facility 

maintenance and upgrades to address known deficiencies in facility safety, reliability, and productivity; facility test technology to develop and implement new 

and improved test capability, improve productivity and efficiency, and improve 

data quality; and facility-related research to involve universities with experimental 

work. The Flight Operations and Test Infrastructure Project provides the Western 

Aeronautical Test Range, support aircraft, testbed aircraft, and the Simulation and 

Flight Loads Laboratories, which together provide and support flight testing and are 

managed to ensure safety, rate stability, reliability, productivity, and improvement.

In its first three years, the ATP was intentionally tactical in nature, and investments were focused on stabilizing aeronautics test facility conditions, charge 

rates, and workforce competency. In FY 09, the ATP completed the development 

of a new strategic plan that contained three thrusts: (1) provide the vision and 

leadership required to meet national goals; (2) provide sustained support for workforce, capability improvements, test technology development, and maintenance; 

and (3) provide strategic planning, management, and coordination with NASA, 

Government, and industry stakeholders.

In FY 09, the ATP implemented an investment fund to provide for the recapitalization of flight operations and test infrastructure and to establish a clear pricing 

structure and charging policy for flight test operations support to assist customers 

in their test planning.

The ATP strengthened collaborations through the National Partnership 

for Aeronautical Testing (NPAT) and the Interagency Infrastructure Working 

Group (IIWG). The ATP, through the NPAT, implemented the National Force 

Measurement Technology Capability (NFMTC), a multi-year project to address 

gaps in state-of-the-art strain gage balance capability. In collaboration with the 

Air Force, the ATP instituted the Hypersonic Propulsion Integrated Test Team 

to address national hypersonic testing requirements. This group was active in the 

decision by the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) to determine which tunnel offered the best capability to conduct turbine-based combined 

cycle transition testing. In collaboration with the Air Force, the ATP instituted 
36 the Test Technology Collaboration Action Team to address national test technology requirements and to develop a national investment strategy. The ATP 

also utilized the collaborative power of NPAT to transfer Navy testing from the 

30 by 60 Foot Full-Scale Tunnel to the strategically important National Full-Scale 

Aerodynamics Complex.

In collaboration with the NPAT, the ATP completed an assessment of the 

Nation’s supersonic wind tunnel capabilities. This identified the wind tunnels that 

are critical to the Nation and will therefore require continued investment. The 

ATP and NPAT also initiated an assessment of the Nation’s hypersonic wind tunnel capabilities.

ATP personnel authored numerous papers. Chief among these was a National 

Force Measurement Technology Capability–related paper coauthored by personnel 

from the Air Force and presented at the 2009 American Institute of Aeronautics 

and Astronautics Conference.

Partnerships with Government and Industry

NASA strives to be in the leadership position for fundamental research required 

to solve aeronautics challenges. In part, NASA accomplished this goal through 

close and strong partnerships with industry, academia, and other Government 

agencies in order to maximize the research capabilities of the Nation.

Because these partnerships are so important, NASA put many mechanisms in 

place to engage academia and industry, including industry working groups and 

technical interchange meetings at the program and project levels; SAAs for cooperative partnerships with industry; and the NRA process, which provides full and 

open competition for the best and most promising research ideas. Cooperative partnerships with industry consortia can result in a significant leveraging of resources 

for all partners and can provide opportunities to test the value of componenttechnology advances in full system-level contexts.

Additionally, ARMD continued its strong collaboration with the Department of 

Defense through NPAT and the ATP. In FY 09, that partnership included a series 

of tests using a shared model and test team in four national transonic wind tunnels 

(three NASA tunnels and one Air Force tunnel). The objectives were to compare 

the results from each facility using a common test matrix and to enable consistent 
practices among the national facilities through shared test processes, techniques, 37

and data reduction methods.

The ATP involved the NPAT in quarterly meetings to share information on 

testing rate structure and content, maintenance and capital investment activities, 

test facility schedules, and long-range planning. Collaborating through the NPAT 

enabled the ATP to develop a vision and funding plan that informs and reflects 

strategic and national testing priorities and direction.

Aeronautics Research Relevance and Benefits to the Public

NASA’s aeronautics research is focused on addressing national priorities, with the 

ultimate goal of enabling the transition of research results into use by Government 

and private-sector stakeholders. ARMD disseminates its research results to the widest practical and appropriate extent (consistent with foreign policy and national 

security) through a variety of mechanisms. One mechanism is partnerships with 

stakeholders on specific research activities that identify and demonstrate potential 

benefits to users. For example, in FY 09, Southwest Airlines (SWA) evaluated two 

data-mining software procedures acquired from a NASA open-source Web site. The 

Web site is maintained by the Aviation Safety Program and has over 300 members. 

Southwest Airlines used the software to automatically analyze flight data recorder 

output from 7,200 flights to seek operational improvements. The airlines found 

improved results compared to the results of their usual analysis methods. As a result, 

Southwest will incorporate the software tools into daily operations—monitoring 

1,600 flights per day on 305 aircraft to improve the quality of their flight operations.

In FY 09, collaborative field tests at the Denver Air Traffic Control Center were 

conducted with three aircraft types flown by Continental, United Airlines, and 

the FAA to simulate an improved NASA air traffic controller decision tool. A 

real-time operational demonstration will be conducted in December of 2010. The 

improved procedure guides aircraft to a precise location at a precise time to begin 

fuel-efficient descents to the runway. Due to the inability of current air traffic control procedures to accurately space aircraft at the start of descent, such descents are 

now possible only under light traffic conditions. NASA studies indicated that full 

use of fuel-efficient descents will result in fuel burn savings of 200 million gallons 

each year if fully implemented for all U.S. airports.
38 ARMD further fostered collaborative research partnerships in FY 09 with 

the academic and private-sector communities through the use of NRAs. NRAs 

provided avenues for new and innovative research ideas to be incorporated into 

NASA research programs while providing significant financial support to universities across the country. This process further encouraged awardees to spend time at 

NASA Centers in order to enhance the exchange of ideas and expand the learning 

experience for everyone involved.

In FY 09, ARMD funded several educational activities for primary- and 

secondary-level students to enhance basic science and math skills and to 

familiarize students with basic aeronautics concepts. NASA was a partner in 

the interactive Smart Skies program, a FlyBy MathTM set of distance, rate, and 

time investigations to engage students in grades five through nine in real-life 

applications of mathematics and science. Using the FlyBy MathTM curriculum 

materials, students learned to predict air traffic conflicts using distance, rate, and 

time relationships.

NASA also funded an adjunct activity to the Smart Skies called Math in Plane 

View, which is an online linked visualization tool that offers multiple dynamic 

representations designed to help students understand distance-rate-time relationships in the real-world context of air traffic control. A side-by-side layout enables 

students to observe and manipulate three views: planes on their routes, the corresponding distances versus time graph, and the equation of each line on the graph.

The Summer Opportunity in Aeronautics for High School Scholars (SOAR) 

program was a three-week summer aeronautics enrichment program for high school 

juniors and seniors; it was held at NASA Langley Research Center. SOAR engaged 

students across the United States in a science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) program focused on aeronautics to encourage their pursuit of various education disciplines critical to NASA’s future missions. The program featured 

interactive aeronautics activities, aeronautics design projects, flight simulation 

software, radio-controlled model aircraft demonstrations, model rocketry, scientific 

ballooning, and wind tunnel testing, among many other activities.

In FY 09, ARMD continued its second year in motivating and inspiring the nextgeneration workforce through the Aeronautics Scholarship Program, funding 20 

new two-year undergraduate and 5 three-year graduate scholarships. Scholarships 
included summer internships at NASA research centers to infuse well-trained and 39

motivated students into the research workforce to strengthen their interest in aviation and apply their academic learning to NASA research efforts.
.
41Fiscal Year 2009 Activities

DOD

In FY 09, the Department of Defense (DOD) was involved in a wide variety of 

complex and challenging space activities, ranging from support for our Nation’s global 

military operations and national civil space programs to development and fielding of 

new technologies and approaches to meet the Nation’s defense space needs.

DOD space systems supported military operations in Iraq, Afghanistan, and 

around the world. Numerous space assets provide crucial capabilities leveraged 

daily by today’s warfighter, including communications, navigation, environmental 

monitoring, and early warning of threats.

Throughout FY 09, DOD pursued improvements to these vital operational capabilities. The Ultra High Frequency Follow-on (UFO) satellite nearly doubled its 

available communication bandwidth through a modification of its operational mode 

to activate additional channels. A second Wideband Global SATCOM spacecraft 

was placed in orbit on April 3, 2009. In the arena of space-based missile warning, 

a new era began in August 2009 with the operational acceptance of the Space 

Based Infrared System (SBIRS) Highly Elliptical Orbit (HEO) system, consisting of 

two hosted payloads and associated ground systems. The SBIRS HEO-1 system was 

also certified for intelligence production use on August 27, 2009. The launch of the 

final GPS IIR satellite on August 17, 2009, further enhanced the Global Positioning 

System (GPS) constellation, providing navigation and timing globally.

Access to space continued to be a DOD priority in FY 09, with DOD systems 

and infrastructure providing support to military, civil, or commercial launches. 

The Evolved Expendable Launch Vehicle (EELV) program continued building its 

impressive track record by successfully placing five satellites in orbit during FY 09. 

These launches, conducted by the United Launch Alliance (ULA), supported 
42Aeronautics and Space Report of the President

missions for the DOD, the National Reconnaissance Office (NRO), and the 

National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA). In addition, the United 

Launch Alliance launched seven Delta II rockets in 2009. These included two civil 

launches (Kepler and NOAA’s N-prime spacecraft), two launches for the Missile 

Defense Agency’s Space Tracking and Surveillance Spacecraft (STSS) program, 

two GPS satellites, and the commercial launch of Italy’s third COSMO-SkyMed 

synthetic aperture radar (SAR) satellite. The DOD and NASA partnership to 

support Nation’s civil space program was evident as the U.S. Air Force operated 

space launch ranges that supported 11 NASA missions in FY 09: five Space Shuttle 

launches and six NASA unmanned spacecraft launches.

In February 2009, the collision of two non-DOD satellites, Iridium 33 and 

Cosmos 2251, generated over 1,500 pieces of new debris in space and alerted 

national attention to the fact that space is increasingly congested, contested, and 

competitive. In response, the DOD placed renewed emphasis on Space Situational 

Awareness (SSA) and Command and Control (C2) of our space forces in three 

primary areas. First, today’s SSA sensors are challenged by the rapid pace of change 

in the space domain. Existing sensors are physically unable to track small objects, 

have difficulty locating unexpected space objects, and are limited in their ability 

to discern space object activities. To fill this critical void, DOD is investing in new 

SSA sensors, both on the ground and in space, to include the Space Fence and the 

Space-Based Space Surveillance programs. Second, significant investment is being 

made in the Joint Space Operations Center (JSpOC) at Vandenberg Air Force 

Base, California, to integrate the new SSA sensors and provide the Nation with 

improved command and control of military space forces. Finally, as good stewards 

of the space environment, DOD is working with commercial and foreign entities 

to proactively prevent satellite collisions and enhance collision warning by making 

SSA data available.

The Department of Defense remained committed to improving the Nation’s 

means to develop, acquire, field, and employ space capabilities in shortened time-

frames and in more affordable ways. In FY 09, the Operationally Responsive Space 

(ORS) program continued to develop capabilities for rapid deployment of systems 

to support operational needs, with a focus on developing enabling technology and 
43Fiscal Year 2009 Activities

prototypes for mission capabilities. The ORS-l spacecraft is scheduled to launch at 

the end of calendar year 2010.

In conclusion, DOD remained committed to the National Security Space 

mission. FY 09 efforts ensured 24/7/365 support to warfighters around the world. 

Numerous military, civil, and commercial programs leveraged DOD launch facili-

ties and range support to deliver new satellite capabilities into orbit. FY 09 saw 

renewed focus to improve today’s operational capabilities, from SSA to ORS, to 

ensure that the U.S. continues to enjoy the unique advantages of space. Sharing 

DOD capabilities, from the GPS signal utilized at no cost by millions around the 

world to enhanced SSA data sharing, demonstrated the continued commitment to 

maximize the military, civil, and commercial utility of the National Security Space 

mission. As always, the DOD remains fully committed to ensuring the United 

States remains the world’s premier spacefaring Nation.
.
45Fiscal Year 2009 Activities

federal aviaTion

adminisTraTion

FAA

In 2009, the Federal Aviation Administration continued to lay the groundwork 

for the Next Generation Air Transportation System known as NextGen. NextGen 

is a wide-ranging transformation of the entire National Airspace System (NAS) 

to meet future demand and support the economic viability of the system while 

reducing delays, improving safety, and protecting the environment. It is a complex, 

multilayered, evolutionary process of developing and implementing new aviation 

technologies and procedures. NextGen is not a single piece of equipment or a program or a system that will instantaneously transform the NAS. It is an evolutionary process, and existing systems must be sustained in the transition. NextGen 

builds on legacy systems to increase capability in today’s airspace system, adds new 

performance-based procedures and routes, and, ultimately, delivers programs that 

will transform the NAS.

The FAA’s development activities on the Aviation Environmental Design Tool 

(AEDT) continued in a more integrated fashion toward accurately quantifying the 

interdependent aspects of aircraft fuel burn, noise, and emissions. In early 2009, 

a first alpha version of AEDT was produced for NASA’s analyses; this version not 

only was an important development milestone for AEDT but also provided seamless integration with NASA’s Airspace Conflict Evaluation Simulator (ACES) tool 

and the FAA’s airspace and airport simulation tool (SIMMOD). Both are cornerstone planning tools for NextGen. A prototype version of the FAA’s Terminal Area 

Route Generation, Evaluation, and Traffic Simulation (TARGETS) integrated with 

AEDT environmental capabilities was successfully developed as a proof of concept. 
46Aeronautics and Space Report of the President

This critical integration will allow for new navigational procedures to be designed 

while taking into consideration the effects of noise, fuel burn, and emissions.

In 2009, FAA researchers at the William J. Hughes Technical Center made 

advances on the Future En Route Workstation (FEWS) interface to support 

controller management of increased traffic levels. In FEWS III, researchers made 

additional modifications to the workstation simulation to support the use of Area 

Navigation (RNAV), self-spacing, and aircraft grouping procedures. The simulation 

assumed Automatic Dependent Surveillance-Broadcast (ADS-B) capabilities and 

used three-mile lateral separation standards in all conditions. Scenarios included 

very high (two to three times current) traffic levels in which 70 percent of the 

aircraft were equipped with Data Communications. Weather was also a factor in 

some conditions. Eleven controllers from five en route facilities participated in the 

simulation. They used two systems to evaluate the concepts: a baseline system sim-

ulating the En Route Automation Modernization (ERAM) system and the FEWS 

system. Results showed that controllers managed more aircraft and reported lower 

workload when using the FEWS system than when using the baseline system.

Laptop computers and other battery-powered electronic devices can pose 

a significant fire hazard when carried aboard passenger aircraft. In 2009, the 

FAA, in conjunction with the airline industry, embarked on a series of tests to 

determine the optimum procedure for fighting a laptop computer fire on board 

an aircraft. Halon 1211, the typical fire extinguisher installed in passenger air-

craft, was effective in extinguishing the burning electrolyte but did not prevent 

adjacent cells from going into thermal runaway and catching on fire. It was 

determined that water was the most effective agent in cooling the remaining 

cells and stopping the chain reaction. A training video, developed by the Fire 

Safety Team, illustrated effective and practical methods to extinguish a cabin 

fire involving lithium batteries in a laptop computer. The video, “Extinguishing 

In-Flight Laptop Computer Fires,” may be viewed at the Fire Safety Team Web site: 

http://www.fire.tc.faa.gov/2007Conference/session_details.asp?sessionID=26.

NextGen will use Cockpit Display of Traffic Information (CDTI), ADS-B, and 

other new technologies and procedures to enable the delegation of some tradi-

tional air traffic control (ATC) tasks to the cockpit. But to take advantage of 

these advances, aircraft must first be appropriately equipped, and no single design 
47Fiscal Year 2009 Activities

supports the broad array of envisioned delegations. In 2009, researchers for the 

Center for Advanced Aviation System Development (CAASD) completed the 

development of a prototype multipurpose CDTI. The prototype development process included both the necessary algorithmic processing and the user interface 

and allowed CAASD researchers to conclude that multipurpose CDTI is feasible. 

Pilots were asked to use the CDTI in a number of scenarios that involved air-to-air 

ADS-B applications in most operating domains. Pilots received minimal training 

on the features of the display and yet were able to operate it effectively. Further 

research will be conducted in 2010.

In September 2009, the international standards organization ASTM 

International approved D7566, specification for synthetic aviation fuel, allowing 

the use of a semi-synthetic aviation fuel produced from the Fischer-Tropsch (FT) 

processes in commercial airliners. These fuels are referred to as FT fuels. The 

Commercial Aviation Alternative Fuel Initiative (CAAFI), a coalition of airlines, 

aircraft and engine manufacturers, energy producers, researchers, international 

participants, and U.S. Government agencies, played a key leadership role in achieving this major milestone to introduce alternative aviation fuels. Under CAAFI’s 

coordination, aviation fuel industry stakeholders worked at an unprecedented 

pace to achieve the consensus necessary to publish this groundbreaking specification. CAAFI stakeholders also took key steps to advance the acceptance and 

understanding of alternative aviation fuels produced from biomass by conducting 

three flight demonstrations on commercial airliners between December 2008 and 

January 2009. The demonstration flights exemplified the technological readiness 

of renewable bio-jet fuels and contributed greatly to the public acceptance of these 

fuels for use in aviation. Important technical data were also generated to be used 

for the eventual industry qualification of these types of fuels. Other new types 

of alternative fuels, such as fuels produced from algae or cellulosic material, will 

be added to D7566 as they are qualified by the industry working group. For more 

information, visit http://www.caafi.org.

The FAA’s Office of Commercial Space Transportation (AST) licenses and 

regulates U.S. commercial space launch and reentry activities and the operation of 

non-Federal launch and reentry sites to protect public health and safety, safety of 

property, and national security and foreign policy interests of the United States. In 
48Aeronautics and Space Report of the President

addition, AST encourages, facilitates, and promotes U.S. commercial space trans-

portation by the private sector.

In 2009, AST licensed 4 orbital commercial space launches, conducted 24 safety 

inspections, and issued 5 experimental permit launches. Continuing the safety 

record of past years, FY 09 saw no injury to the public or damage to public property 

from any commercial launch.

The four orbital commercial space launches the FAA licensed in 2009 were a 

Delta II launch from Vandenberg Air Force Base (AFB) in California; a Delta IV 

launch from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida; the first Falcon 1 launch 

to carry a commercial payload, by Space Exploration Technologies Corporation 

(SpaceX) from the Ronald Reagan Ballistic Missile Test Site at Kwajalein Atoll in 

the Marshall Islands; and a Zenit 3SL launched by the Sea Launch multinational 

partnership from a mobile platform in the Pacific Ocean.

The five launches covered by experimental permits included three flights by 

the MOD-1 vehicle operated by Armadillo Aerospace, one flight of the Armadillo 

QUAD vehicle, and one by the Ignignokt vehicle operated by TrueZer0. These 

permit flights were part of the Northrop Grumman Lunar Lander Challenge com-

petition in Las Cruces, New Mexico.

AST conducted 24 safety inspections on over 14 different types of licensed and 

permitted activities. The goal of every AST safety inspection is to ensure public 

safety by verifying FAA licensee and permittee compliance with FAA regulations 

and license/permit terms and conditions. Inspectors traveled to various locations 

including Cape Canaveral, Florida; Vandenberg Air Force Base, California; Mojave, 

California; Kodiak, Alaska; Wallops Flight Facility, Virginia; the Republic of the 

Marshall Islands; and the equator in the Pacific Ocean for sea launch operations.

As part of its licensing responsibilities, AST developed and issued the Final 

Environmental Impact Statement and Record of Decision for the Spaceport 

America Commercial Launch Site in Sierra County, New Mexico, and the Final 

Environmental Assessment and Finding of No Significant Impact for Jacksonville 

Aviation Authority Launch Site Operator License at Cecil Field, Florida. AST 

issued a launch license renewal for Orbital Sciences Corporation’s Pegasus airlaunched vehicle operating from the Reagan Test Site at Kwajalein. A launch site 

operator license renewal was issued to East Kern Airport District for the operation 
of Mojave Airport as a launch site in California, and a new launch site operator 49

license was issued to the New Mexico Spaceport Authority to operate a launch site 

at Spaceport America in New Mexico.

Several research and development projects were completed in FY 09, including a high-altitude wind prediction and measurement technology assessment, a 

study of the impact on suborbital rocket trajectories by temporal winds at three 

inland launch sites, and a study of potential impacts from reusable launch vehicle 

operations in the NAS. The last study was conducted in the interest of the FAA’s 

NextGen program.

AST continued to provide real-time support to NASA during Shuttle reentries, 

using its Shuttle Hazard Area to Aircraft Calculator (SHAAC) tool. This tool 

predicts and identifies the extent of the airspace that could contain falling debris 

hazardous to aircraft in the event of a Space Shuttle orbiter failure on reentry, such 

as the failure of Columbia in 2003.

In partnership with NASA, AST continued its support of the selection process of Commercial Resupply Services missions to supply cargo launch and return 

services for the International Space Station (ISS). This resulted in NASA awarding ISS CRS contracts to both SpaceX and Orbital Sciences Corporation. These 

commercial space launches will be licensed by the FAA. AST participated in 

the NASA ISS CRS initial contracts meetings with both contractors and in the 

Vehicle Baseline Review with SpaceX. AST supported the selection process for the 

Commercial Crew Development (CCDev) competition that was initiated and led 

by NASA to develop system concepts and capabilities that could ultimately lead 

to the availability of commercial human spaceflight services. AST continued to 

support the NASA review meetings for the Commercial Orbital Transportation 

Services (COTS) Demonstrations missions. AST also participated in activities 

on the NASA-led Commercial Crew Implementation Team and Human Rating 

Requirements Team.

Several informative reports of interest to the public, the space industry, and the 

U.S. Government were released by AST. An Analysis of Human Spaceflight Safety 

was completed in response to Congressional request. Other reports included State 

Support for Commercial Space Activities, Space Weather Biological and System Effects 

for Suborbital Flights, and Support Services for Commercial Space Transportation. Two 
50 detailed technical reports were published: Hazard Analysis of Complex Systems: A 

New Method for Hazard Analysis of Rocket Vehicles and Graphical Cockpit-Based 

Depictions of Space Vehicle Operations Based upon Use of Aeronautical Information 

Data Link Services.

AST continued to issue annual revisions of several reports, including Research 

and Development Accomplishments, 2009; U.S. Commercial Space Transportation 

Developments and Concepts: Vehicles, Technologies, and Spaceports; Quarterly 

Launch Reports; Commercial Space Transportation: 2008 Year in Review; and the 

2009 Commercial Space Transportation Forecasts. The forecasts, prepared by the 

industry-led Commercial Space Transportation Advisory Committee and the 

FAA, projected an average worldwide demand of about 16 launches per year to geosynchronous orbit and 11 launches per year to non-geosynchronous orbits between 

2009 and 2018.

Information about the Office of Commercial Space Transportation, regulations, 

reports, and other documents can be found at http://ast.faa.gov.
51Fiscal Year 2009 Activities

deparTmenT of CommerCe

DOC

In FY 09, the Department of Commerce (DOC) continued to play a key role 

on the National Executive Committee for Space-Based Positioning, Navigation, 

and Timing (PNT)—the senior body that advises and coordinates Federal 

departments and agencies on matters concerning the Global Positioning System 

(GPS) and related systems. The Department hosted the meetings of the National 

Executive Committee and its Executive Steering Group. The Department provided 

resources and personnel in support of the committee’s secretariat, the National 

Coordination Office for Space-Based PNT. The Department also assisted the 

National Coordination Office in organizing outreach events and efforts to educate 

the public about GPS. These included various conferences and speaking engagements, funding for a new science exhibit called “GPS Adventures Arkansas,” two 

new trade show booths, a new newsletter, and upgrades to the PNT.gov Web site.

DOC’s Office of Space Commercialization (OSC) participated in governmentto-government consultations with Europe and Japan concerning cooperation in 

the area of satellite navigation. OSC continued to serve as the U.S. cochair of the 

U.S.-European working group on trade issues related to GPS and Europe’s Galileo 

system. OSC also assisted the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative (USTR) 

in completing a report to Congress regarding U.S. equipment industry access to 

Galileo markets and Europe’s compliance with the trade provisions in the GPSGalileo Agreement of 2004.

OSC coordinated the successful implementation of a 2008 Memorandum of 

Agreement between the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration 

(NOAA) and the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA), allowing JAXA 

to install a ground station for Japan’s Quasi-Zenith Satellite System (QZSS) at 
52Aeronautics and Space Report of the President

a NOAA facility in Guam. JAXA and NOAA held a ribbon-cutting ceremony 

for the completed ground station in FY 09. The Quasi-Zenith Satellite System is 

designed to be highly compatible and interoperable with GPS for enhanced coverage over Japan.

National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration

Within NOAA, space-related activities occurred across the entire organization. 

During the 2009 Atlantic hurricane season, NOAA’s GOES system provided a 

continuous flow of imagery that contributed significantly to the development of 

storm forecasts. These forecasts helped minimize the loss of life in the United 

States. GOES satellites provided space weather monitoring for the NOAA Space 

Weather Prediction Center to issue forecasts and warnings that protected space-

craft and power grids.

NOAA’s GOES and Polar-orbiting Operational Environmental Satellite (POES) 

system continued to provide an uninterrupted flow of global environmental information to support weather, ocean, and space environmental modeling, as well as 

tropical storm analysis and forecasting, local weather forecasting, and ecosystem 

and climate monitoring. NOAA’s weather and climate prediction numerical models 

used the global data from these satellites extensively.

NOAA provided forecast support for NASA Space Shuttle missions before 

launching, during flight, and during landing.

NOAA-N Prime successfully launched on Friday, February 6, 2009, from the 

Vandenberg Air Force Base in California aboard a Delta-II rocket. This new 

NOAA polar-orbiting operational environmental satellite circles the globe every 

102 minutes, taking images and measurements to support NOAA’s efforts to fore-

cast and monitor the environment. NOAA-N Prime, renamed NOAA-19 after 

reaching orbit, joined Metop-A, a European satellite, as the operational satellites 

in polar orbit that NOAA used in its forecasts. Data from NOAA-19 supported sev-

eral NOAA programs, including weather analysis and forecasting, climate research 

and prediction, global sea surface temperature measurements, atmospheric sound-

ings of temperature and humidity, ocean dynamics research, volcanic eruption 

monitoring, forest fire detection, global vegetation analysis, and search and rescue 
53Fiscal Year 2009 Activities

operations. NOAA-19 data helped NOAA monitor conditions in the atmosphere 

and oceans and keep tabs on long-term climate trends. These data are increasingly important in polar regions, given the potential effects of climate change on 

the polar ice cap and sea ice extent. NOAA’s National Environmental Satellite, 

Data, and Information Service (NESDIS) worked closely with the European 

Organization for the Exploitation of Meteorological Satellites (EUMETSAT) 

to ensure seamless polar-orbiting satellite coverage. Under an agreement, two of 

NOAA’s polar-orbiting satellites—NOAA-18 and NOAA-19, both in afternoon 

orbits—carried a EUMETSAT instrument. In return, EUMETSAT carried key 

NOAA instruments on board its first of three Metop satellites, Metop-A, which 

launched into a morning orbit.

The GOES-O spacecraft successfully launched and reached orbit on Saturday, 

June 27, 2009, from the Kennedy Space Center. GOES-O, now renamed GOES-14, 

joined three other GOES spacecraft that helped NOAA forecasters track lifethreatening weather and solar storms by providing reliable satellite coverage to 

see severe weather as it develops. With more than a thousand tornadoes touching 

down in the United States each year and the serious risk posed by hurricanes to 

residents along the Gulf and eastern coastlines, GOES-14 was critical. GOES-14 

is the second spacecraft in the GOES-N/O/P series and carries instruments that 

capture high-resolution images of weather patterns and atmospheric measurements. 

The imagery and data from GOES spacecraft were key to NOAA’s ability to continuously monitor and forecast weather in the tropics. Continued improvements in 

the type and quality of GOES data improved tropical cyclone forecasts. GOES-14 

also provided expanded measurements for the space and solar environment using 

a Solar X-Ray Imager. These data allowed improved forecasts and warnings for solar 

disturbances, which protected billions of dollars of commercial and Government 

assets in space and on the ground and lessened the effect of power surges for satellitebased electronics and the communications industry.

In December 2008, NOAA and NASA officials announced that the Lockheed 

Martin Space Systems Company of Denver, Colorado, was selected to build two 

spacecraft for NOAA’s next generation GOES series, GOES-R. On May 27, 2009, 

NOAA announced that the Harris Corporation Government Communications 

Systems Division of Melbourne, Florida, was selected to develop the GOES-R 
54Aeronautics and Space Report of the President

ground system. This system will capture, process, and distribute GOES imagery 

and other information to users around the world.

The GOES-R ground system will be installed and operated at the NOAA 

Satellite Operations Facility in Suitland, Maryland, and at the Wallops Command 

and Data Acquisition Station in Wallops, Virginia. The advanced spacecraft and 

instrument technology used on the GOES-R series will result in more timely and 

accurate weather forecasts. It will improve support for the detection and observa-

tions of meteorological phenomena that directly affect public safety, protection of 

property, and, ultimately, economic health and development. The first launch of 

the GOES-R series satellite is scheduled for 2015.

The Jason-2 satellite launched successfully on June 20, 2008. On October 29, 2008, 

after four months of tests and qualification of the segment, command and control 

operations for the Jason-2 ocean altimetry satellite were handed over to NOAA 

from the French Space Agency, Centre National d’Études Spatiales (CNES). The 

handover was a major step in Jason-2 operations. NOAA now carries out routine 

operations on the satellite and processes the operational data received by its ground 

stations and interface with users. It also archived and distributed all scientific prod-

ucts. Jason-2 provides satellite-based ocean altimetry measurements, which measure 

sea level height. This extraordinarily precise measurement reveals upper level ocean 

heat content and patterns and indicates changes in the volume of water. With this 

information, scientists can predict El Niño and La Niña cycles—cycles vitally important to short-term climate prediction—and detect currents, such as the Gulf Stream. 

The current information provided by ocean altimetry is detailed enough to show 

the location, width, and temperature differences in adjacent waters and detect and 

predict current eddies, temporary ocean features that can be of critical interest to 

ocean users such as drilling operators in the Gulf of Mexico.

NESDIS researchers made significant progress in FY 09 advancing the develop-

ment of the NOAA end-to-end satellite ocean color radiometry system. This system 

is key for supporting multiple NOAA line office and goal team/program activi-

ties. Several important milestones were met during FY 09. For example, Medium 

Resolution Imaging Spectrometer (MERIS) chlorophyll-a ocean color radiometry 

products were declared operational in January 2009 and are now routinely posted 

on the CoastWatch Web site. (Chlorophyll-a is a proxy for phytoplankton biomass.) 
In addition, Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) regional 55

chlorophyll-a products for the Chesapeake Bay region were declared operational in 

February 2009 and are on the CoastWatch Web site. CoastWatch made standardized 

MODIS ocean color data available for the Gulf of Mexico region; additional regions 

will be online shortly. Collectively, these efforts helped to facilitate continuity and 

accessibility of quality ocean color data and derived products in support of NOAA 

and external users and their operational and climate applications, particularly in the 

areas of integrated ecosystem assessments, harmful algal bloom forecasts, and water 

quality monitoring in the Chesapeake Bay and other important coastal regions.

In FY 09, NOAA satellites were key factors in the rescues of 184 people throughout the United States and its surrounding waters, thanks to the Search and 

Rescue Satellite-Aided Tracking (SARSAT) Program. In each incident, NOAA 

satellites detected and located a distress signal from an emergency beacon and 

relayed the information to first responders on the ground. NOAA’s polar-orbiting 

and geostationary satellites, along with Russia’s COSPAS spacecraft, are part 

of the international Search and Rescue Satellite-Aided Tracking system, called 

COSPAS-SARSAT. This system uses a network of satellites to quickly detect and 

locate distress signals from emergency beacons on board aircraft and boats and 

from handheld personal locator beacons. When a satellite finds the location of a 

distress signal within the United States or its surrounding waters, the information 

is relayed to the SARSAT Mission Control Center at NOAA’s Satellite Operations 

Facility in Suitland, Maryland. From there, it is sent to a Rescue Coordination 

Center, operated by either the U.S. Air Force, for land rescues, or the U.S. Coast 

Guard, for water rescues. Now in its 27th year, COSPAS-SARSAT has been credited with supporting more than 25,000 rescues worldwide, including 6,134 in the 

United States and its surrounding waters.

2009 SARSAT rescue highlights:

• 

• 

• 

Six people were rescued from a fishing vessel off the coast of Freeport, 

Texas, when their boat became disabled.

One person was rescued near Barrow, Alaska, after his snowmobile broke 

through the ice when crossing the Chip River.

One person was rescued from a crashed helicopter 18 miles north-northeast of Santa Fe, New Mexico.
56 To increase our severe weather forecasting ability, NESDIS developed a new use 

for GOES-12 sounder data. NOAA can now forecast the onset of severe weather, 

such as thunderstorms and tornadoes, up to six hours in advance. NESDIS 

collaborated with scientists at the Cooperative Institute for Meteorological 

Satellite Studies, University of Wisconsin, to develop and test this model. 

Using hourly multilevel water vapor observations from the GOES-12 sounder, 

scientists can track regions where upper level drying is occurring over low-level 

moistening. A rapid change in these measurements is often a precursor to severe 

weather development.

In March 2009, NOAA’s National Geophysical Data Center (NGDC) supported 

safe navigation by developing a new, much higher resolution model of Earth’s magnetic field. This new model captures not only the field generated from the interior 

of Earth’s core, but also the anomalous field in the crust, a major source of error 

when navigating by magnetic compass. Magnetic anomaly maps enable improved 

navigation and are widely used in the geological sciences, in resource exploration, 

and in science education to illustrate various aspects of Earth evolution such as 

plate tectonics and seafloor spreading. All maps, compasses, GPS units, and even 

iPhones rely on magnetic models to provide the orientation difference between 

true, geographic, and magnetic north. The new and improved model, designated 

EMAG2, will lead to more accurate navigational capability for ships and aircraft.

In July 2009, NCDC released the International Best Track Archive for Climate 

Stewardship (IBTrACS) global tropical cyclone dataset. IBTrACS is a new dataset 

based on the best track data from numerous sources by consolidating and unifying data to one location. This dataset is the culmination of tropical cyclone 

best track data from many available sources, including the World Meteorological 

Organization’s officially recognized Regional Specialized Meteorological Centres 

and Tropical Cyclone Warning Centres. NCDC personnel collected, combined, 

and quality controlled the data; vetted the process through the scientific community; and publicly distributed the dataset. Tropical cyclone best track data are used 

to monitor the positions and intensities of tropical cyclones. They include the 

position of maximum sustained winds and minimum central pressure of tropical 

cyclones at six-hour intervals. IBTrACS facilitates an improved understanding of 

global tropical cyclone distribution, frequency, and intensity.
Despite the significant impact of tropical cyclones on society and natural systems, 57

there was no central repository for global best track data prior to the development 

of IBTrACS. A comprehensive archive of global tropical cyclone best track data 

was sorely needed, since such a database is utilized for a wide variety of projects, 

including climate change research, the determination of appropriate building codes 

for coastal zones, risk assessments for emergency managers, and analyses of potential losses for insurance and business interests.

The Fairbanks Command and Data Acquisition Station (FCDAS) met an outstanding performance goal of 99.8 percent for data recovery during FY 09. FCDAS 

took in excess of 56,000 spacecraft communications during calendar year 2009, a 

new station metric achievement, matching the metric the entire NASA Ground 

Network will achieve during 2009. This metric is significant, as it approached a 

200 percent increase in spacecraft operations since January 1, 2003, and it was 

accomplished without an increase in staff or support contract modifications.

Sensors aboard environmental satellites collected massive amounts of data on the 

atmospheric, oceanic, and terrestrial conditions throughout the world. The data 

were stored on-board the spacecraft for a portion of an orbit and then transmitted 

down to FCDAS when the satellites passed over the station. FCDAS sends radio 

signals to the satellites to direct operation of their propulsion and sensor systems.

Space-based navigation, weather, communications, reconnaissance, and imagery 

data were valuable to many national and international operations. FCDAS contains antennas, electronic equipment, and support facilities designed to provide 

radio communications with satellites observing Earth. Due to its location at high 

latitude, FCDAS is well-positioned to achieve line of sight with polar-orbiting satellites as they converge on the north polar region.

In order to safeguard the vast amount of critical data and information provided 

through the NOAA Satellite Operations Facility (NSOF) in Suitland, Maryland, 

NESDIS created a remote backup system at our Wallops Island, Virginia, facility. In 

the event of a disaster at NSOF, this remote backup system will continue to process 

and distribute critical environmental satellite products. NESDIS personnel not 

only resolved the network and infrastructure issues in order to create this backup 

facility but also ensured that the computing infrastructure was continuously synchronized with the primary facility at NSOF to minimize the potential loss of 
58 service and product degradation resulting from a switchover to the backup facility. 

This system ensures that if a disaster occurs that disables NSOF, NESDIS will be 

able to continue to provide all critical products to the National Weather Service, 

Department of Defense, and other users with minimal interruption of service. This 

ensures the availability of continuous and timely environmental information to 

the Nation.

During FY 09, the NGDC space weather team focused on developing tools, 

techniques, and models to help decision makers and the public understand the 

impacts of space weather on their systems. These new tools included improved 

measurements of the ionosphere (part of Earth’s atmosphere) and a model of global 

radio wave absorption in the ionosphere. Improved modeling and forecasting of 

space weather phenomena promotes increased safety for transportation, along 

with improved reliability in critical products to the National Weather Service, 

Department of Defense, and other users with minimal interruption of service. This 

ensures the availability of continuous and timely environmental information to 

the Nation.

NESDIS uncovered a source of solar drawings from the Wendelstein Observatory 

in Austria for the period from 1946 to 1987. These drawings were largely forgotten but represent a key source of information regarding solar features (sunspots, 

solar flares, etc.) during the transition from ground-based solar observations to 

space-based. Through an arrangement with the University of Munich, NESDIS 

temporarily acquired the original drawings and digitally preserved them through 

the NOAA Climate Data Modernization Program. These data are now available 

to space scientists, climate researchers, and the public through the NOAA 

Data Centers.

NOAA’s NCDC collected over 20 years of remotely sensed data from multiple 

satellite-based instruments from national and international partners. With these 

data, NCDC produced a global high-resolution sea surface wind product and distributed it worldwide to a variety of users, including the offshore energy sector, 

climate modelers, and the coastal ecosystem community. SeaWinds measurements 

provide information for several sectors of the public and research communities. 

SeaWinds provides wind climatologies for the Offshore Wind Energy community; is used by NOAA Coral Reef Watch to predict coral bleaching events; and 
provides wind stress estimates for the ocean and climate modeling communities, 59

including the coastal ecosystem community, to aid in the production of coastal 

upwelling estimates.

NGS submitted positioning products—from 2000 to the present—to the 

International Global Navigation Satellite System Service (IGS) for inclusion with 

comparable products to create a new International Terrestrial Reference Frame 

released in 2009. Model upgrades and strategy changes made over the years have 

significantly improved estimates of satellite and station positions to the centimeter 

level; however, they have also made the full position history inconsistent. NGS 

reanalyzed the GPS data collected from 1994 through 2007, resulting in a consistent position history and new position products. Data collected from the network 

were used for a variety of purposes, including precise GPS satellite positions, precise 

position of the tracking stations, and precise position of Earth’s axis of rotation.

In November 2008, NGS performed preliminary terrestrial gravity observations 

in Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands with the establishment of one absolute gravity station in Puerto Rico and another on the Island of St. Thomas in the U.S. 

Virgin Islands. These new absolute gravity stations were used as control points for 

scheduled airborne gravity observations to support the creation of a vertical datum. 

The work in Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands tested procedures and methodologies for conducting nationwide gravity collection, as defined in the Gravity for 

the Redefinition of the American Vertical Datum plan. Without a comprehensive, 

cohesive, and accurate gravity-based vertical datum, geographic positioning systems 

cannot be used to accurately determine elevations.

NGS completed an aerial gravity survey along parts of the Gulf Coast to enhance 

Vertical Datum (VDatum) in partnership with the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. 

Coastal gravity data were collected along the Gulf Coast from the Alabama/Georgia 

state line to the border with Mexico. Applications that use VDatum include inundation modeling, ecosystem modeling, coastal management, hydrographic survey 

depths, and shoreline extracting from LIght Detection And Ranging (LIDAR) 

data. VDatum is a free software tool developed jointly by NGS, the Office of Coast 

Survey, and the Center for Operational Oceanographic Products and Services.

VDatum is a revolutionary vertical datum transformation tool that translates 

geospatial data between vertical reference systems and removes the most serious 
60 impediments to data sharing. VDatum provides NOAA and other mapping agencies 

with the ability to seamlessly integrate geospatial data for numerous critical 

applications, allowing for easy and accurate transformation of elevation data from 

one vertical datum to another. In 2009, the Office of Coast Survey, NGS, and the 

Center for Operational Oceanographic Products and Services were instrumental in 

releasing the VDatum tool in New Orleans, Louisiana, and the Pacific Northwest 

(San Francisco Bay to Strait of Juan de Fuca).

NGS developed software for processing Global Navigation Satellite System 

(GLONASS) satellite data to support differential positioning between GLONASS 

receivers. This software is in the process of being embedded into the Online 

Positioning User Service (OPUS) so that users can submit U.S. GPS or GLONASS 

data for precise positioning coordinates of where observations were collected. NGS 

will also develop software to compute the path of the GLONASS satellites as 

they orbit Earth for a wide variety of satellite-based precise positioning activities. 

Incorporating GLONASS satellites into traditional GPS solutions enhances their 

accuracy and reliability because of the availability of more satellites to process a 

solution. For GPS receivers to provide accurate information, the precise location of 

positioning satellites as they orbit Earth must first be determined.

NGS developed draft versions of two real-time positioning guidelines—User 

Guidelines for Classical Global Navigation Satellite Systems GNSS (Global Navigation 

Satellite Systems) Real-Time Positioning and Guidelines for Operating a Real-Time 

GNSS Network. In addition to NGS outreach efforts at more than 15 workshops 

across the country to market these products, the publications gained the attention 

of trade magazines. GPS World highlighted NGS in their February 2009 Survey 

and Construction newsletter and included a link to the NGS Web site where the 

draft user guidelines can be found. NGS is working toward developing national 

guidelines for Real-Time Networks (RTNs) to ensure the consistency, accuracy, and 

alignment of RTNs operated by a wide variety of entities across the Nation.

The Mongolia Office of the Millennium Challenge Account invited NOAA 

to provide geodetic expertise to assist with further developing the office’s geospatial infrastructure in support of the privatization and capitalization of land 

assets held by Mongolians. NGS scientists traveled to Mongolia in February 2009 

to improve the country’s geospatial capabilities. Over a two-week period, NGS 
met and interviewed Mongolian government officials from the Agency for Land 61

Administration; Geodesy and Cartography personnel; and the Minister for the 

Ministry of Roads, Transportation, Construction, and Urban Development on the 

status of Mongolia’s existing geospatial capabilities. These meetings focused on the 

Mongolian geodetic infrastructure and how modern remote-sensing methodologies could contribute to performing accurate land parcel mapping for private land 

ownership initiatives.

NOAA’s Office of Response and Restoration and the University of New 

Hampshire’s Coastal Response Research Center developed a data platform that 

seamlessly aggregates diverse spatial datasets into an Internet-based mapping 

format. The Environmental Response Management Application (ERMATM) integrates real-time data such as weather, currents, and Automated Information System 

data, as well as static datasets, with maps, resulting in high-resolution visualization 

on the Internet. An ERMATM for Portsmouth, New Hampshire, recently debuted 

during an industry-led National Preparedness for Response Exercise Program. 

NOAA will provide ERMA for New England by expanding and enhancing the 

Portsmouth pilot project, to be used during the Spill of National Significance 

exercise in March 2010.

The platform allows users to collect, manipulate, analyze, and display spatially 

referenced data for solving complex resource issues. The Web delivery of the 

platform provides a common operational picture for all individuals involved in 

an incident, improves communication and coordination among responders and 

stakeholders, and provides resource managers with the information necessary to 

make faster and better informed decisions. Each version of ERMATM is specific to 

a single geographic region. ERMATM sites are currently being developed for the 

Caribbean, the Pacific Northwest, and the Pacific Islands. There is also interest for 

development in New York and the Arctic, and funds are available for development 

in the Great Lakes in FY 11.

Across the Pacific, derelict fishing gear (DFG) is recognized as a major environmental threat to coastal and near-shore areas. In FY 09, a summit was held for 

NOAA, NASA, and other Federal agency, academic, and private-sector experts 

in marine debris, oceanography, and remote-sensing technology. Objectives of 

the summit were to identify and synthesize existing information on the behavior 
62 and movement of DFG in the North Pacific; the use of satellite data in modeling 

likely areas of DFG accumulation; appropriate sensor, unmanned aerial systems, 

and anomaly detection technologies; and completed activities that were used to 

detect and track DFG. The partnerships have continued, and a special issue was 

in development for publication in the journal Marine Pollution Bulletin that will 

highlight current knowledge, activities, and needs to effectively detect DFG at sea.

In 2009, the NOAA Integrated Ocean Observing System (IOOS®) Program 

collaborated with NESDIS’s CoastWatch Program to make satellite-derived ocean 

color products of the Gulf of Mexico available via standardized Web services used 

by IOOS. The data products support the NOAA operational Harmful Algal Bloom 

(HAB) analysis for the Gulf of Mexico. These new capabilities provide satellite 

data using community-derived standards, which support not only the operational 

Harmful Algal Bloom system but a multitude of other user needs.

OSC collaborated with the FAA on the release of a joint publication titled 

Introduction to U.S. Export Controls for the Commercial Space Industry in October 

2008. The intent of the guidebook was to help entrepreneurial space businesses 

understand the processes associated with the International Traffic in Arms 

Regulations (ITAR).

In collaboration with NASA, NOAA’s Office of Oceanic and Atmospheric 

Research (OAR) developed a new ocean surface wind product, which provides 

a long-term (from 1987 to 2008), uniform record of global ocean surface winds. 

It was created through the use of an enhanced analysis method of data from two 

space-based, remote-sensing tools—QuikSCAT and ADEOS-2—combined with 

wind data from ships and buoys. Wind data from future satellite missions will be 

added to the dataset as they become available in order to extend the data record 

and keep it current.

For the first time, OAR scientists demonstrated that tsunamis in the open ocean 

can change sea surface texture in a way that can be measured by satellite-borne 

radars. The finding could one day help save lives through improved detection and 

forecasting of tsunami intensity and direction at the ocean surface. According to 

the study, large tsunamis crossing the open ocean stir up and darken the surface 

waters along the leading edge of the wave. The rougher water forms a long, shadowlike strip parallel to the wave and proportional to the strength of the tsunami. 
That shadow can be measured by orbiting radars and may one day help scientists 63

improve early warning systems. This constitutes a new way to detect tsunamis. 

The research project was led by NOAA’s Earth System Research Laboratory and 

the Cooperative Institute for Research in Environmental Sciences, in Boulder, 

Colorado. An article on this project was published in July 2009 in the journal 

Natural Hazards and Earth System Sciences.

From the icebreaker Oden, stationed near the North Pole, and a NASA DC-8 

research airplane, scientists collected data from the sea-ice interface through the 

cloud-topped atmospheric boundary layer and into the free troposphere above. 

These measurements will allow scientists to better understand the atmospheric 

processes leading to Arctic cloud formation and how clouds influence the annual 

freeze-up of Earth’s polar ice cap. The measurements will also help improve the 

accuracy of NASA satellite images of Arctic sea-ice coverage using the long-range 

mapping capabilities of the DC-8. NOAA contributed a suite of remote sensors 

to measurement arrays on and near the Oden, while the University of Colorado 

deployed instruments on both the Oden and the DC-8.

In 2009, NOAA researchers used a variety of research aircraft, including 

NOAA’s own aircraft fleet as well as NASA and National Science Foundation 

research aircraft, to conduct research on climate change and air quality. The effective deployment of these aircraft required detailed information on the state of the 

atmosphere often thousands of miles from the base of operations. NOAA mission planning for these very capable research platforms relied heavily on satellite 

retrievals for atmospheric meteorology, cloud data, and atmospheric composition.

On September 20, 2009, NOAA hurricane researchers from the Atlantic 

Oceanographic and Meteorological Laboratory (AOML), in partnership with staff 

from BAE Systems and the Navy, completed the first test flight of an unmanned 

aircraft system from aboard a manned aircraft operated by NOAA’s Aircraft 

Operations Center. The Coyote, a mini-unmanned aircraft, was launched from 

NOAA’s P-3 hurricane reconnaissance aircraft over the Gulf of Mexico at an altitude of 10,000 feet via a free-fall parachute. After Coyote completed its launch 

sequence as programmed, it navigated along a predetermined flight pattern at 

1,000 feet. During its 49-minute flight, the Coyote successfully completed a loss 

of communications demonstration, communication range tests at three altitudes, 
64 spiral maneuvers, and flight at altitudes as low as 64 feet above the ocean surface. 

The P-3 aircraft circled above the unmanned aircraft at 10,000 feet and launched 

four dropsondes for post-flight comparisons with the meteorological data obtained 

from the Coyote autopilot and dropsondes. All objectives for the test flight and 

demonstration were met. BAE is developing the Coyote for use by the Navy. It 

is also being adapted for hurricane research data collection efforts. Unmanned 

aircraft have the potential for gathering critical observations from the lower levels 

of the hurricane environment, where the winds are strongest, areas too dangerous 

for manned aircraft.

In May 2009, NOAA renewed its affiliation with the Cooperative Institute for 

Research in the Atmosphere (CIRA) at Colorado State University in Fort Collins, 

Colorado. Chosen through a competitive process, the institute will investigate 

satellite applications for improving regional and global-scale weather forecasts and 

water resource forecasts and provide integrated weather information to meet future 

aviation and surface transportation needs. The NOAA/CIRA partnership provides 

professors and students of the university with an exciting and challenging opportunity to collaborate with NOAA scientists on cutting-edge research.

CIRA will focus on ways to improve the development of satellite-based algorithms for weather forecasting; improve weather and climate models; develop 

techniques to integrate satellite, terrestrial, oceanic, and biological observations; 

increase understanding of environmental changes on weather and climate; and 

develop effective and efficient methods to quickly distribute and display large sets 

of environmental and model data using various data networks.

National Institute of Standards and Technology

In FY 09, the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) provided 

Federal agencies and the aerospace industry with the research, standards, products, 

and services needed to advance the President’s space agenda. These wide-ranging 

outputs fall into four main categories: (1) validation, measurement, and calibration; (2) manufacturing technology; (3) observation and sensing; and (4) spacecraft 

and living environments. NIST supported accurate and compatible measurements 

made by the aerospace industry by providing Standard Reference Materials (SRM) 
and calibration services. Customers used these materials and services to ensure the 65

accuracy of their own instrument calibrations and the validity of their measurement methods. In 2009, aerospace companies purchased 106 units of Standard 

Reference Materials, including ferrous and nonferrous metals certified for chemical 

composition and for hardness, and artifacts certified for nanoscale dimensional 

properties. In addition, these companies submitted over 240 instruments or artifacts to NIST for calibration. NIST performed over 1,500 separate tests on these 

items, spanning dimensional, force, vibration, and electrical measurements, which 

provided the companies with a source of metrological traceability for their primary 

measurement standards.

NIST administers the National Voluntary Laboratory Accreditation Program 

(NVLAP), which accredited two aerospace and aeronautic facilities in 2009. 

NVLAP accreditation ensures that the laboratories are following best practices for 

quality in testing and measurements as established by standards organizations such 

as the International Organization for Standardization (ISO) and the International 

Electrotechnical Commission (IEC).

Ensuring the security of communications and data remains crucial to aerospace 

applications. NIST helped NASA Langley Research Center with information 

technology security through the NIST Cryptographic Module Validation Program 

and the Cryptographic Algorithm Validation Program, ensuring proper use of 

Federal Information Processing Standards. NASA works with many vendors and 

other government space agencies such as JAXA, which must comply with Federal 

Information Processing Standards.

Carbon nanotubes are lightweight materials with potentially great strength and 

unique electrical properties, plus other attributes that make them very interesting 

for potential aerospace applications. NIST collaborated with the NASA Johnson 

Space Center to promote the standardization of test techniques for single-wall carbon nanotubes. Following a third workshop that brought together over 70 leading 

experts, NIST and NASA developed a recommended practice guide, Measurement 

Issues in Carbon Nanotubes, which was published by NIST in 2008 (http://www.nist.

gov/mml/mmsd/nanotube_041508.cfm). In 2009, this practice guide formed the basis 

for accepted U.S. proposals to ISO’s Technical Committee on Nanotechnology for 

the standardization of single-wall carbon nanotube measurement practices. Several 
66 technical standards are expected to gain final approval by ISO in coming months. 

In addition, NIST demonstrated a new way to separate NASA’s laser-produced 

single-wall nanotubes, which will remove a major technological barrier to many 

space-based applications of nanotubes.

NIST’s Synchrotron Ultraviolet Radiation Facility SURF III was used as a source 

of soft x-rays and vacuum ultraviolet light to calibrate mirrors, detectors, and 

spectrometers used in NASA spacecraft. These include the Extreme Ultraviolet 

Variability Experiment (EVE), which will be launched on the Solar Dynamics 

Observatory (SDO), and the calibration rocket experiment for the Thermosphere 

Ionosphere Mesosphere Energetics and Dynamics (TIMED) satellite. Both of these 

satellites are designed to study extreme ultraviolet (EUV) solar irradiance and its 

variability over minutes (flares) to years (11-year solar cycle). These measurements 

are important to the National Space Weather Program (NSWP), which tracks solar 

storms that impact space-based communications and navigation technologies. In 

addition, SURF III provides the calibration standard for experimental determination of atomic radiation intensities that are required for interpretation of data 

from HST experiments. NIST has initiated work on the calibration of ultraviolet 

instrumentation for satellites in the NOAA GOES program.

NIST provided spectroscopic data for astronomers who are analyzing observations from NASA’s land- and space-based missions, including the Hubble Space 

Telescope, the Chandra X-ray Observatory, the Far Ultraviolet Spectroscopic 

Explorer, and the Spitzer Infrared Observatory. In 2009, NIST provided critical 

compiled data for titanium, nickel, argon, chlorine, hydrogen, helium, lithium, 

beryllium, boron, fluorine, neon, barium, strontium, and other elements of 

particularly strong current interest. For each dataset, NIST distilled a single, 

self-consistent set of best values from the frequently inconsistent, incomplete, 

and heterogeneous-quality data scattered across the open literature. NIST published these critically compiled datasets in peer-reviewed scientific journals and 

disseminated them publicly through NIST’s online Atomic Spectra Database 

(http://www.nist.gov/physlab/data/asd.cfm). These efforts provided standardized, 

best quality data across the astronomical community and eliminated the need for 

astronomers to separately invest time in performing the same task. This work was 

partially funded by NASA.
NIST used its unique spectroscopic instruments to measure atomic data values 67

needed by astronomers but not available in the literature. The measurements support the analysis of results from NASA’s x-ray, ultraviolet, and infrared space-based 

observatories. NIST measured data and provided analysis for several ions of iron. 

This work was partially funded by NASA.

NIST collaborated with the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics 

(CfA) to create and observe exotic states of matter similar to those observed from 

space by orbiting observatories. This work improved the analysis of data from 

the multi-billion-dollar Chandra X-ray Observatory, operated in orbit for NASA 

by CfA. Spectra from highly charged states of iron, which are among the most 

prevalent and brightest observed from space, are produced under known and 

well-controlled conditions and studied using a combination of instruments from 

NIST and Harvard. Analysis is underway to try to resolve discrepancies that have 

persisted for years between experiments from various groups as well as between 

theory and experiments. This work was partially funded by NASA.

NIST participated in a high-level discussion with the NASA Langley Research 

Center in order to prioritize collaborative activities in support of the Tier-1 

Decadal Survey Mission, Climate Absolute Radiance and Refractivity Observatory 

(CLARREO). This mission is designed to help establish a benchmark climate data 

record. Leading up to this high-level meeting, NIST was actively engaged in the 

CLARREO Science Study Team discussions and meetings. NIST also participated 

in three instrumentation incubator projects closely coupled to CLARREO, examining detector linearity in the reflected solar region (400 to 2,500 nanometers), 

characterizing the far infrared optical properties of candidate materials for satellite 

optical systems, and calibrating the performance of prototype systems for on-board 

calibration blackbody sources designed for the CLARREO mission.

NIST scientists demonstrated hyperspectral scene projection from a stored 

hyperspectral data cube image of a coral reef off the coast of Puerto Rico. This 

work, carried out in the context of global remote sensing of interest to NASA 

and DOD, is a critical step on the path toward having a more realistic calibration 

system for future satellites.

In collaboration with NASA and NOAA, NIST directed the development of the 

prototype marine optical system (MOS) for the next-generation Marine Optical 
68 Buoy (MOBY-C) that can be used to help calibrate satellites. NIST also has continued its calibration/validation support of the present MOBY that is situated off 

the shore of Lanai, Hawaii, that is used for in situ vicarious calibration of several 

active environmental satellites.

In support of the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) Landsat Data Continuity Mission 

(LDCM) Operational Land Imager (OLI) sensor, NIST calibrated several transfer 

radiometers and conducted stray-light characterization for several spectrometers to 

be used in prelaunch calibration of the spacecraft instruments. NIST also helped 

develop a calibration plan for spacecraft system-level testing of the optical system.

In support of the NPOESS Preparatory Project (NPP), NIST developed and built 

a flat-plate illuminator that was used in a thermo-vacuum environment testing of 

the Visible Infrared Imager Radiometer Suite (VIIRS) instrument at the Goddard 

Space Flight Center in preparation for spacecraft system-level tests to be done at 

the Ball Aerospace Technology Corporation in Boulder, Colorado. NIST also 

began a new project that will use an interferometer-based strategy to study the 

spectral response of the VIIRS infrared bands. NIST also prepared for tests of the 

VIIRS sensor spectral response in end-to-end testing in the solar reflected region.

NIST participated in meetings of NASA’s Aerosol-Cloud-Environment (ACE) 

Decadal Survey Mission science team and helped develop the calibration plan. 

NIST also participated in a meeting of the Hyperspectral Infrared Imager 

(HyspIRI) Decadal Survey Mission science team.

NIST completed its analysis of the calibration of the Total Solar Irradiance 

Radiometer Facility at the Laboratory for Atmospheric and Space Physics in 

Boulder, Colorado. NIST also participated on the GLORY science team to develop 

a remote-sensing, Earth-orbiting instrument to collect data on aerosols and total 

solar irradiance.

NIST participated in an international intercomparison of the calibration of 

radiometric equipment using its Earth Observing System (EOS) thermal transfer 

radiometer and a water-bath blackbody in Miami, Florida. This intercomparison was 

conducted as an activity of the Committee on Earth Observing Satellites (CEOS).

NIST helped calibrate the spectral response of the Jet Propulsion Laboratory/

Caltech Cosmic Infrared Background Experiment (CIBER) sensor that flew in 

June 2009.
NIST collaborated with the Utah State University Space Dynamics Laboratory 69

to advance the development and calibration of optical sensors. The collaboration 

emphasizes the calibration and characterization of satellite imagers and sensors 

that are important for defense and climate-change research.

NIST used its Low Background Infrared facility to provide calibrations of 

infrared sources and test chambers for quality assurance for the Missile Defense 

Agency’s testing of Exoatmospheric Kill Vehicle (EKV) units prior to deployment. 

The Low Background Infrared facility also supported calibrations of the antiballistic missile-defense hardware-in-the-loop simulation test chamber, 10V, being 

developed by the Missile Defense Agency at the Arnold Engineering Development 

Center in Tennessee. The 10V chamber will simulate real engagement scenarios in 

the testing of Exoatmospheric Kill Vehicle missile units.

NIST supported the testing of calibrators for the near infrared spectrograph 

(NIRSpec) being built by the European Space Agency and its contractors for the 

James Webb Space Telescope (JWST). NIRSpec will enable scientists to better 

understand the formation of stars, stellar clusters, and galaxies.

With NASA funding, NIST developed a prototype circuit for critical signal processing applications on future space-based observatories. The demanding specifications for these circuits were met by using superconducting electronics operated at 

ultralow temperature.

The NIST Manufacturing Extension Partnership (MEP) program maintains a 

network of 59 centers, with at least one in every state and Puerto Rico. MEP centers 

offer business and technical assistance services to the Nation’s small and mediumsized manufacturers. In FY 09, MEP centers implemented 241 business improvement projects with 151 individual manufacturing companies in the aerospace 

and defense industry. In addition, the MEP program worked with several prime 

aerospace companies, including Boeing, Rockwell-Collins, Lockheed Martin, and 

Honeywell, to most effectively utilize and develop their supply bases. Working with 

these prime companies and partner agencies, MEP centers have reduced supplier 

lead times; improved quality; and developed a stronger, more reliable aerospace 

supply base.

As important parts of their state and local economic development communities, several MEP centers (including the Colorado Association for Manufacturing 
70 Technology, the Texas Manufacturing Assistance Center, the Alabama Technology 

Network, and the Ohio Manufacturing Extension Partnership) are also actively 

involved in their state aerospace industry initiatives.

NIST is working with industry to test and advance MTConnect, a low-cost, open 

machine tool integration standard sponsored by the Association for Manufacturing 

Technology, General Electric, TechSolve, and other partners. MTConnect fosters 

greater interoperability between controls, devices, and software applications by 

publishing data over networks using the Internet Protocol. NIST researchers are 

part of MTConnect’s Technical Advisory Group, and they led the performance 

evaluation tests. Encouraged by initial demonstrations at the 2008 International 

Manufacturing Technology Show, factory managers at the Boeing plant in Auburn, 

Washington, sought to collaborate with NIST to further explore the potential of 

this technology. In May 2009, NIST and Boeing worked together to test a machinemonitoring “dashboard” application that collected actual production figures for 

analysis and archiving. This allowed easy monitoring of progress and delays in 

plant production for different original equipment manufacturer machine tools. 

Tests were conducted on 60 machine tools from two different vendors.

NIST and members of the STEP Manufacturing Team (including The Boeing 

Company) met in May 2009 at Boeing’s Renton, Washington, facility to demonstrate and discuss advanced uses of the STEP-NC AP238 (also known as ISO 

10303-238) standard. STEP-NC is an extension to the international standard—

STandard for Exchange of Product model data, a comprehensive ISO standard that 

describes how to represent and exchange digital product information. STEP-NC 

extends the STEP standard to parts created by computer numerical control. 

STEP-NC will enable manufacturers to design a three-dimensional part electronically and then send the part geometry, along with tolerance, feature, and high-level 

process information, directly to a machine tool without taking the extra step to 

define all of the machine-specific motion codes needed to make the part. The 

May 2009 international implementation and testing event demonstrated and 

tested the integration of tolerance information from design with machining and 

inspection using the STEP-NC standard. Technicians machined several parts using 

a complex mold part as the basis for data exchange at the Connecticut Center 

for Advanced Technology, KTH/Sweden, and NIST and then brought them to 
Mitutoyo/Kirkland for inspection. The association between measured surfaces and 71

the tools and operations that created them made it easy to see how tooling choices 

impacted quality. NIST’s evaluation of the results determined that deviation from 

the desired part geometry occurred in some cases due to tooling compromises.

NIST researchers collaborated with NASA on measurement methods for x-ray 

telescopes that require hundreds of extremely thin mirrors nested like the layers 

of an onion. Researchers completed the design and theoretical analysis of a new 

measurement technique that uses two computer-generated holograms to address the 

challenge of measuring mandrels for the fabrication of these x-ray telescope mirrors.

In 2009, NIST performed the first official NIST laser tracker calibration per the 

ASME B89.4.19 standard and the first official NIST articulated arm coordinate 

measuring machines (CMM) calibration per ASME B89.4.22. Major aerospace 

manufacturers such as Boeing and Pratt & Whitney increasingly rely on measurements of complex surfaces by frameless measurement systems such as laser trackers 

and articulating arm coordinate measuring machines. Calibrations of these types 

of systems allow manufacturers to use cost-effective, flexible, and reconfigurable 

measurement equipment in their manufacturing environment.

Many of NASA’s next-generation satellite observatories require new detectors 

with improved sensitivity and scalability. With funding from NASA, NIST developed new detectors based on the voltage-biased superconducting transition-edge 

sensor (TES). The TES offers new capabilities for the detection of electromagnetic signals from millimeter waves through x-rays. Following on their successful development at NIST, the TES has become the reference technology and a 

leading candidate for future NASA satellite missions at x-ray (International 

X-ray Observatory), millimeter (CMB Polarimeter Satellite), and submillimeter 

(Submillimeter and Far-InfraRed Experiment, or SAFIRE) wavelengths, as well 

as for many NASA-funded suborbital instruments including balloon-borne instruments and instruments intended for the Stratospheric Observatory for Infrared 

Astronomy (SOFIA).

With NASA funding, NIST began the development of Superconducting 

Quantum Interference Devices (SQUIDs) and SQUID-based multiplexers to read 

out large arrays of TES detectors in a manageable number of output channels. 

NIST has already provided SQUID systems to many researchers at NASA Centers 
72 (Goddard Space Flight Center and the Jet Propulsion Laboratory) and to those in 

academia working on NASA-funded projects (including the California Institute of 

Technology, Stanford, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, the University 

of California at Berkeley, Princeton University, Harvard University, and the 

University of Chicago). SQUIDs and SQUID multiplexers developed at NIST will 

be used in most of NASA’s future TES instruments.

Over the past several years, NIST developed noise mitigation features that made it 

possible to demonstrate TES x-ray calorimeters with improved energy resolution. The 

performance goal for the International X-ray Observatory satellite mission of 2 eV 

at 6 keV has been reached by a collaboration of the NASA/Goddard Space Flight 

Center and NIST, which will make it possible to better probe general relativity in 

the strong gravitational limit by studying the x-ray emissions of iron falling into 

black holes.

NIST is now deploying SQUID multiplexers with two orders of magnitude better 

immunity to stray fields from the environment. This immunity will be critical for 

systematic error control in high-precision systems to study the cosmic microwave 

background (CMB). NIST SQUIDs will be used in two NASA-funded balloonborne CMB experiments (SPIDER and EBEX).

In response to this report, in 2007, NIST established a significant effort through 

the Innovations in Measurement Science program to develop CMB polarimeters 

with the necessary level of sensitivity. A NIST team worked with collaborators at 

NASA Centers and in universities to develop large arrays of CMB polarimeters to 

make this challenging measurement.

Over the last several years, with funding from NASA, NIST has taken several 

critical steps towards fielding even larger detector arrays (greater than 10,000 pixels) in NASA missions. These include the development of dissipation-less microwave SQUID multiplexers and code-division multiplexers. In combination, these 

will make it possible to read out many thousands of detector channels in a single 

coaxial cable. NIST has fully demonstrated these devices and worked to disseminate this technology to its collaborators at NASA Centers and universities.

NIST continued work on new concepts to achieve on-chip electrical cooling 

of cryogenic detectors. These on-chip coolers, based on superconducting tunnel 

junctions, could greatly simplify spacecraft cryogenic requirements by providing 
a final on-chip stage of cooling from 0.3 to 0.1 Kelvin. Researchers at NIST have 73

developed large-area coolers fabricated using standard microelectronic processes. 

These devices have demonstrated cooling from 260 to 115 millikelvin with cooling 

power 100 to 1,000 times greater than in previous demonstrations. NIST worked 

with the NASA John H. Glenn Research Center to complete the characterization 

of the large vacuum chamber located near Sandusky, Ohio, for use as a reverberation chamber. The goal is to use the vacuum chamber for radiated immunity tests 

to ensure that space vehicles will not be interfered with by incidental electromagnetic fields from radar, communications, and other sources. The chamber was well 

suited to such tests with acceptable uniformity and a lack of hot spots that might 

overstress electronics during high-power tests. A detailed report was delivered 

to NASA.

NIST continued to provide support for high-performance satellite and radar 

systems through its antenna parameter calibration services. Recent customers 

include Northrop Grumman and Harris Corporation.

In FY 09, NIST worked with the U.S. Air Force, industry, and NASA in fuels 

research geared towards developing alternative fuels and generating an understanding upon which to base innovative designs for jet and rocket propulsion systems. 

Two of the major foci of the work involved chemical characterization and thermophysical properties. In particular, NIST evaluated properties of synthetic FischerTropsch fuels (including several renewable bio-based fluids) and rocket/jet fuels.

NIST supported collaborators working in industry, academia, and national laboratories to improve the stability of thermal barrier coatings that are used to extend 

the high-temperature behavior of nickel-based superalloy turbine blades and, thus, 

enhance turbine engine efficiency. In 2009, NIST generated and disseminated 

multicomponent diffusion data to advance the modeling of the critical strengthening mechanism, the gamma-prime precipitation process; demonstrated how to 

model interdiffusion reactions occurring between the thermal barrier coating and 

the nickel-based superalloy; and continued to refine diffusion databases needed 

to model, validate, and predict the microstructural evolution of third-generation 

nickel-based disk superalloys during manufacturing and service.

The worldwide electronics industry transition to lead-free solder and surface 

finishes is well under way. However, high-reliability aerospace microelectronic 
74 products are faced with an extreme reliability issue due to the phenomenon of 

“tin whisker” formation in systems employing lead-free solders and surface finishes. 

These whiskers can cause shorts in electronic panels, which could lead to aircraft 

failure. The NIST Tin Whisker Project worked to identify the fundamental cause 

of whisker growth to assist U.S. industry, including aerospace firms, in mitigating this problem. In 2009, NIST experts in tin-whisker mitigation were central 

participants on a team of 16 nationally recognized expert scientists and engineers 

on Phases 1 and 2 of the Lead Free Electronics Manhattan Project. The project, 

sponsored by the Office of Naval Research and the Joint Defense Manufacturing 

Technology Panel, was formed to address the serious reliability threat from leadfree solders and surface finishes that are infiltrating critical aerospace and defense 

systems. In April 2009, Phase 1 of the Project identified gaps in current industry 

best practices for the use of lead-free solders and surface finishes in the highreliability aerospace and defense programs. In August 2009, Phase 2 produced a 

three-year roadmap that addressed the reliability and sustainment risks identified 

in Phase 1. The third phase of this project, renamed the Lead-free Electronics Risk 

Reduction Program, has articulated eighty R&D tasks needed to address the leadfree technology knowledge gaps.

NIST is currently working with NASA’s Glenn Research Center on spacecraft 

fire-detection research. Due to the lack of experimental data for spacecraft fires, scientists designed ISS and Shuttle smoke detectors based upon Earth gravity test data 

and experience. The absence of or reduction in gravity has a significant impact on 

the smoke properties from a spacecraft fire. NASA and NIST developed the Smoke 

Aerosol Measurement Experiment (SAME) to characterize smoke properties from 

overheated spacecraft materials using a suite of aerosol measurement instruments and 

smoke-collection devices. Additional experiments are prepared for the re-flight of 

SAME (SAME-R).

NIST worked with the Air Force Office of Scientific Research to formulate and 

manufacture a variety of biopolymer nanocomposites through synthesis of the 

polymer and in-situ intercalation/dispersion of treated nanoparticles in an attempt 

to improve the flammability characteristics of the materials. The structure and 

properties of the materials will be examined, including the network microstructure, 

rheology, processing, electrical, and mechanical properties.
NIST worked with The Boeing Company to provide fundamental understand- 75

ing of observed combustion promotion by halogenated fire suppressants during 

the FAA aerosol can fire suppression test. NIST worked on developing an understanding of the likely cause of the unwanted enhanced burning using detailed 

numerical simulations of reacting systems and reduced-scale surrogate experiments. 

Alternative agents and approaches for overcoming the unwanted enhanced burning were considered.

International Trade Administration

Industry and Trade Policy

The Office of Transportation and Machinery (OTM) within the Department of 

Commerce’s International Trade Administration (ITA) participated in the development of Administration policies on aeronautical R&D through the National 

Science and Technology Council’s (NSTC) Subcommittee on Aeronautics Science 

and Technology (ASTS). In FY 09, the ASTS completed the first biennial update 

to the National Aeronautics Research and Development Plan, which establishes 

research goals and objectives for Federal aeronautics R&D investments in priority 

areas. In FY 10, the ASTS will update the National Plan for Aeronautics R&D 

and Related Infrastructure, which establishes aeronautics R&D goals, objectives, 

and guidance outlining the path forward for developing an aeronautics R&D, test, 

and evaluation infrastructure plan. The ASTS will also update the associated 

Technical Appendix to the R&D Plan, which identifies research investments by 

Federal departments and agencies related to the national goals and objectives and 

includes a preliminary assessment of Federal R&D activities to identify areas of 

opportunity for potential increased emphasis.

OTM participated in the planning and implementation process for NextGen 

through the interagency JPDO, which oversees the initiative. OTM staff continued 

to represent the Department of Commerce on both the Global Harmonization 

Working Group (GHWG) and the Aviation Security Working Group. As part of 

the GHWG, OTM staff participated in the drafting of the NextGen International 

Strategy, which assembled participating agency priorities. Also, OTM staff 
76 supported the GHWG Executive Committee and cochaired the Liaison Standing 

Committee (charged with collaborating with the other working groups on technological and procedural developments with global implications). Further, OTM 

staff coordinated a review of various JPDO documents, including the Global 

Harmonization Roadmap and the Safety Culture Improvement Resource Guide, 

as well as documents from industry partners (such as the RTCA, Inc., NextGen 

Mid-Term Implementation Plan).

OTM participated in a meeting and workshop for the Commercial Aviation 

Alternative Fuels Initiative (CAAFI). CAAFI is a public/private group sponsored 

by the FAA, the Air Transport Association of America, the Aerospace Industries 

Association, and Airports Council International-North America. The purpose of 

the meeting was to review developments in aviation alternative fuels; set roadmaps 

for current and future research, development, and deployment; and facilitate communications, relationship-building, and partnerships across sectors. In addition, 

OTM staff worked with Kallman Worldwide to highlight the 2009 Paris Air Show 

as an opportunity for alternative fuels producers to showcase their products and 

scope the potential market.

OTM continued its participation in aviation security activities, including work 

on the JPDO Aviation Security Working Group. OTM staff took part in various 

security technology demonstrations and presentations to determine viability and 

provide perspective on the state of aviation security technology. OTM staff worked 

to ensure cooperation between the GHWG and the Aviation Security Working 

Group with regard to specific projects, such as the Flight Data Initiative (advanced 

flight data recorder technology), the Emergency Management Operational Control 

System (a portable air traffic management system for use in disaster-stricken 

areas), and the Security Integrated Tool Suite (for assessing the threat level of 

various flight objects). OTM updated market and policy assessments for civil-use 

Unmanned Aerial Systems (UAS). OTM continued public outreach on UAS issues 

through meetings with major UAS manufacturers at the 2009 Paris Air Show. In 

addition, OTM staff participated in the 2009 Association for Unmanned Vehicle 

Systems International (AUVSI) conference in Paris. A number of outcomes of the 

conference were incorporated into the ongoing market and policy assessments.
ITA supported the U.S. Trade Representative on issues relating to the enforce- 77

ment of U.S. rights under the World Trade Organization and in free trade agreement negotiations. In particular, OTM provided support for the ongoing U.S./EU 

trade dispute over Large Civil Aircraft by providing industry expertise in areas 

relating to changes in the market, actions of the major stakeholders, and political 

analysis of the countries impacted. With the impending release of a final determination in the U.S. case against Airbus subsidies and an interim ruling in the EU 

case against Boeing, EU officials have called for a negotiated settlement regarding 

aircraft subsidies. If these talks materialize, OTM will be a key source of industry 

and trade policy expertise for the U.S. negotiators.

ITA’s OTM and Office of Financial Services Industries participated in the 

Group on the Sector Understanding on Export Credits for Civil Aircraft (the 

“Aircraft Sector Understanding”) at the Organization for Economic Cooperation 

and Development (OECD). The governments of almost all countries with major 

aircraft manufacturers are signatories to the Aircraft Sector Understanding, an 

annex to the OECD Arrangement on Officially Supported Export Credits, which 

establishes rules for export credit agencies. The OECD rules aim to ensure that 

government-provided export financing is not a competitive factor in civil aircraft 

sales competitions. After several years of negotiations, a new Aircraft Sector 

Understanding was reached in 2007. As a member of the U.S. delegation, ITA 

supported the United States’ efforts to ensure the successful implementation of the 

new agreement. In addition, OTM and the Office of Financial Services Industries 

supported interagency efforts to engage the Canadian government on expanding 

the so-called Home Markets Understanding to the C-Series, a new Canadian aircraft that will compete with Boeing’s 737. Under this understanding, the producers 

of large civil aircraft have agreed not to provide official financing into each other’s 

market in order to preserve a level playing field.

ITA and NOAA continued their active participation in the implementation 

of the Bush Administration’s National Space Policies as well as the new review of 

Federal space policy directed by President Obama. In order to ensure that commercial interests continue to be adequately addressed, OTM and NOAA worked to 

ensure that current policies’ implementation actions and the new policies’ language 
78 both create an environment that will improve U.S. industry’s competitiveness, 

stimulate the American economy, and create U.S. jobs.

OTM represented commercial remote-sensing satellite industry interests within 

the Remote Sensing Interagency Working Group (RSIWG), led by the State 

Department. The RSIWG coordinates policy for the export of commercial remote 

sensing satellite systems and negotiates government-to-government agreements 

that address the safeguarding of those systems’ technology. The RSIWG consulted 

with several foreign countries on satellite cooperation and met with industry to 

understand the impact on industry.

ITA played an important role in promoting U.S. aerospace trade interests as the 

industry faced mounting competition from abroad. ITA participated in and organized trade events and provided advocacy to support U.S. companies in international aerospace competitions, including commercial sales for aircraft, helicopters, 

airport construction, communications, and remote sensing satellites; commercial 

projects; and air traffic management projects.

In June 2009, ITA organized and supported the Commerce Department’s participation in the Paris Air Show and arranged senior-level meetings for the Acting 

Assistant Secretary for Manufacturing and Services with foreign government and 

industry officials as well as U.S. industry executives. ITA/OTM met with numerous U.S. and foreign government and industry officials to discuss ongoing policy 

issues impacting the competitiveness of U.S. industry. OTM staff also provided 

similar services during the Moscow International Aviation and Space Salon and 

toured the Moscow Design Center to discuss ongoing aerospace business interests 

in Russia.

OTM continued to monitor the progress of the Indian Air Force’s Medium 

Multi-Role Combat Aircraft (MMRCA) acquisition program for 126 aircraft worth 

over $10 billion. OTM staff updated policy assessments for the MMRCA as the 

competition progressed through technical and field evaluations as well as policy 

assessments on the Indian FY 07 rollback of tariff exemptions for importation of 

general aviation aircraft into India. The net impact of the tariff placed an effective 

25 percent duty on fixed wing general aviation imports and an 18.5 percent duty 

on general aviation helicopter imports. Although the tariff exemption remained in 

effect in FY 09, OTM continued to work within Commerce and on an interagency 
basis to advocate for reinstatement of the tariff exemption in the next Indian bud- 79

get, scheduled for release in February 2010.

Industry and Trade Promotion

ITA’s U.S. and Foreign Commercial Service Aerospace Team recorded 148 

export successes in FY 09 valued at over $2 billion. An export success is an activity 

in which Department of Commerce personnel effectively assist a U.S. company 

with identifying new international sales channels or resolving an issue that is hindering an export sale. Commercial Service (CS) personnel impacted deals with 

small- and medium-sized companies, as well as larger corporations such as Boeing, 

Lockheed Martin, Raytheon, and Northrop Grumman.

The CS Aerospace Team held over 500 counseling sessions with U.S. aerospace 

companies, helping them to resolve international trade issues, identify new export 

markets, and develop strategies for entering those markets.

The CS Aerospace Team participated in 30 domestic and international aerospace trade events at which CS Aerospace Team members supported U.S. industry 

with one-on-one counseling sessions, arranged individualized business-to-business 

meetings with international business partners, and provided additional export 

counseling services. ITA also sponsored Aerospace Products Literature Centers 

(APLC) at several air shows, which offered low-cost, efficient venues for U.S. smallto medium-sized aerospace companies to explore international and niche aerospace 

markets. ITA trade show support generated hundreds of trade leads for participating companies, allowing them to enter or expand their exports to international 

markets. These international trade events included the Paris Air Show and Asian 

Aerospace, among others.

Bureau of Industry and Security

DOC’s Bureau of Industry and Security (BIS) participates in seminars specific to 

the civil aircraft industry to address ongoing export control issues. For example, BIS 

participated in the Paris Air Show in June 2009, providing a one-day seminar on 

export controls and conducting one-on-one meetings with industry representatives.
.
81Fiscal Year 2009 Activities

deparTmenT of The inTerior

DOI

During FY 09, agencies within the Department of the Interior (DOI) greatly 

expanded their use of remotely sensed data to assist them in their responsibilities. 

Traditional aerial photography, federally managed, commercially available, and 

foreign satellite data, as well as advanced radar data, were essential sources of data.

Additionally, many agencies within the Department drew on the expertise of 

sister agencies to more fully understand and apply remotely sensed data.

The National Park Service (NPS) has a long history and standing investment in remote sensing and GPS technologies. A wide range of its projects and 

programs have business requirements that utilize aerial and spaceborne platforms 

ranging from acquisition to applications and the use of imagery in reports and 

related products.

The Inventory and Monitoring (I&M) Program conducted 12 baseline inventories of over 270 parks spanning over 30 million acres of public lands. Geology, Soils, 

Vegetation, and Base Cartography are four surveys that provided important baseline 

inventories for the support of land management decisions. Every level of resolution 

of spacebased remote sensing is used by these efforts. For more information, see the 

I&M program brief at http://science.nature.nps.gov/im/assets/docs/IM_Program_Brief.pdf.

In 2009, the NPScapes project packaged data from Landsat Thematic Mapper 

(TM), National Land Cover Data, GAP Land Cover, and Landscape Fire and 

Resource Management Planning Tools Project (LANDFIRE), as well as various 

metrics from these data, for all of the NPS units in order to allow parks to start 

monitoring landscape dynamics in and around their units. This will be expanded 

in the future to include Land Cover data for all of North America derived from 

MODIS imagery and NOAA’s Coastal Change Analysis Program (C-CAP) data.
82Aeronautics and Space Report of the President

The Northeast Coastal and Barrier Network (NCBN) of the NPS I&M Program 

collaborated with the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) Florida Integrated Science 

Center to collect LIDAR data and aerial photography at Fire Island National 

Seashore and Gateway National Recreation Area to support the network’s coastal 

geomorphological monitoring program. These data are used to generate highly accu-

rate elevation models of beach, dune, and other coastal features and are used by park 

natural resource managers to assess rates of erosion and deposition. Ongoing moni-

toring of the NCBN coastal parks using LIDAR will also assist managers in assessing 

the effects of climate change (such as sea-level rise) on these coastal systems.

Many park vegetation maps utilized remote sensing, with 9 million acres 

mapped, 8.2 million acres underway, and 12 million remaining. The use of the 

U.S. Department of Agriculture’s (USDA) National Agriculture Imagery Program 

(NAIP) resources, sometimes coupled with Landsat TM and a variety of com-

mercial SPOT, QuickBird, and IKONOS products, are used to support these map-

ping inventories. (For more information, see the Vegetation Inventory Brief at 

http://science.nature.nps.gov/im/inventory/veg/index.cfm.) GPS is also a critical tool in 

checking field data, accuracy assessments, and project mapping. The use of Continuous 

Operating Referenced Stations (CORS) data and the National Differential GPS sys-

tem maintained by the U.S. Coast Guard are critical tools in resource assessments.

U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service staff will be collocating with the NPS I&M 

program in Colorado to stand up a set of I&M parallel efforts for Wildlife Refuges. 

Sharing of resources, techniques, and space-based data will be a critical tool for 

this new joint effort. This data sharing and teamwork will demonstrate agency 

collaboration and leverage data collection and analysis efforts as part of the new, 

changing climate-based initiative.

The NPS’s I&M Program, Southwest Alaska Network, used a combination of 

high-resolution IKONOS imagery, Landsat data, and historical aerial photographs 

to quantify decadal changes in glacier ice cover (1973–2002) and to document land 

cover change (1955–2005) in three national park units. In addition, MODIS data 

assisted in documenting seasonal variation in lake ice and in calculating growing 

season metrics across the study region.

Using Landsat data, the Southwest Alaska Network, in cooperation with NASA, 

quantified current glacial extent and changes in ice cover over a roughly 30-year 
83Fiscal Year 2009 Activities

period in Kenai Fjords, Katmai, and Lake Clark National Park and Preserve. 

Scientists used automated classification techniques and manual interpretation 

to delineate ice boundaries. In addition, the NPS and USGS developed baseline 

Digital Elevation Models for the Bear and Exit Glaciers using LIDAR data acquired 

through a partnership grant.

Under an Interagency Agreement with the U.S. Forest Service’s (USFS) Pacific 

Northwest Research Station, the Southwest Alaska Network developed methods 

for using Landsat data to detect changes in land cover in Lake Clark National 

Park and Preserve (1987–2005), including loss of tree cover due to fire or insect 

outbreaks, shrub establishment on glacial outwash and/or abandoned river channels, and pond drying. The new analytical approach resulted in more stable and 

thematically consistent labels for changes occurring on the landscape and better 

integration of information from existing land cover maps. Additional funding from 

NASA supported the analysis of scenes from Katmai National Park and Preserve.

Evaluating approximately 423,952 acres of parklands, researchers generated 

wildland fire burn severity products from Landsat data for 18 fires that occurred 

between 2005 and 2007 within Alaska national parks. Resulting data products 

included burn severity datasets and detailed fire perimeters, which NPS distributed 

to park staff and public users.

A University of Colorado research team, in coordination with the Alaska 

Arctic Inventory and Monitoring Network, assessed rates of coastal erosion and 

accretion along the shores of Bering Land Bridge National Preserve and Cape 

Krusenstern National Monument. The team used repeat aerial photography 

with time series from the 1950s, 1980s, and 2003, as well as IKONOS satellite 

imagery, to determine coastline changes. Comparisons of the imagery showed 

significant changes to the 450 kilometers of coastline along the park shorelines. 

These changes affect animal habitat, water, soil, permafrost, and other aspects of 

coastal ecosystems, cultural resources, and local communities. The project will 

assist NPS in developing protocols to continue acquiring aerial photographs and 

satellite imagery for long-term monitoring of the coastline.

NPS Yellowstone National Park staff used a temporal series of high-resolution 

(1-meter resolution or less) commercial imagery and Landsat-derived Normalized 

Burn Ratio products to delineate stand-replacing fire effects from 1988 to the 
84Aeronautics and Space Report of the President

present in Yellowstone National Park. The park purchased 1,600 square kilome-

ters of QuickBird 2-foot-resolution imagery along road corridors and developed 

areas. This imagery will be used for multiple park projects, including updating 

buildings, roads, utilities, vegetation, and trails in GIS data layers. Since highresolution imagery became the de facto background base map for park operations maps, the QuickBird imagery will also be used as background imagery for 

cartographic products.

Starting in 2005, the NPS became the Interior sponsoring agency for the 

Monitoring Trends in Burn Severity (MTBS) project as a joint venture between 

DOI and USFS with the USGS and the USFS Remote Sensing Application Center 

(RSAC) responsible for the project. The project will map all wildland and pre-

scribed fires greater than 1,000 acres in the west and 500 acres in the east from the 

present back to the early 1980s.

Yellowstone Park staff worked with researchers at Idaho State University to quan-

tify high-alpine vegetation change over time using current and historic remotely 

sensed imagery. Historical aerial photo negatives of Yellowstone National Park 

and the surrounding high alpine areas, from USGS Earth Resources Observation 

and Science (EROS) Center, were scanned to digital format. Landsat, IKONOS, 

QuickBird, and WorldView satellite imagery was also pulled from archive, and new 

satellite tasking was ordered for the study areas.

Natural Resource staff used Landsat-derived products to run models developed 

by the Yellowstone Ecological Research Center and the NASA Ames Research 

Center. The models were designed to predict the amount of forage available at the 

end of the growing season, which may affect the movement of ungulate species 

such as bison, elk, deer, and pronghorn. Archival Landsat imagery and GPS collar 

locations of bison were used to test the model for 1990 through the present.

Envisat Advanced Along-Track Scanning Radiometer (ASAR) image data 

(radar) collected during Hurricane Ike provided the first satellite view of surge 

flooding in southwest Louisiana. (Extensive cloud cover prevented useable optical 

satellite image collections.) The ASAR images were used by the Federal Emergency 

Management Agency (FEMA) to support search and rescue planning and efforts.

Staff members from the USGS Biological Resources Discipline participated in 

the USGS initiative to build a civil-operational radar remote sensing system to 
provide national strategic mapping of land deformation and water issues. If success- 85

ful, the USGS program will build on established satellite optical and radar abilities 

to map risks and resource sustainability related to (1) land deformation related to 

subsurface extractions and injections, (2) deformations related to volcanic activities and crustal movements, and (3) changing surface and canopy subsurface water 

inundation extents and depths.

The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS) used a diverse set of remotely sensed 

data, from traditional aerial images to satellite radar imagery, for a wide variety of 

habitat and land management activities as varied as habitat, wetland and vegetation 

mapping; monitoring fish and wildlife populations; refuge management; trend analysis 

and modeling; climate change mapping; and strategic habitat conservation planning.

Despite a relatively small budget allocation for direct funding of remote sensing 

programs, the FWS contributed toward the Multi-Resolution Land Characteristics 

(MRLC) program, which used Landsat datasets to create the National Land Cover 

Dataset (NLCD) and NAIP.

Starting with North Carolina in the FWS’s Southeast Region, multiple return 

LIDAR data from the North Carolina Floodplain Mapping Program were processed 

using free, open source, geospatial software to complete a forest canopy height 

model for all of North Carolina. This canopy height model was then compared 

to known nesting locations of different bird species to derive species preference 

models for canopy heights. A simulated 1-meter sea level rise was also applied using 

the North Carolina Floodplain Mapping 20-foot elevation grid. The resulting mask 

was used to approximate the impact of sea level rise on different canopy height 

classes along the North Carolina coast.

Bare earth digital elevation model (DEM) data generated from LIDAR data were 

used for a variety of purposes:

• 

• 

• 

to determine the wildlife-friendly lighting ordinance zone boundary along 

the coastline of Walton County, Florida;

to determine the lands of the Perdido Key beach mouse range that potentially would be available to the mouse if there were a 100-year flood event 

within the area; and

as part of a predictive distribution model for the Godfrey’s butterwort 

(Pinguicula ionantha).
86 The Gulf Coast Joint Venture (GCJV) used a combination of aerial photography 

and satellite imagery to develop habitat models for priority bird species along the 

western Gulf Coast. The GCJV used both USGS digital orthophotographs and 

USDA NAIP orthophotographs for estimating the amount of available foraging 

habitat for wintering waterfowl in emergent coastal marshes. Landsat imagery was 

used to model pond use by redhead ducks for protection and enhancement of ponds 

based on available shallow shoal grass, distance to freshwater basins from foraging sites, and degree of isolation and permanence. The GCJV also used Landsat 

imagery to develop estimates of seasonal surface water on agricultural landscapes 

for wintering waterfowl and fall migrating shorebirds.

In the FWS Division of Bird Habitat Conservation, joint ventures rely on 

remotely sensed data to provide information on habitat restoration, inventory, and 

management. Most joint ventures use National Wetland Inventory and NLCD 

datasets and, in some years, acquire aerial photographs to assess habitat conditions 

and report progress in wetland restoration. In central Nebraska, the Rainwater 

Basin Joint Venture (RWBJV) collected the final season of 2-foot resolution color 

infrared (CIR) aerial photography as part of a five-year project (2004–2009) to document spring wetland conditions. RWBJV also acquired LIDAR data to delineate 

wetlands and create hydrologic models to prioritize wetland restoration efforts. The 

Atlantic Coast Joint Venture (ACJV) used land-cover data derived from Landsat 

imagery in a variety of analyses to support the conservation of bird habitat from 

Florida to Maine. In the Southeast Region, ACJV used the data from USGS’s 

Southeast ReGAP project to determine the capacity of the existing landscape to 

support populations of priority species. One research project used these data to 

predict future land cover to evaluate the likelihood of alternative management 

scenarios for maintaining bird populations (e.g., to the year 2100). Also, landscape 

metrics such as percent cover, amount of edge, and contagion were computed for 

use in modeling species’ response to vegetative characteristics.

Other uses of remotely sensed land cover data included the development of energetic (i.e., kilocalorie) surfaces that were input into the development of a migration model and general land cover summary statistics assessment of net landscape 

changes in the ACJV administrative boundary. During 2009, the ACJV initiated 

a project in collaboration with USGS that used LIDAR data to assess the impact 
of sea level rise on populations of priority bird species in salt marshes in the mid- 87

Atlantic and New England portion of the joint venture. The ACJV also used DEMs 

to calculate landscape metrics (e.g., slope, aspect, or surface roughness) that were 

useful in modeling species response to landscape features. The ACJV supported 

a project that used NEXRAD data to map bird migration hot spots. These data 

were useful in determining areas that are important in maintaining populations of 

migratory species but are not commonly considered when developing focus areas 

for conservation actions.

The 2008 Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) “Climate 

Change and Water Technical Paper” described wetlands as the most vulnerable 

habitat on Earth. As a result, the need to map and monitor wetland habitats 

substantially increased, not only for habitat and landscape planning, but also for 

assessing climate change impacts on fish, wildlife, and human resources. User surveys confirmed the need to provide updated current wetland maps on a five-year 

cycle. Currently, the National Wetland Inventory is at a 100-year update schedule.

The FWS is the lead Federal agency for a publication produced by the Office of 

Management and Budget (OMB) through the National Wetland Inventory program, Circular A-16: “National Spatial Data Infrastructure (NSDI) Wetland Data 

Theme.” In 2009, the National Wetland Inventory became the endorsed Federal 

Geographic Data Committee standard. The National Wetland Inventory began 

over 30 years ago by mapping wetland types using USGS spring, leaf-off, highaltitude, black-and-white/color infrared aerial photographs using the Cowardin 

classification system. Today, due to the lack of a national program for spring imagery, the National Wetland Inventory uses a variety of state or local government–

acquired spring, leaf-off, CIR aerial digital imagery to inventory and update wetland 

maps. The USDA’s NAIP imagery is sometimes used when current spring, leaf-off 

imagery is not available.

Dissolved organic material (DOM) exported from land complicates the remote 

sensing of water quality in coastal waters by NASA satellites. However, the variability of DOM chemistry is a useful indicator of watershed processes. As such, 

it can be used to monitor climate effects on carbon cycling by identifying trends 

in land-to-sea carbon transport as a function of changing precipitation patterns. 

USGS scientists in the Water Resources Discipline (National Research Program, 
88 Boulder, Colorado, and Maine Water Science Center), in association with oceanographers at the Bigelow Laboratory for Ocean Sciences, conducted a project 

designed to study DOM in the Penobscot River, its influences on the DOM in the 

Gulf of Maine, and the complications posed by its presence on remote sensing of 

water quality in the Gulf of Maine by NASA satellites. Results showed that high 

rates of river discharge during fall storms export the greatest amount of DOM per 

unit area of the watershed. In addition, large variations in exported DOM were 

observed throughout the year. These large interannual variations were related to 

strong upward trends in the absorption properties of DOM and detritus over the 

entire Gulf of Maine. They were incorporated into algorithms designed to utilize 

satellite-derived absorption data (MODIS) to determine DOM concentrations in 

the Gulf of Maine.

The Bureau of Land Management (BLM) used an array of remote sensing technologies to inventory, monitor, and address concerns about resource conditions 

and energy and mineral resource extraction on public lands. The technologies 

ranged from simple digital cameras to global-monitoring satellites (e.g., MODIS, 

Landsat). The BLM recognizes two intrinsic values that are uniquely provided by 

remote sensing: providing data that can be used at multiple scales (from plot level 

to Western U.S.) and providing consistent/quantifiable data over time. Both these 

values provide the foundation to support BLM’s long-term resource management 

and monitoring goals.

In FY 09, BLM made its largest single-year acquisition ever of the USDA 

NAIP orthoimagery. NAIP full-state imagery was acquired for nine western 

states—California, Colorado, Idaho, Montana, Nevada, New Mexico, Oregon, 

Washington, and Wyoming. Due to the massive landscapes covered by the NAIP 

program, this imagery dataset proved to be the de facto base orthoimagery dataset 

for the BLM. It can be used for change detection studies and surface disturbance 

delineation; road development updates and route inventory creation crucial to 

planning efforts; characterization of land exchanges, mining, reclamation and recreation facilities; monitoring the health of rangelands and oil and gas development 

impacts; and vegetation treatments, fire planning, and trespass studies.

Traditionally, and for 2009, the widest use of remote sensing data was for firerelated activities. Most of the activities centered on interpretation of active fires, 
post-fire perimeter delineation, and vegetation classification for fire/fuel risk model- 89

ing and disturbance mapping. However, the utility of remote sensing data goes far 

beyond the fire world. BLM, with its partners, conducted a large range of natural 

resource management projects that leveraged remote sensing data and analyses to 

support the BLM mission.

BLM Oregon partnered with multiple agencies to capture LIDAR data in 2007. 

These data were processed in 2009 to provide updated forest stand inventory at 

an estimated cost savings of greater than 60 percent. The inventory also proved 

to be more accurate than traditional methods because the data were derived from 

measurements throughout the area rather than interpreted from sample sites.

The BLM in Utah supported the national Forest Vegetation Information 

System forest inventory program by mapping 1.2 million acres of vegetation 

cover types including forest stands, woodlands, shrubs, grasses, agriculture, and 

urban areas. Both aerial photography and Landsat data were used in the model, 

as well as several indices depicting vegetation, slope, aspect, elevation, and other 

statistical representatives.

In 2008, the Billings, Montana, Field Office began work on a new resource 

management plan (RMP). From the planning development standpoint, resource 

specialists needed a baseline description of vegetation within the planning area 

to support monitoring management effectiveness over time. To fill this baseline 

need, BLM contracted USGS EROS Center to apply their continuous field mapping techniques to develop local and regional scale models of vegetation covering 

90 percent of the field office boundary. Eight model components were generated 

for this project: continuous field estimates (from 1 to 100 percent) of percentage of bare ground, herbaceous plants (grass and forb), shrub, litter, sagebrush, 

big sagebrush, Wyoming sagebrush, and vegetation height. USGS successfully 

completed this mapping work and, in 2009, integrated these continuous field data 

to produce a variety of derived habitat mapping products for resource management 

planning activities.

Change detection and surface disturbance analysis studies were completed in the 

BLM Wyoming Buffalo Field Office. The Powder River Basin Oil and Gas Project 

Environmental Impact Statement was approved in 2003. The Environmental 

Impact Statement included limits for surface disturbance due to oil and gas 
90 development and required monitoring of this disturbance for development planning. The study evaluated the level of disturbance by computing the areas and 

acreage of disturbance.

Both true color and color infrared aerial 2006 NAIP photographs were used to 

delineate potential habitat for the Pine Nut Mountains Ivesia, a rare endemic species known to occur only within the higher elevations of the Pine Nut Mountains 

in western Nevada. Remote sensing greatly improved the efficiency and effectiveness of locating likely habitat based on vegetative reflectance and ground texture.

BLM continued to be a leader in the field of photogrammetry, having pioneered 

the use of close-range and traditional photogrammetry for a host of applications, 

such as cultural resource preservation and quantifying erosion impacts due to offhighway vehicle activity, hazardous waste management, engineering projects, and 

boundary dispute litigation.

The Astrogeology Science Center of the USGS continued to be involved 

heavily in the Mars Exploration Rovers (MER) mission, whose twin rovers, Spirit 

and Opportunity, both surpassed 2,100 sols (Martian days) of surface operations in FY 09. Since the rovers’ landings in January 2004, USGS Astrogeology 

Science Center members led efforts to plan, acquire, archive, and interpret data 

from the rover cameras, principally the Microscopic Imager on the instrument 

arm. They also analyzed color Panoramic Camera data of rocks, soils, and active 

processes on the surface of Mars. The USGS also contributed leadership to the 

Science Operations Working Group to plan each day of rover operations, working alongside science team members throughout the world and engineers at the 

Jet Propulsion Laboratory.

USGS scientists mapped minerals on Mars with the NASA Mars Reconnaissance 

Orbiter. Using the Compact Reconnaissance Imaging Spectrometer for Mars 

(CRISM) and High Resolution Imaging Science Experiment (HiRISE) imager, 

USGS scientists, working with other scientists, discovered an ancient acid-saline 

lake deposit consisting of layered clay and sulfate minerals in the bottom of Cross 

Crater, located in the southern highlands of Mars. This discovery added another 

piece to the emerging picture of early Mars and provided insights that may help 

future rover missions focus on the trail of water in their search for evidence of 

ancient life. A new, unnamed mineral was recognized spectrally from orbit above 
Mars at this site and others. Known by its simple chemical formula Fe(OH)SO4, 91

it is manufactured here on Earth for its desirable pigment properties. USGS 

implemented efforts to find a natural terrestrial occurrence so this mineral can be 

formally named.

The USGS Astrogeology Science Center directly supported the testing, calibration, operation, and analysis of images acquired by the HiRISE camera aboard the 

Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO). This camera provided the highest resolution 

images of Mars from orbit (equivalency of 30 centimeters/pixel) and will be used to 

certify future spacecraft landing sites for the 2011 Mars Science Laboratory rover 

and support numerous Mars science investigations.

USGS scientists from the Astrogeology and Crustal Imaging and 

Characterization Centers participated as science team members on the NASA 

Cassini-Huygens Mission to Saturn and its moon Titan. Their work included 

(1)  searching for seasonal changes in the lakes and larger seas of hydrocarbon 

around Titan’s north pole, detecting a mirror-like reflection from the northern seas 

at infrared wavelengths, and investigating lakes near the south pole with radar for 

the first time; (2) monitoring Titan’s rotation, which suggests that the body may 

have an internal ocean, by comparing the latest radar images with older ones of 

the same area; (3) generating digital elevation models of Titan from stereo pairs 

of radar images, including a complete map of the north polar region, to provide 

quantitative information about liquid transport, ice volcanism, dune activity, and 

other processes; (4) producing a set of high-level Titan map products containing all 

prime-mission radar observations, including image mosaics, topographic models, 

and maps of microwave emission and scattering properties relevant to understanding surface composition; (5) producing a complete set of maps of Titan with multiple color images from the Visual-Infrared Mapping Spectrometer; (6) mapping 

the composition of Saturn’s rings and satellites; (7) representing science teams for 

planning future observations; and (8) calibrating returned imaging spectroscopy 

data. USGS scientists led or contributed to authoring several chapters in the 

book Titan from Cassini-Huygens, which is likely to remain the key reference for 

several decades.

USGS Crustal Imaging and Characterization Center scientists participated in 

the NASA/Indian Chandrayaan-1 mission, Moon Mineralogy Mapper. USGS 
92 imaging spectroscopy scientists made a major discovery of water and hydroxyl on 

the sunlit areas of the lunar surface, where many predicted it was impossible for 

it to exist. USGS scientists found water with two spacecraft: the Chandrayaan-1 

and Cassini.

Two scientists from the USGS Astrogeology Science Center were science 

instrument team members, and three were involved as participating scientists 

in the NASA LRO mission. This spacecraft is the first robotic precursor for the 

return of U.S. astronauts to the moon. LRO launched in June 2009 and has provided a wealth of data and images of the lunar surface useful for future planning. 

Astrogeology team members worked on exploration and identification of water ice 

at the lunar poles with LRO radar and radiometer data, studied unusual volcanic 

and impact crater deposits with camera data, and developed image mosaics and 

topographic maps of the surface to support future robotic and human in-situ lunar 

exploration. The Astrogeology Science Center also supported software development for the LRO radar and camera systems to produce image mosaics and topographic maps of the lunar surface and contributed to the development of standards 

for such mapping.

Computer scientists and cartographers from the USGS Astrogeology Science 

Center played key roles in making a global image mosaic of Mercury. Using images 

obtained by the MESSENGER spacecraft during its third flyby of Mercury (in 

2009), USGS team members assembled images from the previous two flybys and 

images from the Mariner 10 mission (1973) to assemble a large mosaic that will be 

vital to planning future observations of the planet when MESSENGER goes into 

an elliptical orbit around Mercury in 2011.

The Landsat Program is a joint effort of the USGS and NASA to gather Earth 

resource data using a series of land observing satellites. Whereas NASA’s role is 

the development and launch of Earth observing instruments and spacecraft, the 

USGS is responsible for flight operations, maintenance, and management of all 

ground data reception, processing, archiving, product generation, and distribution. 

A primary objective of the Landsat Program is to ensure a collection of consistently 

calibrated Earth imagery.

The Landsat Project at USGS manages two active satellites, Landsat 5 and 

Landsat 7, and the entire historical archive of data collected since 1972—more 
than 2.4 million images. In 2009, a change in data policy (no-charge, Web-enabled 93

data) transformed the distribution of Landsat data for scientists and operational 

users worldwide. As a result, more than 1.1 million Landsat images were delivered 

to customers! In 2009, the Landsat Project also reached milestones with both satellites. Landsat 5 celebrated 25 years in orbit, and Landsat 7 reached 10 years in 

orbit. With respective design lives of three years and five years, both of these satellites continued to provide essential data well beyond their expected lifespans. The 

Landsat team worked to extend the longevity of the satellites in orbit; enhance 

Landsat data quality; and improve the systems used to archive, process, and access 

Landsat data; it also led the design and development of the ground system for the 

upcoming Landsat Data Continuity Mission.

The USGS and NASA collaborated on the creation of several global land datasets derived from Landsat images: one from the 1970s and one each from circa 

1990 and 2000. Each global dataset was created from the primary Landsat sensor 

in use at the time: Multispectral Scanner (MSS) in the 1970s, TM in 1990, and 

Enhanced Thematic Mapper Plus (ETM+) in 2000.

To extend this multi-decadal Landsat data collection, NASA and the USGS 

again partnered to develop the Global Land Survey 2005 (GLS 2005), a new global 

land dataset with core acquisition dates from 2005 to 2006. The data consist of 

Landsat TM, ETM+, and Earth Observing-1 (EO-1) data, making GLS 2005 the 

first-ever global dataset derived from multiple sensors. The entire dataset neared 

completion in 2009 with more than 95 percent available for free download. Plans 

to collaborate on a GLS 2010 dataset were in the works and expected to begin in 

late 2009.

The Landsat Data Continuity Mission (LDCM) was the development phase for 

the next Landsat mission (Landsat 8). In 2009, the LDCM project responded to the 

challenges of new and evolving mission requirements. The original launch date of 

July 2011 was moved to December 2012 to satisfy NASA’s criteria for a 70 percent 

probability of meeting schedule and staying within budget.

Using images from the Landsat data archive, the USGS, in collaboration with 

the USFS, generated and provided access to burn severity assessments for thousands of fires from 1984 to 2007. In FY 09, all large historical fires were assessed 

for the southeastern United States as well as those that occurred in 2007 across all 
94 50 United States. Additionally, the USGS provided support to the LANDFIRE 

refresh effort where burn severity assessments for smaller fires are provided directly 

to the LANDFIRE project to support data product updates. Burn severity data 

are used to monitor vegetation recovery and analyze long-term fire effects. They 

facilitate the assessment of ecological or socioeconomic factors that are affected by 

wildland fire. These data are used to study the effectiveness of management practices implemented in response to the National Fire Plan and the Healthy Forest 

Restoration Act.

Climate change effects are being seen in high northern latitudes more dramatically than in other parts of the globe. Understanding how climate change 

will impact permafrost, carbon dynamics, and watershed hydrology will help scientists predict future ecosystem responses. Cooperation with the Canada Centre 

for Remote Sensing (CCRS) allowed the USGS to secure Canadian imagery and 

examine the entire Yukon River Basin. Models and maps of vegetation change 

during the boreal forest growing season, a surrogate for ecosystem productivity, 

were produced from interpolated weather and site potential using MODIS data at a 

resolution of 250 meters (CCRS MODIS and eMODIS products). Projected productivity maps were then compared to actual productivity maps to identify anomalous 

areas, those that are more or less productive than expected during any given year’s 

weather conditions. This approach accounted for inter-annual variations associated 

with weather to reveal effects caused by insect infestation, fires, changed drainage 

patterns, and permafrost degradation, all of which are of increasing concern as 

warming continues. Anomalous areas that are persistent over multiple years are 

mapped and can be used by modelers to account for disturbances in boreal forests 

of the Yukon River Basin.

In 2009, USGS scientists and their counterparts in West African countries 

completed a major effort to use Landsat imagery to map land use and land cover 

of much of West Africa for 1975 and 2000. This was the culmination of a project carried out collaboratively with the Agricultural-Hydrological-Meteorological 

(AGRHYMET) Regional Center in Niger and partners from 12  participating 

countries, with support from the U.S. Agency for International Development. 

Environmental scientists from each country were trained in the analysis, mapping, 

and monitoring of trends in land resources using a wealth of Landsat imagery 
spanning nearly 30 years. The mapping was done on a national level. To map 95

this vast region efficiently and quickly, the USGS scientists developed a special 

tool called the Rapid Land Cover Mapper. It is a vector-raster hybrid approach 

that lends itself to time-series land use and land cover mapping. The new results 

provided West African land managers with a better understanding of the land 

use/land cover patterns and trends in each country. The information is used by 

the Inter-Governmental Authority on Combating Drought in the Sahel (CILSS), 

particularly in their food security and natural resource management programs.

Remote sensing project activities in the Office of Surface Mining (OSM) 

included the continuation of a two-year pilot project working with USGS and the 

National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency. The project determined the best methods for the acquisition and delivery of image data, products, and services for the 

OSM regulatory program and determined which remote image data products and 

services support virtual inspection. The state of West Virginia used high-resolution 

satellite imagery for determining approximate original contours in support of the 

state’s regulatory program and realized cost savings over the use of GPS field devices 

on the ground.

OSM staff used high-resolution satellite imagery along with other geospatial 

tools to inventory abandoned mine sites in Virginia. This resulted in the identification of acid mine drainage sites, dangerous high walls, apple cores, gob piles, and 

spoil piles.

Remote sensing education outreach is an integral part of the program. OSM 

staff conducted a “Basics of Remote Sensing” course at the 2009 American Society 

for Mining and Reclamation Conference. The use of remotely sensed imagery to 

support on-the-ground Surface Mining Control and Reclamation Act activities will 

continue in FY 11.

In FY 09, USGS worked with universities, local agencies, and the Plate Boundary 

Observatory (PBO) component of the National Science Foundation’s EarthScope 

program to conduct geodetic investigations using GPS, LIDAR, Interferometric 

Synthetic Aperture Radar (InSAR), creepmeters, and sensitive long baseline and 

borehole strainmeters. To address the problem of earthquake hazards in the urban 

Los Angeles region, the USGS operated approximately 100 continuous GPS stations along the San Andreas Fault and in the densely populated urban area and 
96 processed data from state-of-the-art, continuously operating GPS stations operated 

by the Scripps Institution of Oceanography and the Plate Boundary Observatory. 

In addition, the USGS worked with partners to use LIDAR and InSAR data to 

quickly and accurately produce large aerial maps of pre- and post-earthquake 

land deformation.

High-resolution LIDAR data identified active faults in Oregon and Washington 

that have the potential to generate damaging earthquakes. The USGS used funds 

from the multi-hazards initiative to collect and analyze LIDAR data in four at-risk 

areas in Oregon and Washington. In the Portland area, LIDAR studies identified 

sites for field studies for clarifying whether the Gales Creek fault had slipped in 

the recent geologic past and thus remains a hazard. Near Mount Hood, LIDAR 

revealed a set of faults, each with about two meters of surface displacement, which 

may be part of the southern extension of the Saint Helens seismic zone. This will 

be the subject of further investigations by the USGS and the Oregon Department 

of Geology and Mineral Industries (DOGAMI). In eastern Washington, LIDAR 

studies identified a major north-south fault that is approximately perpendicular 

to faults previously mapped in the Yakima fold and thrust belt in the Columbia 

Plateau. Finally, LIDAR was used to analyze the potential interaction of faults in 

the Cascade Range and the Yakima fold and thrust belt in central Washington, 

where a massive landslide occurred on October 14, 2009.

Satellite InSAR and GPS are essential elements of the USGS’s volcano hazards 

mitigation strategy. The USGS used InSAR and GPS data to track minute surface 

motion due to volcanic processes in Hawaii; the Cascade Range of Washington, 

Oregon, and California; Yellowstone, Wyoming; Long Valley, California; and the 

Aleutian volcanoes of Alaska. USGS scientists used these data to model the subsurface flow of water and molten rock, including the depth and volume of new 

magma under a volcano.

A team of scientists from Washington State University, the Jet Propulsion 

Laboratory, and the USGS’s Cascade Volcano Observatory developed a prototype 

rapid-deployment hazard monitoring instrumentation network and applied it to volcano monitoring. The Optimized Autonomous Space In-Situ Sensor-web (OASIS) 

has two-way communication capability between ground and satellites, uses ground 

and space data for optimal allocation of power and bandwidth resources to send 
data to the observatory, and can autonomously request the re-tasking of satellites if 97

monitoring data suggest a significant change in monitoring parameters. The sensorweb can also reconfigure itself for the best data pathway, for example, if ash in the 

air from explosive eruptions blocks monitoring signals or if a station in the web is 

destroyed. Helicopters can rapidly deploy the sensor-web without landing, thereby 

minimizing risk to scientists. The team successfully tested the system on Mount St. 

Helens. Future applications include response to unrest at unmonitored volcanoes 

in foreign countries, response to natural and human-caused disasters where conditions on the ground are hazardous, and planetary exploration.

USGS scientists from the Geologic Hazards Team and the USGS EROS Center, 

in collaboration with the China Geological Survey and funded in part by the 

U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) Office of Foreign Disaster 

Assistance (OFDA), began assessing the distribution and influence of geologic, 

topographic, and ground-shaking conditions on the hundreds of thousands of 

landslides triggered by the 2008 Wenchuan earthquake in the Himalayan foothills in Sichuan, China. For this work, they relied on data from the Shuttle Radar 

Topography Mission and ASTER topography from the Terra mission, along with 

imagery from the QuickBird, IKONOS, and WorldView-1 sensors.

The Bureau of Reclamation continued its use of Landsat TM satellite imagery, 

digital aerial imagery and LIDAR data in its water resource management mission. 

Reclamation used digital aerial multispectral and thermal imagery to map riparian 

and in-stream habitat to support salmon recovery activities in the Columbia and 

San Joaquin River Basins. Reclamation also used LIDAR data supplemented with 

GPS and ground survey data to produce digital representations of river channel 

and floodplain topography. These elevation data were input to hydraulic models, 

which predicted river flow velocities and depths at a number of river discharge scenarios. Model results helped characterize riverine habitat for fish species at specific 

river discharges and estimate potential loss of life and economic damage arising 

from hypothetical dam failure scenarios.

Reclamation also used remotely sensed data to estimate consumptive water use 

from agricultural crops, riparian vegetation, and open water in the Central Valley 

of California; in the Newlands Irrigation Project, Nevada; and at several locations 

within the Colorado River Basin. Consumptive water use data are required in the 
98 monitoring of water use compacts and in the verification of compliance with fallowing programs associated with water conservation programs. Evapotranspiration 

was estimated using both energy balance models and models based on land cover 

maps. Energy balance models use estimates of net radiation, soil heat flux, and 

sensible heat flux derived from a time series of image and surface-measured data 

to produce spatially varying maps of evapotranspiration. The land cover approach 

applies theoretical water use curves to vegetation class acreages obtained from 

maps generated from remotely sensed imagery.

The Gulf of Mexico Regional Office’s Minerals Management Service’s (MMS) 

and ESA’s World Fire Atlas Data group began a fully collaborative effort to improve 

detection of natural gas flaring events from Gulf of Mexico Federal waters. ESA used 

the Advanced Along-Track Scanning Radiometer (AATSR) sensor onboard Envisat 

to collect world-wide fire event and hot spot data. ESA’s World Fire Atlas Data have 

been collected since late 1995. Unique to ESA’s data collection is the ability to 

record fire events from offshore oil and natural gas production operations. Gulf of 

Mexico natural gas flaring is an MMS-regulated production activity. The ESA group 

developed a new proprietary processing algorithm with improved detection sensitivity. ESA provided flare event data to MMS using the new algorithm; MMS provided 

in-situ data of detected flares to enhance satellite calibration operations.

Approximately 135 production platforms were destroyed by Hurricanes Ivan in 

2004, Katrina and Rita in 2005, and Gustav and Ike in 2008. To assist in future 

post-storm infrastructure assessment, MMS, in collaboration with NOAA, collected baseline synthetic aperture radar (SAR) imagery of production infrastructure in the Gulf. The baseline data will be compared to SAR imagery collected 

post-hurricane to identify infrastructure destruction, damage, and oil spills. 

Approximately 20 to 25 percent of the domestic production of natural gas and 

crude oil comes from the Gulf. In 2009, there were over 3,500 fixed oil and gas production platforms in the Federal waters of the Gulf. These structures are connected 

by thousands of miles of seafloor pipelines that ultimately tie into onshore production and processing facilities. Post-storm SAR imagery will allow MMS to rapidly assess destruction and damage to infrastructure, identify oil spills, document 

navigation hazards, assess the impact to human health and safety, and respond to 

potential environmental damage.
The USGS conducted a national-scale assessment of the potential for ecosystem 99

carbon sequestration under various climate, policy, and land use change scenarios, 

as required by Section 712 of the Energy Independence Security Act of 2007. The 

disturbance modeling team, composed of interdisciplinary scientists, produced 

a series of statistical and process-based models that predict future disturbances, 

including wildfires and insect outbreaks. These models rely heavily on datasets 

derived from remotely sensed imagery, especially from the Landsat and MODIS 

sensors. The USGS is leading the development of the disturbance modeling effort 

with the objective of producing disturbance models for the southern Mississippi 

River Valley, the prototype assessment area.

USGS scientists used NAIP imagery to identify and inventory the environmental impacts of wind-energy infrastructure development. The features mapped 

include individual turbines, roads, and power lines. The mapping was done on a 

subset of wind generation facilities across the nation, specifically chosen to vary in 

turbine capacity, overall facility size (number of turbines), topography (flat plains, 

ridgelines, and hilly regions), and land use (farmland, brown fields, and natural 

habitat). The new maps provide baseline data for understanding how aspects of 

wind production (turbine spacing, energy output, capacity factor, and levels of disturbed land) change with the aforementioned variables. To date, the majority of 

studies projecting wind energy market penetration estimate land surface requirements of wind power with theoretical relationships that relate the power in wind at 

a known wind speed and blade height to the area of land required to capture this 

wind. The mapping and modeling done by USGS scientists will allow empirical 

estimates to replace theoretical relationships and more fully specify the effects of 

geographic location, topography, and land use effects on wind energy production. 

This will improve future projections and optimize the placement of wind generation facilities within the U.S.

Rapid Assessment of Values at Risk (RAVAR) is a modeling effort that provides 

dollar estimates of values (structures, infrastructure, etc.) as well as assessments 

of nonmonetary values such as critical habitats that are threatened by a wildfire. 

When county-level parcel data are not available, the USFS requests that the USGS 

conduct an analysis of remotely sensed imagery to identify structures located 

within the area of concern. The NAIP photography has served as the primary 
100 source of imagery. On average, the USGS has provided the locations of over 11,000 

structures for fifty 1:24,000 scale, 7.5-minute quadrangles to the USFS for analysis 

and use by the fire science and incident support communities. Response time from 

request to data provisioning is normally around five hours.

USGS scientists developed indicators for use in long-term monitoring programs 

in the Wyoming Land Conservation Initiative (WLCI). In order to identify and 

prioritize indicators for monitoring, scientists used conceptual models of how major 

ecosystems in the WLCI respond to anthropogenic stressors. The conceptual models were used by local planning teams for more effective land use decisions. Efforts 

are underway to develop dynamic land change modeling scenarios to simulate the 

multiplicative effects of energy development and climate change on native vegetation and a suite of exotic plant species.

The USGS is conducting multi-year monitoring and analysis of land use and 

land cover change for the Nation and its ecological regions using the extensive 

Landsat data archive and other information. The project, conducted in conjunction with NASA and the Environmental Protection Agency, completed the 

development of the Great Plains land cover change database, a synthesis report of 

results, and conducted preliminary analyses of the implications of contemporary 

land transformation. The analyses provided valuable information about the rates, 

causes, and consequences of land use change in the Great Plains region since 1973. 

Additionally, an analysis of land cover trends in the ecoregions of the East, using 

a land cover change database completed in prior years, was completed. The study 

showed that recent land use pressures from timber-cutting cycles, urbanization, 

and other land use demands caused a significant decline in eastern U.S. forest 

cover, which triggered an important transition from gain of regional forest cover 

to loss of forest cover. Information from the Great Plains and eastern U.S. studies 

were used to develop estimates of the land use impact on ecological processes 

including carbon sequestration, to understand future scenarios of change, and to 

develop future forecasting capabilities. Subsequent years will focus on the West and 

Midwest, as well as a national synthesis of land use and land cover trends.

The USGS made declassified images from the Global Fiducials Library (GFL) 

available to the public. To support researchers and policy makers in identifying and 

understanding long-term environmental trends and processes, the GFL maintains a 
long-term archive of images from U.S. National Imagery Systems for selected envi- 101

ronmentally sensitive and scientifically important sites. These images are released 

to the public through the Global Fiducials Library Web site: http://gfl.usgs.gov.

The outbreak of mountain pine beetle (MPB), Dendroctonus ponderosae, that 

killed millions of lodgepole pine trees west of the Continental Divide started to 

spread across the eastern slopes of the Rocky Mountains in Colorado. This epidemic represents a major potential disturbance to ecosystems and communities in 

Colorado’s Front Range, where many of the state’s residents and visitors draw on 

ecosystem services such as clean water and diverse recreation opportunities. USGS 

scientists investigated the possible ecological and social impacts of the MPB epidemic in a field study that collected extensive data on forest health, insect activity, 

management history, fire fuels, etc., at 40 sites along the Front Range. To assess 

conifer health in Grand County, Colorado, the USGS developed methodology 

for the use of moderate-resolution remotely sensed imagery. Landsat and ASTER 

multispectral sensors were employed for this effort because their spatial resolution 

is discrete enough to characterize health conditions at forest landscape level, they 

cover a suitably large geographic mapping area, and they are cost-effective.

The USGS Unmanned Aircraft Systems (UAS) Project Office led the implementation of an exciting new technology originally developed by the U.S. Army. 

This technology is used to monitor environmental conditions, analyze the impacts 

of climate change, respond to natural hazards, understand landscape change rates 

and consequences, conduct wildlife inventories, and support related land management missions. USGS teamed with the DOI’s Aviation Management Directorate 

(AMD) to lead the safe and cost-effective adoption of UAS technology by the DOI 

bureaus and USGS scientists. An important milestone was reached during 2009, 

when the USGS sponsored the first UAS training for DOI employees.

The Navajo Regional Office requested that the Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA) 

provide time series mosaics of different compositions such as burn scar detection, 

vegetation, and true color composites. The BIA processed 15 Landsat 7 ETM+ 

scenes per mosaic for each composition and pan-merged them. The time series 

covered the years from 1999 through 2003.
.
103 Fiscal Year 2009 Activities

federal CommuniCaTions

Commission

FCC

The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) formulates rules to facilitate the provision of commercial satellite services in the United States. It also 

issues licenses for the launch and operation of all nongovernmental U.S. satellites. 

Internationally, the FCC coordinates satellite radio-frequency usage with other 

countries. The FCC’s accomplishments for FY 09 related primarily to commercial 

communications satellites and Earth observation satellites.

The FCC took two significant actions in rule-making proceedings in FY 09. In 

one proceeding, the FCC adopted rules concerning vehicle-mounted earth stations. 

The rules include technical and licensing requirements for the use of Ku-band 

frequencies. The new rules were adopted in order to increase the potential that 

broadband communications capabilities will be made available for various emergency preparedness and commercial purposes where high-bandwidth, advanced 

mobile communications capabilities are beneficial. In a second proceeding, the 

FCC modified technical and licensing requirements for Earth Stations on Vessels 

(ESVs) operating in C- and Ku-band frequencies. ESVs are mobile transmitters 

that facilitate communications services, including broadband services and Internet 

access, to cruise ships, merchant ships, ferries, yachts, U.S. Navy vessels, and other 

maritime vessels that carry a stabilized satellite dish. The modified technical rules 

are designed to provide ESVs with greater operational flexibility while continuing 

to ensure that the other services are protected from harmful interference.

The FCC authorized a number of commercial communication satellite launches 

and operations. The authorizations are as follows:
104Aeronautics and Space Report of the President

• 

• 

• 

• 

January 9, 2009: to Intelsat for a geostationary satellite planned for the 

longitude 32.8° east orbit location.

February 23, 2009: to Northrop Grumman to construct, launch, and operate four geostationary satellites planned for the longitude 125° west, 73° 

west, 68.5° east, and 116.5° east orbit locations and to construct three 

non-geostationary satellites. The satellites were planned to operate in the 

Ka- and V-bands. Northrop Grumman relinquished this authorization at 

the deadline for submitting a required performance bond.

May 29, 2009: to Intelsat for a geostationary satellite planned for the lon-

gitude 58.1° west orbit location.

August 31, 2009: to XM Radio for a geostationary satellite planned for the 

longitude 85.2° west orbit location.

The FCC also began to authorize satellites for operations in the recently avail-

able 17-gigahertz (GHz) downlink band, as follows:

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

December 17, 2008: to Pegasus for a geostationary satellite planned for the 

longitude 115° west orbit location.

March 13, 2009: to EchoStar for a geostationary satellite planned for the 

longitude 62.15° west orbit location.

March 18, 2009: to EchoStar for a geostationary satellite planned for the 

longitude 75° west orbit location.

April 20, 2009: to EchoStar for a geostationary satellite planned for the 

longitude 79° west orbit location.

May 26, 2009: to Intelsat for a geostationary satellite planned for the lon-

gitude 95.15° west orbit location. Intelsat relinquished the authorization at 

the deadline for submitting a required performance bond.

June 15, 2009: to Intelsat for a geostationary satellite planned for the lon-

gitude 122.9° west orbit location. Intelsat relinquished the authorization at 

the deadline for submitting a required performance bond.

July 28, 2009: to Intelsat for geostationary satellites planned for the longi-

tude 90.9° west and 99.1° west orbit locations. Intelsat relinquished these 

authorizations at the deadline for submitting a required performance bond.

July 28, 2009: to DirecTV for geostationary satellites planned for the 

longitude 99.175° west, 102.825° west, 107° west, and 110.9° west orbit 
105 Fiscal Year 2009 Activities

locations. DirecTV relinquished the authorization for the 107° west orbit 

location at the deadline for submitting a required performance bond.

July 28, 2009: to EchoStar for geostationary satellites planned for the longitude 110.4° west and 107° west orbit locations.

July 28, 2009: to Pegasus for geostationary satellites planned for the longitude 107° west and 91° west orbit locations. Pegasus relinquished these 

authorizations at the deadline for submitting a required performance bond.

• 

• 

The FCC added one non-U.S.-licensed space station to the Commission’s permitted space station list in order to allow the space station to provide domestic and 

international satellite service to U.S. earth stations that have routine technical 

parameters. Specifically, on February 10, 2009, the FCC added the Netherlands’ 

NSS-9 space station to its permitted list for C-band frequencies.

On October 21, 2008, the FCC created a new list of satellites, the “I-Sat List,” in 

order to simplify the licensing of earth stations communicating using the Inmarsat 

satellite system. The FCC updated and modified that list on December 24, 2008; 

April 10, 2009; and September 8, 2009.

The FCC also granted a number of requests for non-US.-licensed space stations 

to provide service in the United States on a non-routine basis as listed below.

• 

• 

January 30, 2009: EchoStar received authorization to deploy terminals 

to receive direct-to-home service from the Ciel 2 satellite, licensed by 

Canada to operate at the longitude 129° west orbit location.

August 18, 2009: ViaSat reserved Ka-band spectrum for use with a satellite 

licensed by the Isle of Man, to be operated at the 115° west orbit location.

The FCC also remained active in international satellite coordination. In 

the first quarter of FY 09, the FCC reached a total of three Administration-toAdministration Coordination Agreements for U.S. networks with Sweden. In 

the second quarter of FY 09, the FCC reached a total of 343 Administration-toAdministration Coordination Agreements for U.S. networks with Canada, the 

Russian Federation, Japan, and Mexico. In the third quarter of FY 09, the FCC 

reached a total of 38 Administration-to-Administration Coordination Agreements 

for U.S. networks with Canada, Japan, and Spain. In the fourth quarter of FY 09, 

the FCC reached a total of 27 Administration-to-Administration Coordination 

Agreements for U.S. networks with Canada, Pakistan, and the Russian Federation.
.
107 Fiscal Year 2009 Activities

u.s. deparTmenT of 

agriCulTure

USDA

The mission of the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) is to provide leadership on food, agriculture, natural resources, and related issues, based on sound public 

policy, the best available science, and efficient management. Select departmental 

responsibilities include increasing the competitiveness and sustainability of rural 

and farm economies, improving the protection and safety of the Nation’s agriculture 

and food supply, and protecting and enhancing the Nation’s natural resource base 

and environment. Through a diverse range of research and operational applications, 

multiple USDA agencies demonstrated the value of remote sensing data and related 

technologies to support departmental activities. Although each agency had different 

responsibilities, several of these agencies shared data and technologies to ensure the 

most efficient and cost-effective use of USDA resources.

As the primary research agency for the USDA, the Agricultural Research Service 

(ARS) conducted research to solve problems relating to global food security, agricultural air quality, ecosystem health, biofuels, and climate change. ARS collaborated 

with NASA and other USDA agencies to develop technologies that would help each 

agency accomplish its mission. Partnerships with additional Federal agencies, universities, industry, and state governments were also integral to ARS research.

Water quality and quantity management was the largest area of emphasis for 

ARS remote sensing activities. Remote sensing research on soil moisture continued 

with the development of algorithms for soil moisture estimation from aircraft and 

satellites. ARS scientists also contributed to the development of the next generation of satellite remote sensing systems through the Soil Moisture Active-Passive 
108Aeronautics and Space Report of the President

(SMAP) mission, with three scientists serving on the Science Definition Team. 

Researchers demonstrated that thermal infrared (TIR) data could be used to 

map evapotranspiration and plant moisture stress on spatial scales ranging from 

within-field to continental. ARS scientists also showed that thermal infrared and 

multispectral visible, near-infrared, and shortwave infrared data could be used to 

schedule irrigation, perform spatially variable irrigation, map drought, and estimate 

soil moisture and vegetation canopy water content. Additional research into more 

efficient fertilizer application using remote sensing of crop nitrogen status demon-

strated reduced excess fertilizer losses to the environment, thus leading to improved 

water quality and better economic returns to farmers.

ARS developed a data assimilation system for merging land surface information 

from models and remote sensing into a single enhanced estimate of land surface 

variables including root-zone soil moisture, stream flow, and evapotranspiration. 

This data assimilation technique enhanced the value of remote sensing retriev-

als for monitoring key environmental variables as well as improved precipitation 

estimates from numerical weather-prediction models.

Scientists used remotely sensed information in the management of soil and 

nutrient resources via projects to map crop tillage practices, crop residue cover, and 

soil carbon. These applications proved important for conserving soil and water, 

sustaining soil quality, and sequestering carbon. Specific research on how winter 

cover crops reduced nitrogen runoff to sensitive ecosystems, like the Chesapeake 

Bay, used remote sensing to map and quantify the contributing landscapes. 

Similarly, radar remote sensing was developed as a tool to better understand and 

manage the fate of agrochemicals and sediment in coastal watersheds. In addition, 

ARS continued its collaboration with the National Agricultural Statistics Service 

(NASS) to develop soybean and corn production estimates from satellites, resulting 

in improved crop yield estimates at a significant cost savings.

ARS also used remote sensing to develop procedures to monitor the proliferation 

of invasive species in order to manage rangeland and to understand the impacts 

of climate change on managed and natural ecosystems. ARS researchers devel-

oped a rangeland decision support tool for public land management, incorporating 

remote sensing access via the Internet. Additionally, pest-management research 

was enhanced with airborne and satellite imagery. Both cattle fever tick and 
109 Fiscal Year 2009 Activities

screwworm flies were the focus of eradication and containment research, where 

remote sensing was used to map infestations and favorable habitats.

The National Institute of Food and Agriculture (NIFA) is the extramural 

research arm of the USDA. The NIFA primarily provided financial assistance in 

the form of grants to conduct high-priority agricultural research and education. 

The NIFA awarded many grants that used NASA data products to solve complex, 

environmentally related problems on topics such as land use, water and nutrient 

management, resource conservation, and pest management in forest and crop 

lands. A few examples of NIFA-supported research include the following:

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

characterizing uncertainty in land use/cover maps across the Upper Great 

Lake states region;

using remote sensing to examine nutrient and water use in deciduous 

perennial crops to provide growers with the ability to manage water and 

nitrogen with more efficiency;

developing and using remote sensing–based tools to evaluate the impacts 

of USDA conservation practices on environmental quality;

developing and testing remote sensing methods for automated and repeatable quantification of insect disturbance to Wisconsin forests; and

developing outbreak prediction models for the improvement of aphid pestmanagement strategies for Russian wheat.

The NIFA also funded long-term studies in Mississippi, Kentucky, Alabama, 

and Wisconsin that utilized remote sensing and geospatial technologies to develop 

precision management techniques for various agricultural production strategies and 

to evaluate land use practices. The NIFA and the Science Mission Directorate 

of NASA jointly funded several geospatial extension programs at land-grant, seagrant, and space-grant institutions. After NIFA/NASA funding terminated, these 

geospatial outreach programs continued to help train local and regional technologists in the use of NASA data products and geospatial technologies. By leveraging the ongoing coordination in these state geospatial programs in the realm of 

geospatial technologies (e.g., interoperability, standards, metadata, architecture), 

the geospatial extension specialists helped ensure that the vast quantity of data 

and information being collected by NASA and other Federal agencies was utilized 

effectively and shared more broadly with the public.
110Aeronautics and Space Report of the President

The United States Forest Service (USFS), in collaboration with NASA Goddard 

Space Flight Center (GSFC) and the University of Maryland, continued to pro-

cess data from the NASA Terra and Aqua satellites as part of the MODIS Active 

Fire Mapping Program. The USFS Remote Sensing Applications Center (RSAC) 

in Salt Lake City, Utah, collected real-time MODIS imagery and derived firedetection data for the western United States. Separately, the MODIS Active Fire 

Mapping Program also obtained real-time MODIS fire-detection data for Alaska, 

western Canada, and the eastern United States. These data combined enabled the 

USFS to produce active wildland fire-mapping products daily for the Contiguous 

United States (CONUS), Alaska, and Canada.

The USFS disseminated MODIS fire products to national fire managers and 

the general public via the Internet (http://activefiremaps.fs.fed.us). These products 

provided the interagency fire community with a synoptic view of the wildland 

fire situation, aiding in the strategic allocation of firefighting resources and assets 

throughout the country. In addition, MODIS Active Fire Mapping Program data 

and products were integrated into several interagency fire support programs and 

applications. Major media entities routinely used the maps and fire-detection data 

as well. Such customers included the Washington Post, the New York Times, the 

Cable News Network (CNN), the Associated Press (AP), and the Los Angeles 

Times. In total, nearly three million users accessed the MODIS Active Fire 

Mapping Web site during 2009.

The USFS also worked with the NASA Ames Research Center on a number 

of fire-related remote sensing technologies. Work with Ames included advanced 

sensor design and image processing from airborne platforms, utilization of satellite 

communication data links, mission profiling for tactical wildland fire mapping, and 

unmanned aerial system development. More specifically, the USFS and ARC col-

laborated on the use of UAS for fire mapping and forest health missions. Because 

of the light fire season, efforts in 2009 focused primarily on further testing and 

development with the Ikhana aircraft and the Autonomous Modular Scanner sen-

sor. Due to the success of this partnership, the USFS incorporated many of the 

technologies demonstrated on board the Ikhana aircraft. In early 2009, two Aircell 

systems were installed in the USFS fire-mapping aircraft to facilitate the immediate 

downlink and dissemination of imagery acquired over wildfires.
The Farm Service Agency (FSA) administered and managed farm commodity, 111

credit, conservation, disaster, and loan programs as laid out by Congress through a 

network of Federal, state, and county offices. Geospatial data played a fundamental 

role in the management of FSA’s programs. The agency maintained a nationally 

consistent geospatial dataset representing farm and field boundaries known as 

Common Land Units (CLUs). FSA used CLUs, digital soil surveys, 1-meter imagery, satellite imagery, and other datasets for program implementation, management, 

and monitoring, as well as for response and recovery efforts during natural disasters. FSA also utilized NASS remotely sensed data for the analysis of commodity 

and conservation programs.

In the spring of 2009, FSA used remotely sensed data to respond to and help mitigate impacts of flooding in the Red River Valley of North Dakota and Minnesota. 

MODIS, Advanced Wide Field Sensor (AWiFS), and locally collected high-resolution 

aerial imagery were used in conjunction with National Weather Service and other 

USDA and FSA geospatial datasets to immediately respond to and coordinate efforts 

with other Federal, state, and local agencies. These data were also used during the 

recovery period to assist those producers impacted and to support FSA administration 

of the Emergency Loan, Emergency Conservation, and Livestock Indemnity Programs. 

The same type of remotely sensed data was used in the tsunami response and damage 

mitigation effort in American Samoa in October.

As the primary source of aerial imagery for the USDA, FSA administered the 

NAIP, leveraging partnership funds from other Federal, state, and local entities 

to acquire imagery during the growing season over the CONUS. In 2009, FSA 

collected imagery over 32 states. NAIP, as well as a large imagery archive, was 

accessible to the public through the USDA Geospatial Data Gateway.

During FY 09, the National Agricultural Statistics Service (NASS) used remote 

sensing data to construct and sample area frames for statistical surveys, estimate 

crop area and yield, and create crop-specific land cover data layers as inputs for 

GIS. NASS used remote sensing data and techniques to improve the accuracy of 

its statistics. For example, NASS used Landsat imagery, digital NAIP orthophoto 

quadrangles, and other remotely sensed inputs for the CONUS and Puerto Rico to 

select the yearly area-based samples for the June Agricultural Survey. In addition, 

NASS constructed a new area-based sampling frame for Florida.
112 The remote sensing acreage estimation project used Resourcesat-1’s AWiFS and 

Landsat imagery to produce crop acreage estimates for the 2009 crop year for crops 

at the state and county levels for 27 states, up from 19 states the previous year. 

Acreage estimates were created for 15 different crops, up from 5 the previous year, 

covering all market-sensitive crops and states. With the expanded coverage and 

timeliness, the NASS Agricultural Statistics Board was able to fully utilize the 

remote sensing acreage estimates when preparing official estimates for Monthly 

Crop Production Reports.

NASS researchers derived remote sensing-based acreage estimates from a cropspecific land cover categorization called the Cropland Data Layer (CDL). The 

ground truth for building the CDL came from the FSA CLU program over the 

agricultural domain, while the U.S. Geological Survey’s National Land Cover 

Dataset circa 2001 provided the nonagricultural ground truth. In addition, NASS 

distributed the CDL on DVD and via the USDA Geospatial Data Gateway portal 

for 35 states to users for the previous 2008 crop season.

NASS also continued its partnership with ARS to conduct research and implement the use of MODIS sensor vegetative index and surface temperature data for 

setting state and county corn and soybean yield estimates. Two states, Kansas and 

Ohio, were added to the remote sensing yield program for the 2009 crop year. These 

additions brought the total number of states to seven. The technology transfer from 

ARS to NASS was successfully completed, and NASS processed the yields for 

five states. The Agricultural Statistics Board utilized estimates from this algorithm 

when setting the official September, October, and November yield estimates for 

these states.

The Foreign Agricultural Service (FAS) had primary responsibility for the 

Department’s international activities, including market development, trade agreements and negotiations, and the collection and analysis of statistics and market 

information. This latter responsibility was tasked to the FAS Office of Global 

Analysis (OGA), which was the focal point within FAS for assessing the global 

agricultural production outlook and conditions that affect world food security. 

Satellite-derived information provided an objective and repeatable source of information for early warnings of unusual crop conditions and potential disruptions in 

global food supply. This information, when used in the context of the convergence 
of evidence methodology, enabled more rapid and precise determinations of global 113

food supply conditions. The FAS satellite remote sensing program remained a critical element in the USDA analysis of global agricultural production and crop conditions by providing timely, accurate, and unbiased estimates of global area, yield, 

and production. The FAS partnered with DOD in assessing food supply conditions 

for stabilization and reconstruction operations in Iraq, Afghanistan, and the surrounding region. The FAS provided an early warning of drought-related food supply 

disruptions in Iraq, which enabled the U.S. Government to position emergency 

food supplies.

The FAS exploited many global imagery datasets, including vegetation health 

products from the University of Maryland and NASA, while continuing to 

purchase most of its satellite data commercially. The FAS also supported other 

Federal agencies, sharing satellite imagery and products with U.S. Government 

space agencies and DOD. The FAS continued to manage the USDA Satellite 

Imagery Archive (SIA). The SIA saved the USDA millions of dollars by employing a centralized data acquisition, archival, and dissemination strategy to eliminate 

redundant satellite purchases and hence decreased departmental expenditures. 

The FAS and NASA also cooperated on many projects to exploit space technologies, including near-real-time satellite data acquisition and global reservoir 

monitoring. This Global Agriculture Monitoring (GLAM) partnership continued to expand to multiple universities, commercial companies, and international 

organizations. Information on the FAS remote sensing program can be found at 

http://www.pecad.fas.usda.gov/cropexplorer.

The Natural Resources Conservation Service (NRCS) remained the primary 

Federal agency working with private landowners to help protect and conserve the 

Nation’s natural resources. For over 50 years, NRCS has used remote sensing products to carry out conservation programs. Digital orthoimagery, derived from aerial 

and satellite data, was the primary remote sensing product used by NRCS to inventory, monitor, manage, and assess our natural resources in GIS nationwide. By partnering with other Federal and state agencies, NRCS acquired statewide 1-meter or 

better resolution orthoimagery for 32 states and parts of Alaska, Hawaii, the Pacific 

Basin, and Puerto Rico. NRCS was an active member of several geospatial coordination groups, including the National Digital Orthophoto Program (NDOP), 
114 which assisted in orthoimagery coordination efforts. All orthoimagery purchased 

by NRCS was made available to internal users and the general public via the 

USDA Geospatial Data Gateway Web site. NRCS contracted for high-resolution 

aerial photography (four-inch ground resolving distance) over 70,000 confidential statistical sites to collect natural resources data for the annual National 

Resources Inventory (NRI) program. NRCS also contracted for high-resolution 

aerial photography over 7,245 Wetland Reserve Program (WRP) easements to be 

used to monitor compliance and ecological succession. The use of remote sensing techniques has replaced making expensive on-site visits to collect the same 

data. High-resolution satellite imagery was acquired for conducting the NRI and 

soil survey in Alaska, Hawaii, and the Pacific Basin. NRCS also used commercial high-resolution satellite imagery from the National Geospatial-Intelligence 

Agency’s (NGA) Web-based Access and Retrieval Portal (WARP) to fill in gaps 

in aerial film coverage. NRCS continued using Landsat and AWiFS scenes from 

the USDA SIA and Advanced Spaceborne Thermal Emission and Reflection 

Radiometer (ASTER) data from the Land Processes Distributed Active Archive 

Center for statewide natural resource analysis, change detection, and soil survey 

premapping. NRCS upgraded most satellite orthoimagery licenses in Hawaii and 

the Pacific Basin to allow more open distribution of orthoimagery data to government, universities, not-for-profit organizations, and the general public.

NRCS also funded high-resolution digital elevation data in selective areas 

of many states. High-resolution digital elevation data were used in a variety of 

NRCS agency programs such as Soil Survey, Engineering, Watershed Assessments, 

Water Resources, and Conservation Planning. NRCS was a member agency of the 

National Digital Elevation Program (NDEP), a multi-agency Federal partnership 

chaired by USGS to expedite the collection and availability of digital elevation 

data. NRCS funded Interferometric Synthetic Aperture Radar (IfSAR)-based digital elevation data in North Dakota and South Dakota. NRCS funded LIDAR-based 

digital elevation data in coordination with USGS/NDEP in Alabama, Arkansas, 

Illinois, Kansas, Oregon, Tennessee, and Kentucky.
115 Fiscal Year 2009 Activities

naTional sCienCe 

foundaTion

NSF

The National Science Foundation (NSF) continued to serve as the lead Federal 

agency for the support of ground-based astronomy and space science. Through the 

Divisions of Astronomical Sciences, Atmospheric Sciences, and Physics, as well 

as the Office of Polar Programs, the NSF sponsored a broad base of observational, 

theoretical, and laboratory research aimed at understanding the states of matter 

and physical processes in the universe. Areas of research ranged from the most 

distant reaches of the universe and the earliest moments of its existence to nearby 

stars and planets, including our own sun and planetary system, as well as Earth’s 

atmosphere and space environment.

Division of Astronomical Sciences

In addition to providing core support for the optical and radio observatories 

whose state-of-the-art instrumentation and observing capabilities are accessible 

to the community on the basis of scientific merit, the Division of Astronomical 

Sciences (AST) supported the development of advanced technologies and instrumentation for astronomical sciences. The NSF’s national astronomical facilities 

included the National Radio Astronomy Observatory (NRAO), the National 

Astronomy and Ionosphere Center (NAIC), the National Optical Astronomy 

Observatory (NOAO), and the National Solar Observatory (NSO). The NSF also 

served as the executive agency for the Gemini Observatory—an international 
116Aeronautics and Space Report of the President

partnership operating optical/infrared telescopes in both the Northern and Southern 

Hemispheres—providing the United States’ share of support for the program.

In partnership with Europe, Canada, Japan, and Taiwan, construction contin-

ued on the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA), an interferometer located near San Pedro de Atacama, Chile. FY 09 saw formal acceptance 

of the first North American and Japanese antennas and continued delivery of 

North American antennas at a rate of one every two months. Signals from the 

two accepted antennas were combined and the first interferometric measurements 

made from the ALMA mid-level site. The number of antennas at various stages of 

integration and testing in Chile now totals 17—12 from the United States, 4 from 

Japan, and 1 from Europe. The third and fourth cryogenic receiver systems were 

delivered to Chile and installed in antennas.

AST continued support for the development of the Advanced Technology Solar 

Telescope (ATST), the next-generation U.S. ground-based solar telescope. The 

ATST, a collaboration of scientists from 22 institutions representing a broad seg-

ment of the U.S. solar physics community, previously earned the strong recommen-

dation of the National Research Council of the National Academy of Sciences. In 

FY 09, the ATST passed a comprehensive final design review and was subsequently 

approved by the National Science Board for construction funding. Funding for 

construction of the $298 million ATST will be issued in early calendar year 2010.

In FY 09, AST continued to fund a four-year technology development and 

design effort for the Large Synoptic Survey Telescope (LSST). The LSST will be 

a 6.5-meter effective aperture telescope with a field of view exceeding 3 degrees. 

In addition, the LSST will use a 3-gigapixel camera to image the entire accessible 

sky repeatedly, producing approximately 20 terabytes of data nightly. The science 

goals of the LSST project are extremely broad, spanning the fields of cosmology, 

galactic structure, and solar system astronomy. The LSST will undertake both a 

census of distant (trans-Neptunian) solar system objects and surveys of near-Earth 

and potentially hazardous asteroids. Over a 10-year lifetime, the LSST should 

provide a 90 percent–complete sample of potentially hazardous objects with diam-

eters greater than 250 meters and an 80 percent–complete sample of those with 

diameters down to 140 meters. The University of Arizona’s Steward Observatory 

Mirror Lab is fabricating the 8.4-meter-diameter primary/tertiary mirror using 
117 Fiscal Year 2009 Activities

funds donated from private sources. The decision to fund the construction of LSST 

is pending the outcome of the 2010 Astronomy and Astrophysics decadal survey. If 

funded, the LSST will be a joint project of the National Science Foundation and 

the Department of Energy.

The Atacama Cosmology Telescope (ACT) is a new 6-meter-diameter millimeterwave telescope located at 5,200 meters (17,000 feet) on Cerro Toco in the Atacama 

Desert of northern Chile, near the ALMA site. It is designed to measure minute 

variations in intensity of the cosmic microwave background (the radiation at microwave wavelengths that is a remnant of the Big Bang) to study how the universe 

began, what it is made of, and how it evolved to its current state. ACT is a dedicated 

special-purpose telescope, equipped with a state-of-the-art customized camera with 

over 2,500 detectors cooled to a third of a degree above absolute zero. During FY 09, 

the telescope commenced full science operations, obtaining measurements that 

span size scales on the sky two to three times finer than in any previous experiment.

In FY 09, ACT discovered 13 new clusters of galaxies. The most distant cluster is 

at z=0.82, over nine billion light-years away. The clusters were revealed through the 

Sunyaev-Zeldovich effect, an interaction of the electrons in the clusters with the 

cosmic microwave background radiation. Once found, the clusters were confirmed 

optically by team members.

Also in FY 09, ACT measured the spectrum of fluctuations in the cosmic microwave background. For the first time, the team mapped out the transition from 

the regime described by the “standard model of cosmology” to the finer resolution 

regime of the recent epoch, where distinct gravitationally bound objects (such as 

galaxies and clusters of galaxies) fill the cosmos.

Division of Atmospheric and Geospace Sciences

In 2009, the NSF’s Division of Atmospheric Sciences (ATM) formally changed 

its name to the Division of Atmospheric and Geospace Sciences (AGS) to more 

accurately reflect the Division’s contributions to space science.

The Division of Atmospheric and Geospace Sciences’ high-altitude aircraft, the 

High-performance Instrumented Airborne Platform for Environmental Research 

(HIAPER), is a highly modified and instrumented Gulfstream V (GV) midsize 
118Aeronautics and Space Report of the President

jet. It is FAA-certified to operate at 51,000 feet. Its ability to fly for a long dura-

tion (over 12 hours), its range (over 6,000 kilometers), and its scientific payload 

capacity (6,000 pounds) enabled scientific research previously not possible with 

existing platforms. HIAPER is the most advanced airborne research platform in 

the U.S. civilian fleet. The German Aerospace Center (DLR) recently completed 

modifications, including advanced instrumentation, to a Gulfstream 550 that can 

collaborate with the NSF’s GV aircraft in scientific campaigns. In FY 09, the GV 

continued to conduct several long-duration flights for the HIAPER Pole to Pole 

Observations (HIPPO) deployment to study the carbon cycle and greenhouse 

gases. In FY 09, the GV conducted research flights from Colorado, Alaska, Tahiti, 

Fiji, Easter Island, New Zealand, and Costa Rica.

The Research Aircraft Facility at the National Center for Atmospheric Research 

(NCAR), a Federally Funded Research and Development Center (FFRDC) of the 

NSF, continues to operate and maintain HIAPER. The GV’s expected lifetime is 

10 to 25 years, during which new instrumentation innovations will be continually 

integrated onto the airframe as appropriate. NCAR also operates and maintains 

NSF’s heavy-lift C-130Q research aircraft. The C-130Q recently completed a major 

inspection, and the aircraft is in excellent condition.

The Division of Atmospheric and Geospace Sciences’ Upper Atmospheric 

Research Section (UARS) supported a wide variety of research programs in space 

science in FY 09. These included the funding of advanced radar systems to study 

the ionosphere and magnetosphere, ground-based optical equipment to study the 

aurora and airglow, partial support to ground-based solar telescopes and instru-

ments, and a wide-ranging portfolio of basic research in space physics. Major UARSfunded activities included the Upper Atmospheric Facilities (UAF); the National 

Space Weather Program (NSWP); the Coupling, Energetics, and Dynamics of 

Atmospheric Regions (CEDAR) program; the Geospace Environment Modeling 

(GEM) program; and the Solar, Heliosphere, and INterplanetary Environment 

(SHINE) program.

In addition, during FY 09 a formal NSF Science and Technology Center called 

the Center for Integrated Space Weather Modeling (CISM) continued to develop 

and test an end-to-end computer simulation for space physics research and applica-

tions. CISM’s coupled models simulated the processes by which energy from the 
sun and solar wind propagates to Earth, as well as the resulting effects on Earth’s 119

magnetosphere, ionosphere, and thermosphere. CISM researchers integrated these 

results with education and outreach activities. An effective knowledge transfer 

program also ensured that CISM shared the models for use in operational space 

weather forecasting centers of the United States Air Force and NOAA.

Throughout FY 09, the Community Coordinated Modeling Center (CCMC) for 

space weather research, co-sponsored by NSF and NASA and located at NASA’s 

Goddard Space Flight Center, continued to provide the research community with 

access to state-of-the-art space weather models and conducted important model validation activities necessary for the transition of research models to operational use.

In FY 09, the AGS Division continued to support the Constellation Observing 

System for Meteorology, Ionosphere, and Climate (COSMIC). The University 

Corporation for Atmospheric Research (UCAR) and its collaborator, Taiwan’s 

National Space Organization (NSPO), designed and built the COSMIC six-satellite 

constellation, which was launched on April 14, 2006, with support and assistance 

by the United States Air Force Space Test Program (STP). Shortly thereafter, data 

became available from the three payloads—the special space-based GPS radio 

occultation (RO) receivers, Tiny Ionosphere Photometers, and Tri-Band Beacons—

and were provided freely to the world scientific community.

These data have been shown to be of extremely high quality and very useful 

for studies of the ionosphere, stratosphere, and troposphere. The RO data are 

being assimilated operationally now at many of the operational weather prediction 

centers, including the U.S. National Centers for Environmental Prediction, the 

European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts (ECMWF), Météo France, 

the U.K. Met Office, the Meteorological Service of Canada, Taiwan’s Central 

Weather Bureau, and others. All of the centers have reported that RO data are 

having a significant positive impact on numerical weather forecasts. For example, 

recent studies by NOAA’s National Centers for Environmental Prediction (NCEP) 

and by the European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts show that RO 

is a leading observational system in reducing forecast error, in spite of the low cost 

of RO and the small number of soundings compared to other satellite observing 

systems. Similar positive results are being found at other weather centers. In addition, the RO data are having a positive impact on the operational assimilation of 
120 data from infrared and microwave sounding systems and aircraft observations by 

reducing their biases, thus complementing these sounding systems and enhancing 

the positive effect of RO data beyond their direct impact.

In ionospheric studies, COSMIC RO data are accelerating the development of 

physical models for space weather prediction by providing dense, accurate, and 

global electron density measurements. These are used for model testing and initialization, including the response of the global ionosphere to the impact of solar 

storms as their effects propagate around the globe.

During FY 09, all six satellites were operating and providing data. On average, 

COSMIC produced from 1,500 to 2,000 GPS RO soundings per day. Ninety percent of these were processed and delivered to operational centers within 3 hours. 

COSMIC is now supporting more than 1,100 registered users from 52 countries. In 

collaboration with the UCAR’s UNIDATA, COSMIC soundings are now provided 

in a real-time data stream to support the university community. COSMIC will 

continue to receive funding from U.S. agencies and Taiwan to continue its operation through April 2011.

In FY 09, research facilities remained the key component of UARS efforts. The 

Upper Atmospheric Facilities program continued to promote basic research on the 

structure and dynamics of Earth’s upper atmosphere. In particular, the CEDAR and 

GEM programs conducted research efforts utilizing these facilities. Observations 

made by the Advanced Modular Incoherent-Scatter Radar (AMISR) at Poker Flat, 
Alaska, throughout FY 09 demonstrated the unique capabilities of this new instru- 121

ment, including the ability to image the ionospheric effects of auroral particle 

precipitation in three dimensions. These observations provided a wealth of data 

particularly useful to modelers interested in validating space weather models. A 

second AMISR system began operation at Resolute Bay in Arctic Canada. This 

radar is ideally situated to observe the properties of the ionosphere in the polar 

cap, a region that is characterized by high ionospheric variability that often causes 

disruption of important navigation and communication systems.

UARS also continued to support the study of magnetospheric physics within the 

international Super Dual Auroral Radar Network (SuperDARN) consortium by 

contributing a new radar installation in southern Virginia to a chain of midlatitude 

SuperDARN radars designed to study geomagnetic storm electric fields. Another 

midlatitude SuperDARN radar began operating at Fort Hays State University in 

Kansas to extend the longitudinal coverage of the instrument chain.

In FY 09, UARS continued to support its new program for CubeSat-based small 

satellite science missions for atmospheric and space weather research. The program 

had a very active and exciting year in 2009. Two projects that started as a result of 

the 2008 competition, Radar Aurora Explorer (RAX) and FIREFLY, have both progressed very well. Under the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009, 

two additional CubeSat projects were awarded in September 2009. These were also 

selected from the proposals submitted in response to the first CubeSat solicitation 

in 2008. Both are truly excellent science projects within their area and, in addition, 

stand out by being double spacecraft missions. This makes them perfect pathfinders 

for the ultimate goal of CubeSat constellation missions. For the second CubeSat 

solicitation with a deadline in May 2009, UARS received proposals for a total of 26 

new missions. As was the case for the first solicitation, the quality of the proposals 

in terms of scientific creativity and technological innovation was exceptional.

UARS supported the satellite-based Active Magnetosphere and Planetary 

Electrodynamics Response Experiment (AMPERE) in FY 09. AMPERE utilized the 

66 networked satellites of the existing Iridium constellation to create a new facility 

for collecting geomagnetic field data. The AMPERE facility yields the first-ever 

real-time observations of the electric currents that link Earth’s magnetosphere and 

ionosphere and provides the first-ever continuous global observations for tracking 
122 geomagnetic storm-time dynamics. Geomagnetic storms occur when charged particles emitted by solar flares interact with Earth’s magnetosphere. Such storms can 

cause major disruptions of power and communications systems on the ground.

The UARS community also continued to benefit from the Division of 

Astronomical Sciences’ efforts in FY 09 to develop and manage the Advanced 

Technology Solar Telescope. In addition, UARS funding supported the continuing 

design and development of the Frequency Agile Solar Radiotelescope (FASR), as well 

as NSF Astronomy’s efforts to construct a radiotelescope test bed in Western Australia 

known as the Murchison Widefield Array (MWA). With funding from the American 

Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009, UARS was able to support much-needed 

upgrades at three solar observatories: the Big Bear Solar Observatory and the Owens 

Valley Radio Observatory in California and the Mees Solar Observatory in Hawaii.

The National Space Weather Program is a multi-agency Federal program 

aimed at mitigating the adverse effects of space weather on the Nation’s technological infrastructure by providing timely, accurate, and reliable space environment observations, specifications, and forecasts. The NSWP Strategic Plan and 

Implementation Plan contain further information about the NSWP. The plans are 

available online through the Office of the Federal Coordinator for Meteorology 

(OFCM). In FY 09, UARS contributed to an OFCM-led study of mitigation strategies to address the removal of space science sensors on the National Polar-orbiting 

Operational Environment Satellite System (NPOESS) satellite system.

Office of Polar Programs

For FY 09, the primary activities of the Office of Polar Programs (OPP) in 

ground-based space science and astronomy included continued full-scale observations with the 10-meter off-axis radio telescope at the U.S. Amundsen-Scott South 

Pole Station to survey deep space galaxy clusters and the continued construction 

of the IceCube Neutrino Observatory.

Following the initial discovery of three new galaxy clusters via the SunyaevZeldovich Effect, the South Pole Telescope successfully completed its third winter 

survey-observing period (northern summer 2009) with the mapping of over 200 

new Sunyaev-Zeldovich Effect galaxy clusters. (The Sunyaev-Zeldovich Effect is a 
decrement in the strength of the Cosmic Microwave Background Radiation as it 123

is scattered by electrons in galaxy clusters.) Using the power of this new method 

of distant galaxy cluster mass detection for mapping enables the reconstruction of 

the universe’s evolution.

The South Pole IceCube Neutrino Observatory deployed 19 new strings of optical photodetectors in deep ice under the South Pole Station in Antarctica, making two-thirds of the total detector volume available for science observations. The 

observatory expects the completion of all 80 strings (plus 6 additional Deep Core 

Array strings for low-energy neutrino detection) in the beginning of 2011. Data 

collection continued with the advance filtering and reconstruction of neutrino 

events. Scientific topics under study included searches for weakly interacting massive particles, neutrino point sources, and magnetic monopoles.
.
125 Fiscal Year 2009 Activities

deparTmenT of sTaTe

DOS

The Department of State (DOS) carries out diplomatic efforts to support U.S. 

space policies and programs internationally. State supports U.S. civil space activities through the negotiation of bilateral and multilateral agreements with partner 

countries and leads U.S. participation in numerous international space and technological venues and international organizations. State also maintains outreach 

programs to advance U.S. space and foreign policy objectives.

DOS continued to represent the U.S. on the United Nations Committee on 

the Peaceful Uses of Outer Space (UNCOPUOS) and its Legal and Scientific 

and Technical Subcommittees. With so many countries now engaged in space 

activities, the DOS considers promoting the safe and responsible use of space by 

all current and future spacefaring nations a vital goal. At UNCOPUOS, the DOS 

led U.S. efforts on the problem of orbital space debris, meteorology, astronomy 

and astrophysics, space transportation, nuclear power sources in space, and legal 

issues related to international liability and responsibility of launching nations. 

Still building on the results of the International Heliophysical Year to improve 

international cooperation in understanding the impact of space weather on satellites and the Earth environment in general, DOS continued to promote space 

weather as an important foreign policy tool worldwide. The Department of State 

continued vigorous international efforts to implement the National Space-Based 

Positioning, Navigation, and Timing (PNT) Policy in FY 09. In October 2008, the 

first Plenary meeting under the U.S.-EU GPS-Galileo Cooperation Agreement of 

2004 met at the U.S. Naval Observatory in Washington, D.C. The four working 

groups established under the Agreement were given directions for future work. 

During FY 09, Working Group C worked on characterizing a combined GPS-Galileo 
126Aeronautics and Space Report of the President

receiver that demonstrated the commitment of both parties to the interoperability 

of their systems.

The U.S. and Japan concluded agreements for Japan to install monitoring 

stations for its Quasi-Zenith Satellite System (QZSS) at Guam and Hawaii. The 

monitoring station at Guam, operated in cooperation with a NOAA weather sta-

tion, was finished and opened in August 2009. The Hawaii monitoring station at 

NASA’s Kokee Park facility will be finished in early 2010. Both monitoring stations 

provide for the sharing of all data. In Tokyo in November 2008, the U.S. and 

Japan held their yearly consultation under the U.S.-Japan Joint Statement on GPS 

Cooperation. Technical information was exchanged on Japan’s planned QZSS 

system, and Japan also clarified its new Basic Space Law and its implications for 

greater U.S.-Japan cooperation in the space arena.

Russia- and State-led delegations held several working group meetings on radiofrequency compatibility and interoperability between GPS and Russia’s GLONASS 

as well as on search and rescue issues related to new GLONASS equipment.

State organized and led, with significant administrative and logistical support 

from NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory, the third full meeting of the International 

Committee on Global Navigation Satellite Systems (ICG-3) in Pasadena, California, 

in December 2008. Significant progress was made in this meeting on the ICG work 

plan and in solidifying support for common definitions of compatibility and interop-

erability. In September 2009, Russia hosted the fourth general meeting of the ICG 

in St. Petersburg, Russia. State vigorously pushed for the eventual adoption of a new 

principle on transparency that states: “Every provider should publish documentation 

that describes signal and system information, policies of provision and minimum lev-

els of performance for its open services.” Compliance with this principle will enable 

greater utilization of available signals in combined system receivers, which will 

improve service for civil users worldwide. During FY 09, the U.S. provided significant 

funding to the United Nations Office of Outer Space Affairs to support meetings 

of the ICG as well as workshops in developing countries to promote awareness of 

GNSS (Global Navigation Satellite System) applications for infrastructure, sustain-

able growth, transportation efficiency and safety, and environmental management.

During FY 09, State supported a wide, international public diplomacy campaign 

on the reliability and accuracy of GPS. State speakers supported this campaign 
127 Fiscal Year 2009 Activities

with PowerPoint presentations at many international conferences, including the 

European Navigation Conference, the Moscow International GNSS Conference, 

the Korean International GNSS symposium, the Berlin GNSS symposium sponsored by the European Position Determination System (EUPOS), meetings of the 

international section of the Civil GPS Service Interface Committee, and the 

Institute of Navigation annual conference.

The State Department sponsored a two-week Satellite Navigation Science 

and Technology for Africa workshop at the Abdus Salam International Centre 

for Theoretical Physics in Trieste, Italy, in late March 2009. From over 200 applicants, nearly 50 students from 7 African countries participated in the workshop to 

develop and use science and technology for socioeconomic transformation and full 

integration into the world economy. GPS applications to increase food security; 

manage natural resources; provide efficient emergency location services; improve 

surveying and mapping; and provide greater precision and safety in land, water, and 

air navigation systems were discussed in a tutorial format.

In 2009, the Department of State promoted several partnerships in the area of 

geospatial technologies, the synergy of Earth observation, GIS, GPS, and Webbased mapping tools with non-traditional space partners in Muslim-majority countries, including Saudi Arabia, Egypt, and the United Arab Emirates.

The State Department’s Office of Space and Advanced Technology (OES/SAT) 

hosted the first working group meeting under the U.S.-Saudi Arabia Science and 

Technology Cooperation Agreement that was signed in December 2008. At the 

meeting, held in Washington, D.C., on December 4–5, 2009, the group developed 

a work plan of cooperation related to space, aerospace, and remote sensing. After 

the working group meeting, officials from King Abdulaziz City for Science and 

Technology (KACST) and NASA signed an agreement to facilitate collaboration on lunar and near-Earth object research. Thanks to this Memorandum of 

Understanding, KACST became an affiliate partner of NASA’s Lunar Science 

Institute at NASA Ames Research Center in Moffett Field, California.

Using the U.S.-Egypt Science and Technology Fund for Science and Technology 

Cooperation, OES/SAT is organizing a workshop on space applications, to be held 

in Cairo on June 14–17, 2010, with Egypt’s National Authority for Remote Sensing 

and Space Sciences (NARSS). The agenda for this meeting will focus on multiple 
128Aeronautics and Space Report of the President

remote sensing applications including management of water resources, agriculture, 

land-use and land-cover change, natural disasters, and urban planning.

Finally, the Department continued to work with the Abu Dhabi Environment 

Agency (EAD) on developing activities to promote the use of geospatial tools and 

access to environmental information in the Middle East North Africa (MENA) 

region. U.S. Government agencies and private stakeholders will be contributing to 

the upcoming Abu Dhabi Global Environmental Data Initiative (AGEDI) Summit 

to be hosted by the United Arab Emirates in the second half of 2010.
129 Fiscal Year 2009 Activities

deparTmenT of energy

DOE

During FY 09, the Department of Energy’s (DOE) Office of Science (SC) cooperated with NASA on a wide variety of activities, such as developing techniques 

to conduct fundamental physics experiments in outer space, using plasma science to devise new propulsion systems, engaging in joint efforts to understand 

atmospheric and environmental phenomena, and entering into a working partnership in advanced computing research. These activities occurred under an 

Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) between NASA and DOE, signed by the 

NASA Administrator and the DOE Secretary in 1992. DOE’s Office of Nuclear 

Energy plans to continue to support NASA’s space science and exploration programs by pursuing the development of space radioisotope and reactor power system 

technologies for future space missions and by maintaining the necessary nuclear 

facility infrastructure.

SC continued to work on the Alpha Magnetic Spectrometer (AMS) instrument, 

designed and built to be carried aboard a Space Shuttle for installation on the 

International Space Station (ISS). With much greater sensitivity than previously 

possible, the AMS, an international scientific collaboration, will use the unique 

environment of space to study the origin and structure of the universe, search for 

antimatter and dark matter, and collect information from cosmic sources emanating from stars and galaxies millions of light-years beyond the Milky Way. The SC 

provided funding in FY 09 to support the research group at the Massachusetts 

Institute of Technology (MIT) that leads the AMS program. In FY 09, work focused 

on the integration of the instrument at the European Organization for Nuclear 

Research (CERN) in Geneva, Switzerland, and then testing and space-qualifying 

the detector. It is scheduled to be shipped to the Kennedy Space Center in 2010.
130Aeronautics and Space Report of the President

SC and NASA’s Science Mission Directorate (SMD), along with international 

partners, have collaborated since FY 00 on the design and fabrication of the Large 

Area Telescope (LAT), the primary instrument for NASA’s Fermi Gamma-ray 

Space Telescope (FGST). Previously called the Gamma-ray Large Area Space 

Telescope (GLAST), FGST was renamed after launch in June 2008. The LAT 

instrument, using the techniques of experimental particle physics research, detects 

and studies gamma rays emitted by the most energetic objects and phenom-

ena in the universe. In FY 09, the Stanford Linear Accelerator Center (SLAC) 

National Accelerator Laboratory continued running the LAT Instrument Science 

Operations Center (ISOC), which processes data during operations. SLAC and 

SC-funded university groups continued participation in data-taking and scientific 

studies. The first year of data was released to the community, and over 35 science 

results were published in peer-reviewed journals.

Determining the nature of dark energy and how it may cause the acceleration 

of the expansion of the universe remains a high-priority science objective for both 

SC and NASA. A study, released in September 2007 by the Beyond Einstein 

Program Advisory Committee (BEPAC) of the National Academies of Science, 

recommended that SC and NASA proceed together on a Joint Dark Energy 

Mission (JDEM).

In FY 09, SC provided funding to the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory 

(LBNL) and other labs and universities for JDEM R&D activities. In FY 09, the 

NASA project office at Goddard Space Flight Center and the DOE project office at 

LBNL worked on the development of a suite of mission concepts that would deliver 

results on dark energy using a variety of experimental techniques. Also in FY 09, 

NASA and DOE formed an Interim Science Working Group to provide scientific 

assistance during the mission concept study period.

The Office of Nuclear Physics within the SC continued to make avail-

able the Alternating Gradient Synchrotron (AGS), an essential component of 

the Relativistic Heavy Ion Collider (RHIC) complex at Brookhaven National 

Laboratory (BNL). The AGS is the only accelerator in the United States capable 

of providing heavy ion beams at energies (up to 1 GeV/nucleon) of interest to the 

space radiobiology community. The AGS allows for NASA-funded radiobiology 

experiments to be performed with silicon, iron, and gold beams. The NASA Space 
131 Fiscal Year 2009 Activities

Radiation Laboratory (NSRL) also operates at BNL and is an efficient and effective 

radiation simulation facility for human space exploration. SC and NASA continued to develop mutually beneficial technical resources for experimentation and 

data analysis at BNL. For example, DOE and NASA supported the design and 

fabrication of the Electron Beam Ion Source (EBIS) at BNL in FY 09; the project is 

on track for completion in FY 10. NASA contributed approximately 25 percent of 

project costs to accelerate project completion. This joint DOE-NASA project will 

enhance the range and intensities of heavy ion beams available to the Relativistic 

Heavy Ion Collider complex, including the NASA Space Radiation Laboratory.

In FY 09, the Office of Nuclear Physics continued to support astrophysicists 

who used approximately 972,000 XT4-equivalent processor hours at the National 

Energy Research Scientific-computing Center (NERSC), which is funded by DOE’s 

Office of Advanced Scientific Computing Research (ASCR). Most of this time 

was used to study the formation, evolution, and observational properties of Type 

Ia supernovae originating from binary white dwarfs, the origin of the stellar mass 

scale in star formation.

Other space-related aspects of the Nuclear Physics Program contain relevance to 

NASA, other Federal agencies (e.g., the National Reconnaissance Office and the 

U.S. Air Force) and the private sector. To facilitate the testing of electronic components used in high-radiation space environments, Nuclear Physics Program accelerator facilities (the BNL Tandem, the 88-Inch Cyclotron at Lawrence Berkeley 

National Laboratory, and the Texas A&M Superconducting Cyclotron) regularly 

provided beam time to NASA, DOE applied laboratories, European and Japanese 

space agencies, and private companies.

In FY 09, the SC Office of Fusion Energy Sciences (OFES) continued research in 

fusion and plasma sciences, some of which has potential application for fusion and 

plasma propulsion, which could be relevant to future NASA missions for human 

and robotic exploration of space. NASA expressed interest in the application of 

the spherical torus and the plasma-jet-driven magnetic-inertial fusion (PJMIF) 

concepts for advanced fusion space propulsion. Fusion Energy Sciences is continuing to research the spherical torus configuration at the National Spherical Torus 

Experiment (NSTX) at the Princeton Plasma Physics Laboratory (PPPL). In FY 09, 

through the results of an open competition, Fusion Energy Sciences took the first 
132Aeronautics and Space Report of the President

significant step in the experimental exploration of the PJMIF concept by initiating the Plasma Liner Experiment (PLX) at Los Alamos National Laboratory. The 

NASA Marshall Space Flight Center is assisting with this experiment by loaning 

a spherical vacuum vessel to Los Alamos National Laboratory for the purpose of 

the experiment through an Interagency Agreement. The two fusion concepts hold 

the potential for reducing travel times to the planets in our solar system by more 

than a factor of 10. In addition, the plasma jet research may provide a very highthrust electric propulsion system, which could be powered by a fission reactor, solar 

panels, or, eventually, a fusion reactor.

In response to the FY 07 report of the interagency Task Force on High Energy 

Density Physics, prepared under the guidance of the National Science and 

Technology Council, the Office of Fusion Energy Sciences and the National 

Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) issued a Joint Solicitation in FY 08. 

This solicitation resulted in the receipt of proposals in the field of laboratory astro-

physics, i.e., the physical simulations of astrophysical phenomena in the laboratory. 

As a result, three awards were made in FY 09 in the area of laboratory measure-

ment of opacities of elements relevant to developing the appropriate model for the 

internal structure of the sun. Another award was given for a laboratory investiga-

tion of relativistic electron-positron plasmas that might be relevant to a number of 

energetic astrophysical phenomena including gamma ray bursts.

SC and NASA worked together to calculate the daily primary productivity of terrestrial ecosystems at diverse sites in northern and central states. SC’s AmeriFlux 

program continued to provide real-time meteorological, solar radiation, and CO2 

flux data, which scientists combined with NASA/MODIS data to calculate annual 

net and gross primary productivity. This joint work investigated continental-scale 

seasonal and geographic patterns of carbon-cycle processes related to the North 

American carbon program. The AmeriFlux program produced unique groundbased measurements of net ecosystem production and atmospheric CO2

 concen-

tration from approximately 30 locations across the United States. Radiometric 

instrumentation upgrades occurred at select AmeriFlux sites to provide improved 

calibration information for Terra platform observations. Collectively, the groundsurface observations from AmeriFlux sites provide critical baseline data to calibrate 

existing and planned NASA satellite data streams.
SC’s Atmospheric Radiation Measurement (ARM) provided ground-validation 133

support for NASA’s Atmospheric Infrared Sounder (AIRS) instrument. The AIRS 

is a high-spectral-resolution infrared sounder on the Earth Observing System 

(EOS) Aqua platform. Additional measurements were conducted to coincide with 

overpasses of the Aqua satellite carrying the AIRS sensor at the Tropical Western 

Pacific (TWP) and North Slope of Alaska sites. The ARM data have been used 

to improve the water vapor and temperature profiles retrieved from the AIRS sensor. Information on water vapor and temperature provides important parameters 

for the development and validation of climate models. During FY 08, the ARM 

continued support of NASA’s solar-viewing Bruker 125 HR Fourier Transform 

Spectrometer (FTS) at the Tropical Western Pacific facility, which validates spacebased column CO2

 retrievals and ensures the accuracy of CO2 source and sink 

information. During the winter of 2008, NASA participated in the SC’s Indirect 

and Semi-Direct Aerosol Campaign (ISDAC). The focus of this cross-disciplinary 

interagency research effort was to advance the understanding of how aerosols 

impact climate in the Arctic.

NASA, NOAA, and DOE agreed to renew their MOU addressing the use of 

Uninhabited Aerial Systems (UAS) for weather and climate change research. The 

MOU, signed in November 2006, facilitated a collaborative, cost-sharing partnership between NASA’s SMD, NOAA’s Office of Marine and Aviation Operations 

(OMAO), and DOE’s SC in utilizing Uninhabited Aerial Systems.

One of their goals was to define how these systems may extend climate and 

weather-related measurements over regions of Earth that are currently undersampled. The three agencies met in May 2009 in Stresa, Italy, during the International 

Symposium on Remote Sensing of Environment (ISRSE) and decided to proceed 

with arrangements to renew the MOU, which expires in 2011.

In FY 09, SC’s Scientific Discovery through Advanced Computing (SciDAC) 

program, jointly with National Nuclear Security Administration, supported 

researchers at NASA’s Ames Research Center in the development of numerical methods and computational tools to investigate turbulent flows with strong 

shocks and density variations. The research studied models of turbulence and 

computational algorithms and made improvements in the ability to predict these 

flow phenomena. NASA researchers in this collaboration investigated aspects of 
134 computational algorithms, including stable and accurate treatment of interface 

boundaries, grid refinement, and accurate solvers for a wide spectrum of flow types. 

This collaboration ended at the close of FY 09.

The Office of Science Low Dose Radiation Research Program continued to interact with the Space Radiation Project within NASA’s Human Research Program. 

DOE’s Low Dose Radiation Research Program focuses on doses of radiation measured at or below current workplace exposure limits. NASA’s Space Radiation 

Project seeks to understand the biological effects of space radiation so that 

radiation risks may be accurately assessed. Both research programs recognize the 

importance of delineating mechanisms of action for biological responses induced 

in the low-dose region. In FY 01, NASA and DOE developed a Memorandum of 

Agreement (MOA) to better coordinate their efforts to understand and predict the 

health risks associated with exposure to low-dose radiation. In FY 09, there were 

11 jointly funded projects, including two NASA Specialized Center of Research 

(NSCOR) program projects. A new program research solicitation offered in FY 08 

is expected to yield an additional number of joint DOE-NASA–supported projects.

DOE’s Office of Nuclear Energy continued to support NASA’s space science 

and exploration programs by pursuing the development of specific heating and 

power technologies for future space missions in coordination with NASA and 

other relevant stakeholders and by maintaining the necessary program and nuclear 

facility infrastructure capabilities to provide radioisotope power systems and 

heater units. In FY 09, DOE continued the development and testing of a MultiMission Radioisotope Thermoelectric Generator for first use on the Mars Science 

Laboratory mission, which is to be launched in 2011, and the development of the 

Advanced Stirling Radioisotope Generator now under consideration for Discovery, 

or Scout-class, missions in the 2014 timeframe. Designed for use in multiple mission 

environments, including planetary surfaces and deep space, these new radioisotope 

power systems, which convert the decay heat of plutonium-238 into electricity, will 

each provide greater than 100 watts of electricity for more than 14 years.

Maintaining a reliable supply of plutonium-238 for future missions that rely on 

these unique power systems has been a key challenge since domestic production of 

plutonium-238 ceased in 1988. The Office of Nuclear Energy augments the Nation’s 

limited inventory of plutonium-238 through purchases from Russia. However, in 
2009, Russia suspended its agreement to sell plutonium-238 to DOE, and a new 135

agreement could delay future deliveries by three to five years. The Office of Nuclear 

Energy is continuing its efforts to resolve these supply issues.

The Office of Nuclear Energy and DOE national laboratories also supported 

technology development that could lead to a fission surface power system for 

deployment by NASA on the moon around the year 2020. During FY 09, DOE 

supported test component and reactor design, as well as lander integration concepts, for a candidate fission surface power system. As part of maintaining the 

required infrastructure capabilities, DOE continued the maintenance and operation of equipment and facilities at Oak Ridge National Laboratory, Idaho National 

Laboratory, and Los Alamos National Laboratory.
.
137 Fiscal Year 2009 Activities

smiThsonian insTiTuTion

The Smithsonian Institution continued to contribute to national aerospace goals 

through the activities of the Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory (SAO), which, 

together with the Harvard College Observatory in Cambridge, Massachusetts, forms 

the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics. Through this organization, more 

than 300 scientists engaged in a broad program of research in astronomy, astrophysics, Earth and space sciences, and science education. The Smithsonian National 

Air and Space Museum (NASM) in Washington, DC, also contributed to national 

aerospace goals through its research and education activities.

FY 09 marked the sixth year of operations for NASA’s Spitzer Space Telescope—

operated by the Jet Propulsion Laboratory—whose Infrared Array Camera (IRAC) 

was developed at SAO and constructed at the NASA Goddard Space Flight Center. 

Spitzer studies the universe at infrared wavelengths of light, enabling it to peer 

into nearby dust-obscured regions to study stellar birth and evolution; observe the 

atmospheres of exoplanets; and spot distant, highly redshifted galaxies.

On May 15, 2009, more than five and a half years after launch, Spitzer ended its 

cryogenic mission phase when it ran out of liquid helium coolant. However, Spitzer is 

still cold enough (–406°F) that two of IRAC’s four detectors can continue to operate.

The Spitzer Warm Mission began its observational phase using IRAC on 

July 28, 2009, with an anticipated lifetime of five years. IRAC team members at 

SAO are leading or participating in five Spitzer Warm Mission Exploration Science 

Programs. As of August 31, 2009, IRAC had logged a total of over 15,700 hours of 

operation in flight.

In FY 09, Smithsonian astronomers using Spitzer announced the discovery that 

the nearby star Epsilon Eridani has two rocky asteroid belts and an outer icy ring, 

making it a triple-ring system. The inner asteroid belt is a virtual twin of the belt in 

our solar system, while the outer asteroid belt holds 20 times more material.
138Aeronautics and Space Report of the President

• 

• 

A new IRAC image from the Spitzer Space Telescope offered a rare view of immi-

nent collision between the cores of two merging galaxies, each powered by a black 

hole with millions of times the mass of the sun. The spectacular image of NGC 6240, 

which consists of a single tangled galaxy containing the two cores, combined visible 

light from the Hubble Space Telescope and infrared light from Spitzer. The image 

caught the galaxies during a rare, short-lived phase of the evolution, when both cores 

of the interacting galaxies are closing in on each other very rapidly.

A sample of other FY 09 findings made by the Spitzer Space Telescope with 

IRAC team member participation includes

evidence that Jupiter-sized planets must gain weight quickly during their 

infancy, since the gaseous disks from which they form disappear within 

just a few million years;

the measurement of thermal emission from the distant “hot Jupiter” 

called XO-1b;
139 Fiscal Year 2009 Activities

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

the detection of streams of young stars flowing from their natal cocoons 

in distant galaxies;

a comprehensive survey of young star clusters within 3,000 light-years of 

the sun;

the in-depth characterization of stars, dust, and gas in two of our closest 

neighboring galaxies, the Large and Small Magellanic Clouds;

the examination of star-forming galaxies 10 billion light-years away; and

the measurement of clustering of red galaxies around a quasar nine billion 

light-years from Earth.

As the Chandra X-ray Observatory entered its second decade of operation in 

FY 09, it continued to play an increasingly important role in the exploration of the 

universe. With its unrivaled ability to create high-resolution x-ray images, Chandra 

has enabled astronomers to investigate phenomena as diverse as comets, black 

holes, dark matter, and dark energy. The Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory, 

located in Cambridge, Massachusetts, controls science and flight operations from 

the Chandra X-ray Center.

In December 2008, astronomers announced that, using Chandra, they had 

clearly seen the effects of “dark energy” on the most massive collapsed objects in 
140Aeronautics and Space Report of the President

the universe. These x-ray results provide a crucial independent test of dark energy, 

long sought by scientists, which depends on how gravity competes with accelerated expansion in the growth of cosmic structures. Scientists think dark energy 

is a form of repulsive force—gravity that repels rather than attracts—that now 

dominates the universe, although they have no clear picture of what it actually is. 

Understanding the nature of dark energy is one of the biggest problems in science.

Scientists using Chandra made other discoveries on some of the largest scales 

across the universe. For example, they found the most crowded collision of galaxy 

clusters in a system known as MACSJ0717.5+3745. By combining information from 

Chandra and two other telescopes, scientists can use this system to learn what 

happens when some of the largest objects in the universe smack together.

Chandra also was used to look back into the early universe to pinpoint the 

“coming of age” of galaxies and black holes. This discovery made by Chandra and 

other telescopes helped resolve the true nature of gigantic blobs of gas observed 

around very young galaxies.

The end of FY 09 brought an opportunity for Chandra to celebrate its incredibly 

successful first decade of science. The Chandra X-ray Center held a symposium 

in September 2009, where key project personnel; hundreds of scientists; and the 

astronauts from STS-93, who helped launch Chandra in 1999, were in attendance. 

Everyone involved in the Chandra mission is looking forward to the next decade 

of discovery with this remarkable observatory.

FY 09 marked the third full year of operation of the Hinode satellite, which 

provides continuous viewing of the sun from space. SAO’s X-Ray Telescope (XRT) 

on board Hinode is the highest resolution telescope of its type ever flown for solar 

studies. The XRT observes x-rays from the solar corona—the sun’s million-degree 

hot outer atmosphere. The XRT is providing groundbreaking new observations 

of both the large-scale global configurations responsible for solar activity and 

the small-scale processes that initiate instabilities and eruptions. The Science 

Operations Center at SAO serves as the focal point from which both satellite 

operations and scientific studies are coordinated.

Results from Hinode have been reported at three dedicated international con-

ferences to date in Europe, the U.S., and Tokyo, Japan. XRT has demonstrated 

the ways in which magnetic disturbances travel through the corona, and it has 
identified the ways in which magnetic energy is stored in S-shaped “sigmoids” 141

that subsequently erupt into huge mass ejections. Far smaller jet-like events in the 

corona have been found to be so numerous that they may be a major source of 

energy and particles for the solar wind, which travels outward from the sun at 

nearly 1,000,000 miles per hour and blows past Earth. The ability of XRT to resolve 

the coronal structures is leading to a deeper understanding of the energy storage 

and release in coronal regions. The XRT has proven to be a highly versatile instrument, appearing in the majority of refereed publications using Hinode results.

SAO’s Ultraviolet Coronagraph Spectrometer (UVCS) team made significant 

progress in understanding the properties and evolution of different types of solar 

winds from the sun. Two of the highlights from the research published in FY 09 

are described below.

The sun produces a nearly continuous supersonic flow of charged particles, primarily protons and electrons, called the solar wind. Since the solar wind influences 

Earth’s magnetosphere, generating aurorae but also causing satellite drag and geomagnetic storms, understanding the solar wind will help us to learn about our immediate 

cosmic environment. Previous analyses of UVCS spectroscopic observations strongly 

suggested that the solar wind is energized and heated by magnetic waves from the 

sun, but exactly how is not fully understood. Theoretical work by UVCS researchers 

showed that solar wind protons receive about 60 percent of the plasma heating by the 

time the wind reaches Earth’s orbit; this fraction increases to 80 percent by the time 

the wind reaches the orbit of Jupiter. The remainder of the energy goes into heating the electrons. These empirical measurements for separate proton and electron 

temperatures helped create an improved and more complete model of the solar wind.

In a separate study, UVCS researchers determined the cooling rate of hot plasma 

inside a Coronal Mass Ejection (CME). CMEs are explosive events on the sun that 

are capable of injecting up to a billion tons of matter into interplanetary space. 

When the largest CMEs impact Earth, they can sometimes wreak havoc on satellites and electrical power grids. For this study, the UVCS researchers measured the 

ultraviolet emissions from a CME that erupted in December 2001 and determined 

that a significant fraction of the total CME energy goes into heating dense knots 

of hydrogen/helium gas. In fact, the heat energy contained in the CME knots can 

exceed the kinetic energy that propels the CME forward.
142

The Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory’s Submillimeter Array (SMA) continued to be the instrument of choice for star formation studies, high-resolution 

imaging, and the initial follow-up studies of distant galaxies in the submillimeter. 

During FY 09, the SMA was used to conduct forefront research on a wide variety 

of topics ranging from planetary science to the study of the most distant galaxies.

One of the most intriguing discoveries made by the SMA in FY 09 was a planetforming disk orbiting twin suns. High-resolution images clearly revealed the presence of a rotating molecular disk orbiting the young binary star system V4046 

Sagittarii. The SMA images provided an unusually vivid snapshot of the process 

of formation of giant planets, comets, and Pluto-like bodies. The results also confirmed that such objects might just as easily form around double stars as around 

single stars like our sun.

The SMA completed its 345-gigahertz (GHz)–band spectral line survey of the 

carbon star CW Leo, which is the brightest infrared object in the northern sky 

but is barely visible at optical wavelengths. CW Leo is expelling much of its mass 

back into the interstellar medium, much as our sun will do a few billion years from 

now. The dusty wind from CW Leo has an exceptionally rich molecular chemistry, 

containing salts, organic molecules, and silicates. Stars like CW Leo are believed 
to be the main source of dust—as well as carbon, oxygen, and nitrogen-bearing 143

molecules—in the interstellar medium.

The SMA survey of CW Leo was the first such project done with an interferometer, 

which, thanks to its fine angular resolution, provides spatial distribution information 

unavailable in earlier single-dish surveys of this source. At submillimeter wavelengths, 

the SMA survey is particularly sensitive to spectral signatures of molecules from hotter 

regions close to the star, which were missed by previous surveys. More than 400 spectral lines have been detected in the SMA survey, including more than 100 new detections of which 70 have not yet been assigned to any known molecular transitions.

The SMA enabled a new level of precision in the study of circumstellar disks, 

leading to a deeper understanding of how planets form. In fewer than ten million 

years, the material in the circumstellar disk around a young star will be accreted 

onto the star, dispersed into the interstellar medium, or converted into planets or 

smaller solid bodies. While the star’s gravity tends to pull all of the disk material 

onto the star, small orbiting clumps of coagulated dust grains in the disk grow 

into larger bodies that disrupt that infall process. The solid bodies often sculpt 

gaps, or cavities, in the disk and accrete more material as some grow into planets. 

Eventually winds from the star will sweep away the remaining disk material. Each 

of these processes is influenced by many factors that astronomers are working hard 

to understand, but their efforts have so far been hampered by a lack of precise 

spatial information about the distribution of the material in the disk.

SAO astronomers used the SMA to probe nine relatively massive proto-planetary disks, down to sizes approximately that of our solar system. They used newly 

improved models to measure the distribution of mass in the disk, including rings 

suggestive of gaps carved out by planets, and to estimate other key parameters such 

as turbulence in the material. The scientists concluded that not only does giant 

planet formation seem possible in all of these nine disks; it might already have 

begun within three of them. The absence of giant planets in the remaining six 

highlights the importance of other parameters, such as age. This work combined 

the high-precision submillimeter imaging capability of the SMA with sophisticated 

modeling to probe the early stages in the development of new planetary systems.

SAO astronomers produced a number of other significant findings in FY 09. In 

October 2008, SAO announced an impending asteroid impact with Earth 10 hours 
144 in advance. The boulder-sized object exploded high in the atmosphere, showering 

the ground below with fragments. Months later, searchers retrieved some of those 

fragments from the Sudanese desert.

SAO researchers showed that our Milky Way galaxy is larger and heftier than 

previously thought. Specifically, the Milky Way is 15 percent larger in size and 

contains 50 percent more mass. That is the cosmic equivalent of a five-foot-five, 

140-pound man suddenly bulking up to the size of a six-foot-three, 210-pound NFL 

linebacker. The Colbert Report, a popular Comedy Central program, commented on 

the finding in one of its episodes in 2009.

Other significant discoveries included stars forming just beyond a black hole’s grasp 

at the galactic center, evidence that a cosmic dance helps galaxies lose weight, and 

hints that magnetic fields play a larger role in star formation than previously thought.

In public outreach, SAO hosted a landmark three-day conference titled 

“Crossroads: The Future of Human Life in the Universe,” co-sponsored by the 

Harvard Origins of Life Initiative. Notable scientists who lectured included geneticist J. Craig Venter, physicist Freeman Dyson, futurist Juan Enriquez, and planet 

hunter David Charbonneau.

SAO continued to offer its popular monthly Observatory Night lectures and 

telescope observing sessions, with a special effort to feature topics relevant to the 

2009 International Year of Astronomy, which commemorated the 400th anniversary of Galileo’s first astronomical use of the telescope. Topical lectures included 

“Galileo Opens the Door” and “The Day We Found the Universe.” SAO also 

participated in an International Year of Astronomy Webcast called “Around the 

World in 80 Telescopes.” SAO provided occasional Author’s Night programs, as 

well as Sci-fi Movie Nights that explored the theme “Everything I learned about 

science, I learned at the movies.”

A new museum exhibit developed by SAO educators and scientists debuted at 

the Boston Museum of Science. Titled “Black Holes: Space Warps & Time Twists,” 

the 2,500-square-foot traveling exhibition pulled visitors into the modern search 

for real black holes—the most mysterious and powerful objects in the universe. 

The exhibit toured the New England region.

In FY 09, NASM continued to educate and inspire the public through exhibits and education programs, including discovery stations, lecture series, family 
145

educational events, and intern programs. The Museum commemorated the 40th 

anniversary of the Apollo 11 lunar landing with astronaut appearances, educational programming related to lunar science and the history of lunar exploration, 

and the opening of the exhibit “Alan Bean: Painting Apollo, First Artist on 

Another World.” In conjunction with the International Year of Astronomy, NASM 

opened a public observatory that provides visitors with the opportunity to view the 

sun, moon, stars, and planets with a 16-inch telescope on loan from the Harvard 

College Observatory. Programming commemorating the Centennial of Military 

Aviation was offered throughout the year, leading up to a public symposium.

At the Museum’s Steven F. Udvar-Hazy Center, which celebrated its fifth anniversary in 2009, plans continued for Phase Two, which will accommodate the 

Museum’s archives and the facilities for restoration and preservation of the Nation’s 

collection of air and space artifacts.

Staff members in NASM’s Center for Earth and Planetary Studies (CEPS) continued to participate on the science teams of several spacecraft missions. Dr. John 

Grant was a Participating Scientist for the Mars Exploration Rover (MER) mission operating on Mars. Also, as chair of the MER Science Operations Working 
146 Group, he directed the science team to consensus on targets and operations for 

the long-lived rovers. He conducted real-time mission planning from a control station installed on site at CEPS. Dr. Grant was also co-chair of the Mars Science 

Laboratory (MSL) Landing Site Steering Committee, which worked to identify 

landing sites for the new Mars rover.

CEPS staff were on the science teams for the Mars Advanced Radar for 

Subsurface and Ionosphere Sounding instrument on Mars Express, the High 

Resolution Imaging Science Experiment and the Shallow Subsurface Radar instruments on the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter, the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter, 

and the MESSENGER mission to Mercury, which this year revealed a never-beforeseen impact basin. CEPS scientist Dr. Tom Watters led the team that studied this 

newly discovered feature.

CEPS continued its active research program in planetary and terrestrial geology 

and geophysics using remote-sensing data from Earth-orbiting satellites, as well as 

piloted and unpiloted space missions. The scope of research activities included 

work on the moon, Mars, Earth, and Mercury, resulting in 41 peer-reviewed publications. Research topics included studies of Martian aeolian and volcanic features, terrestrial lava flows, lunar radar studies, Mercury data, and comparative 
planetology. In addition, CEPS scientists used new capabilities in Earth-based radar 147

imaging to study the surface and deep deposits of the moon at resolutions comparable to those of photos taken from lunar orbit. This work revealed unexpected 

variations in the roughness of lava flows that form the vast lunar plains, suggesting 

changes in the style or rate of volcanic activity over time.

As a NASA Regional Planetary Image Facility (RPIF), CEPS housed a collection 

of over 300,000 images of the planets and their satellites that is a reference library 

for science researchers and the public, serving the mid-Atlantic and southeastern 

U.S. The CEPS RPIF holds the most complete collection of lunar images of any 

RPIF in the world.
.
149

A

Fiscal Year 2009 Activities

A
150Aeronautics and Space Report of the President

Appendix A-1

U

(Includes spacecraft from cooperating countries launched by U.S. launch vehicles.) 

Calendar Year

Earth Orbita Earth Escapeb

Success Failure Success Failure

1957 0 1 0 0

1958 5 8 0 4

1959 9 9 1 2

1960 16 12 1 2

1961 35 12 0 2

1962 55 12 4 1

1963 62 11 0 0

1964 69 8 4 0

1965 93 7 4 1

1966 94 12 7 1b

1967 78 4 10 0

1968 61 15 3 0

1969 58 1 8 1

1970 36 1 3 0

1971 45 2 8 1

1972 33 2 8 0

1973 23 2 3 0

1974 27 2 1 0

1975 30 4 4 0

1976 33 0 1 0

1977 27 2 2 0

1978 34 2 7 0

1979 18 0 0 0

1980 16 4 0 0

1981 20 1 0 0

1982 21 0 0 0

1983 31 0 0 0

1984 35 3 0 0

1985 37 1 0 0

1986 11 4 0 0

1987 9 1 0 0

1988 16 1 0 0

1989 24 0 2 0

1990 40 0 1 0

1991 32c 0 0 0

1992 26c 0 1 0

1993 28c 1 1 0

1994 31c 1 1 0

1995 24c,d 2 1 0

1996 30 1 3 0

1997 22e 0 1 0

1998 23 0 2 0

1999 35 4 2 0

2000 31f 0 0 0

2001 23 0 3 0

2002 18 0 0 1b

2003 28c,f 0 2 0

2004 8c 0 1 0

2005 10 0 2 0

2006 20d 0 2 0

2007 16 2 2 0

2008 22f 0 0 0

2009 24f 1 0 0

TOTAL 1,646 156 106 16

a. The criterion of success or failure used is attainment of Earth orbit or Earth escape rather than judgment of mission success. “Escape” flights 

include all that were intended to go to at least an altitude equal to lunar distance from Earth.

b. This Earth-escape failure did attain Earth orbit and, therefore, is included in the Earth-orbit success totals.

c. This excludes commercial satellites. It counts separately spacecraft launched by the same launch vehicle.

d. This counts various sets of microsatellites as a single payload.

e. This includes the Small Spacecraft Technology Initiative (SSTI) Lewis spacecraft that began spinning out of control shortly after it achieved 

Earth orbit.

f. This includes American spacecraft not launched in the U.S.
151 Fiscal Year 2009 Activities

Appendix A-2

World reCord of spaCe launChes suCCessful

in aTTaining earTh orbiT or beyond

(Enumerates launches rather than spacecraft; some launches orbited multiple spacecraft.)a

Calendar 

Year

United

Statesb

USSR/

CIS Francec Italyc Japan

People’s 

Republic

of China Australia

United

Kingdomc

European 

Space

Agency India Israel Iran

1957 2

1958 5 1

1959 10 3

1960 16 3

1961 29 6

1962 52 20

1963 38 17

1964 57 30

1965 63 48 1

1966 73 44 1

1967 57 66 2 1 1

1968 45 74

1969 40 70

1970 28 81 2 1 1 1

1971 30 83 1 2 2 1 1

1972 30 74 1 1

1973 23 86

1974 22 81 2 1

1975 27 89 3 1 2 3

1976 26 99 1 2

1977 24 98 2

1978 32 88 3 1

1979 16 87 2 1

1980 13 89 2 1

1981 18 98 3 1 2 1

1982 18 101 1 1

1983 22 98 3 1 2 1

1984 22 97 3 3 4

1985 17 98 2 1 3

1986 6 91 2 2 2

1987 8 95 3 2 2

1988 12 90 2 4 7

1989 17 74 2 7 1

1990 27 75 3 5 5 1

1991 20 62 2 1 9 1

1992 31 55 2 3 7 2

1993 24 45 1 1 7

1994 26 49 2 5 6 2

1995 27 33 1 2 12 1

1996 32 25 1 3 10 1

1997 37 28 2 6 12 1

1998 34 24 2 6 11

1999 32 26 4 10 1

2000 30 34 5 12

2001 23 23 1 1 8 2

2002 18 23 3 4 11 1 1

2003 26 21 2 6 4 2

2004 19 22 8 3 1

2005 16 26 2 5 5 1

2006 15 16 5 3 5

2007 25 33 3 13 8 3 1

2008 19 26 1 11 7 3

2009* 18 22 2 1 5 4 1

*(through September 30, 2009)

TOTAL 1,395 2,849 10 8 73 116 1 1 187 28 5 1

a. This includes commercial expendable launches and launches of the Space Shuttle as well as launches to useless orbit.

b. Launches from U.S.-Russia joint platform included in U.S. totals.

c. Since 1979, all launches for ESA member countries have been joint and are listed under ESA. 
152Aeronautics and Space Report of the President

Appendix B

S

October 1, 2008–September 30, 2009

Launch Date Apogee and

Spacecraft Name Perigee (km),

COSPAR* Designation Period (min),

Launch Vehicle Mission Objectives Inclination to Equator (°) Remarks

October 19, 2008 Space physics 320,000 Interstellar Boundary Explorer, designed 

Star 27/IBEX 7,000 to make observations beyond the solar 

2008-051A 8 days system’s termination shock 

Pegasus-XL/L-1011 cargo plane 11

October 25, 2008 Military surveillance 623 Italian Earth observation and military 

Cosmo/SkyMed 3 622 surveillance radar satellite

2008-054A 97.2

97.9

November 15, 2008 International Space Station 352 Resupply and installation of the Leonardo 

STS-126/Endeavour 344 module

2008-059A 91.5 Repair of a broken Solar Array Rotary 

Shuttle 51.6 Joint

January 18, 2009 Geostationary intelligence 38,077 National Reconnaissance Office

USA 202 (NROL 26) 35,943

2009-001A 1,440

Delta IV Heavy 3

February 6, 2009 Weather 867 NOAA-N PRIME

NOAA 19 845 Part of the Polar Orbiting Environmental 

2009-005A 102.10 Satellites (POES)

Delta 2 98.8

March 7, 2009 Astrophysics Search for terrestrial planets near the 

2009-011A habitable zone of their stars and the posKepler sibility of life

Delta 2

March 15, 2009 International Space Station 353 Delivered and installed the fourth starSTS-119/Discovery 335 board truss segment (ITS S6), as well as 

2009-012A 91.40 additional solar arrays and batteries

Shuttle 51.6

March 24, 2009 Navigational 20,272 GPS 2R-20 replaced GPS 2A-27 in the 

Navstar 63 (USA 203) 20,093 navigation network

2009-014A 718

Delta 2 55.1

April 4, 2009 Military communications 35,452 Wideband Global Satcom

WGS F2 (USA 204) 35,397 Part of a military mission to serve U.S. 

2009-017A 1,417.60 forces deployed in Iraq and Afghanistan

Atlas 5 .1000

April 20, 2009 Military communications 35,787 Italian military communications satellite

SICRAL 1B 35,785

2009-020A 1,436

Sea Launch Zenit 3SL 0

May 5, 2009 Military Unknown Space Tracking and Surveillance System 

STSS ATRR (USA 205) Advanced Technology Risk Reduction 

2009-023A satellite 

Delta 2 Operated by the U.S. Missile Defense 

Agency
153 Fiscal Year 2009 Activities

Appendix B

(Continued)

Successful Launches to Orbit on U.S. Vehicles

October 1, 2008–September 30, 2009

Launch Date

Spacecraft Name

COSPAR* Designation

Launch Vehicle Mission Objectives

Apogee and

Perigee (km),

period (min),

Inclination to Equator (°) Remarks

May 11, 2009

STS-125/Atlantis

2009-025A

Shuttle

Hubble Space Telescope 566

302

93.30

28.5

Hubble Servicing Mission SM-4 for 

repairs and upgrades

May 19, 2009

TacSat 3

2009-028A

Minotaur 1

CubeSats and TacSat 463−465

427−433

93.50−93.60

40.5

Tacsat 3 contained the Advanced 

Responsive Tactically Effective Military 

Imaging Spectrometer hyperspectral 

imager, the Office of Naval Research’s 

Satellite Communications Package, and 

the Air Force Research Laboratory’s 

Space Avionics Experiment

Secondary payloads included the 

Pharmasat experiment (2009-028B) 

and three cubesats: Hawksat 1 (2009-

028C), CP6 (2009-028D), Aerocube 3 

(2009-028E)

June 18, 2009

LRO/LCROSS

2009-031A

Atlas 5

Astrophysics Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter, 

designed to map the lunar surface and 

characterize landing sites for future 

missions

Carried Lunar CRater Observation 

and Sensing Satellite (LCROSS) 

(2009-031B), a lunar impact probe for 

detecting water ice in the lunar polar 

regions

June 27, 2009

GOES 14 (GOES O)

2009-033A

Delta 4

Geostationary Earth 

observation

35,788

35,786

1,436.10

.5000

Geostationary Operational 

Environmental Satellite

July 14, 2009

RazakSat

2009-037A

Falcon 1

Imaging 690

665

98.30

9

Malaysian imaging satellite, formerly 

known as MACSat

First flight of a commercial payload 

aboard a Falcon rocket

July 15, 2009

STS-127/Endeavour

2009-038A

International Space Station 336

328

91.20

51.6

Delivered and installed the Kibo 

Japanese Experiment Module Exposed 

Facility (JEM EF), Kibo Japanese 

Experiment Logistics Module–Exposed 

Section (ELM-ES), and Spacelab 

Pallet-Deployable 2 (SLP-D2)

Carried DRAGONSat (2009-038B), 

ANDE Pollux Sphere (2009-038E), 

ANDE Castor Sphere (2009-038F)
154Aeronautics and Space Report of the President

Appendix B

(Continued)

Successful Launches to Orbit on U.S. Vehicles

October 1, 2008–September 30, 2009

Launch Date

Spacecraft Name

COSPAR* Designation

Launch Vehicle Mission Objectives

Apogee and

Perigee (km),

Period (min),

Inclination to Equator (°) Remarks

August 17, 2009

Navstar 64

2009-043A

Delta 2

Navigation 20,228

20,138

718

54.9

Also known as USA 206 and as GPS 

2R-21(M)

August 29, 2009

STS-128/Discovery

2009-045A

Shuttle

International Space Station 352

310

91.2

51.6

Delivered and installed the Multi-Purpose 

Logistics Module (MPLM); the Lightweight 

Multi-Purpose Experiment Support 

Structure Carrier (LMC); three-crew 

quarters, galley, and second treadmill 

(TVIS2); and the Crew Health Care System 

2 (CHeCS 2)

September 8, 2009

USA 207/PAN

2009-047A

Atlas 5

Geostationary 

communications

Unknown Classified communications satellite

September 25, 2009

STSS DEMO 1 (USA 208)

2009-052A

Delta 2

Military Unknown Also included STSS DEMO 2 (USA 209) 

(2009-052B)

Space Tracking and Surveillance System for 

missile launch and flight monitoring using 

infrared sensors

U.S. Missile Defense Agency

* U.N. Committee on Space Research
155 Fiscal Year 2009 Activities

Appendix C

H

October 1, 2008–September 30, 2009

Spacecraft Launch Date Crew

Flight Time 

(d:h:min) Highlights

Soyuz TMA-13

(Expedition 18)

October 12, 2008 E. Michael Fincke

Yuri V. Lonchakov

Gregory E. Chamitoff

Sandra H. Magnus

Koichi Wakata

Richard Garriott

177:19:49 Richard Garriott as American tourist

Space Shuttle

Endeavour (STS-126)

November 15, 2008 Christopher J. Ferguson

Eric A. Boe

Stephen G. Bowen

Robert S. “Shane” Kimbrough

Heidemarie M. Stefanyshyn-Piper

Donald R. Pettit

Sandra H. Magnus

Gregory E. Chamitoff

15:20:29 Primary payload: Multi-Purpose 

Logistics Module (MPLM) 

Magnus remained on the Station, 

replacing Expedition 17/18 Flight 

Engineer Gregory E. Chamitoff

Space Shuttle

Discovery (STS-119)

March 15, 2009 Lee J. Archambault

Dominic A. “Tony” Antonelli

Joseph M. Acaba

John L. Phillips

Steven R. Swanson

Richard R. Arnold

Koichi Wakata

Sandra H. Magnus

12:19:29 Primary payload: S6 truss segment

Wakata remained on the Station, 

replacing Expedition 18 Flight 

Engineer Sandra Magnus

Soyuz TMA-14

(Expedition 19)

March 26, 2009 Gennady I. Padalka

Michael R. Barratt

Koichi Wakata

Charles Simonyi

199:01:48 Charles Simonyi as American tourist

Space Shuttle

Atlantis (STS-125)

May 11, 2009 Scott D. Altman

Gregory C. Johnson

Andrew J. Feustel

Michael T. Good

John M. Grunsfeld

Michael J. Massimino

K. Megan McArthur

12:21:37 Hubble Space Telescope Servicing 

Mission 4 

Soyuz TMA-15

(Expedition 20)

May 27, 2009 Roman Romanenko

Robert Thirsk

Frank De Winne

188:05:46 First six-person crew on board the 

Station

Space Shuttle

Endeavour (STS-127)

July 15, 2009 Mark L. Polansky

Douglas G. Hurley

David A. Wolf

Christopher J. Cassidy

Julie Payette

Thomas H. Marshburn

Timothy L. Kopra

Koichi Wakata

15:16:45 Primary payload: Kibo Japanese 

Experiment Module Exposed Facility 

(JEM EF), Kibo Japanese Experiment 

Logistics Module–Exposed Section 

(ELM-ES) 

Kopra remained on the Station, replacing Japanese astronaut Koichi Wakata

Space Shuttle

Discovery (STS-128)

August 29, 2009 Frederick W. “Rick” Sturckow

Kevin A. Ford

Patrick G. Forrester

José M. Hernández

Christer Fuglesang

John D. “Danny” Olivas

Nicole P. Stott

Timothy L. Kopra

13:20:54 Primary payload: Leonardo MultiPurpose Logistics Module, Lightweight 

Multi-Purpose Experiment Support 

Structure Carrier 

Stott remained on the Station, replacing Flight Engineer Timothy Kopra

Soyuz TMA-16

(Expedition 21)

September 30, 2009 Maksim Suraev

Jeffrey Williams

Guy Laliberté

168:23:44 Guy Laliberté as tourist
156Aeronautics and Space Report of the President

Appendix D-1A

S

HISTORICAL TABLE OF BUDGET AUTHORITY 

(in millions of real-year dollars)

FY

NASA 

Total

NASA 

Space DOD Othera DOEb DOC DOI USDA NSFc DOT Total Space

1959 331 261 490 34 34 785

1960 524 462 561 43 43 1,066

1961 964 926 814 68 68 1,808

1962 1,825 1,797 1,298 199 148 51 3,294

1963 3,673 3,626 1,550 257 214 43 5,433

1964 5,100 5,016 1,599 213 210 3 6,828

1965 5,250 5,138 1,574 241 229 12 6,953

1966 5,175 5,065 1,689 214 187 27 6,968

1967 4,966 4,830 1,664 213 184 29 6,707

1968 4,587 4,430 1,922 174 145 28 0.2 1 6,526

1969 3,991 3,822 2,013 170 118 20 0.2 1 31 6,005

1970 3,746 3,547 1,678 141 103 8 1 1 28 5,366

1971 3,311 3,101 1,512 162 95 27 2 1 37 4,775

1972 3,307 3,071 1,407 133 55 31 6 2 39 4,611

1973 3,406 3,093 1,623 147 54 40 10 2 41 4,863

1974 3,037 2,759 1,766 158 42 60 9 3 44 4,683

1975 3,229 2,915 1,892 158 30 64 8 2 54 4,965

1976 3,550 3,225 1,983 168 23 72 10 4 59 5,376

TQ* 932 849 460 43 5 22 3 1 12 1,352

1977 3,818 3,440 2,412 194 22 91 10 6 65 6,046

1978 4,060 3,623 2,738 226 34 103 10 8 71 6,587

1979 4,596 4,030 3,036 248 59 98 10 8 73 7,314

1980 5,240 4,680 3,848 231 40 93 12 14 72 8,759

1981 5,518 4,992 4,828 234 41 87 12 16 78 10,054

1982 6,044 5,528 6,679 313 61 145 12 15 80 12,520

1983 6,875 6,328 9,019 327 39 178 5 20 85 15,674

1984 7,458 6,858 10,195 395 34 236 3 19 103 17,448

1985 7,573 6,925 12,768 584 34 423 2 15 110 20,277

1986 7,807 7,165 14,126 477 35 309 2 23 108 21,768

1987 10,923 9,809 16,287 466 48 278 8 19 112 1 26,562

1988 9,062 8,322 17,679 741 241 352 14 18 115 1 26,742

1989 10,969 10,097 17,906 560 97 301 17 21 121 3 28,563

1990 12,324 11,460 15,616 506 79 243 31 25 124 4 27,582

1991 14,016 13,046 14,181 772 251 251 29 26 211 4 27,999

1992 14,317 13,199 15,023 798 223 327 34 29 181 4 29,020

1993 14,310 13,064 14,106 731 165 324 33 25 180 4 27,901

1994 14,570 13,022 13,166 632 74 312 31 31 179 5 26,820

1995 13,854 12,543 10,644 759 60 352 31 32 278 6 23,946

1996 13,884 12,569 11,514 828 46 472 36 37 231 6 24,911

1997 13,709 12,457 11,727 789 35 448 42 39 219 6 24,973

1998 13,648 12,321 12,359 839 103 435 43 39 213 6 25,519

1999 13,653 12,459 13,203 982 105 575 59 37 200 6 26,644

2000 13,601 12,521 12,941 1,056 164 575 60 44 207 6 26,518

2001 14,230 13,304 14,326 1,062 145 577 60 36 232 12 28,692

2002 14,868 13,871 15,740 1,180 166 644 64 28 266 12 30,791

2003 15,364 14,360 19,388 1,305 191 649 74 42 337 12 35,053

2004 15,379 14,322 19,115 1,464 209 745 71 61 366 12 34,901

2005 16,198 15,234 19,690 1,551 229 807 70 73 360 12 36,475

2006 16,623 15,765 22,114 1,647 245 860 82 84 364 12 39,526

2007 16,285 15,568 22,418 1,680 200 912 87 65 404 12 39,666

2008 17,117 16,502 24,795 1,698 195 862 90 59 479 13 42,995

2009 17,775 17,275 26,528 1,868 200 1,078 64 27 485 14 45,671

a. The Other column is the total of the non-NASA and non-DOD budget authority figures that appear in the succeeding columns. The total is 

sometimes different from the sum of the individual figures because of rounding. The Total Space column does not include the NASA Total 

column because the latter includes budget authority for aeronautics as well as in space. For the years 1989–1997, this Other column also includes 

small figures for the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). Also includes $2.1 billion for replacement of Space Shuttle Challenger in 1987.

b. The DOE has recalculated its space expenditures since 1998

c. The NSF has recalculated its space expenditures since 1980, making them significantly higher than reported in previous years.

* Transition Quarter
157 Fiscal Year 2009 Activities

Appendix D-1B

S

HISTORICAL TABLE OF BUDGET AUTHORITY 

(in millions of inflation-adjusted FY 09 dollars)

FY

Inflation 

Factors

NASA 

Total

NASA 

Space DOD Othera DOEb DOC DOI USDA NSFc DOT Total Space

1959 5.999 1,986 1,566 2,940 204 204 4,709

1960 5.907 3,095 2,729 3,314 254 254 6,296

1961 5.836 5,626 5,404 4,751 397 397 10,552

1962 5.754 10,501 10,340 7,469 1,145 852 293 18,954

1963 5.690 20,899 20,632 8,819 1,462 1,218 245 30,913

1964 5.619 28,659 28,187 8,985 1,197 1,180 17 38,370

1965 5.553 29,155 28,533 8,741 1,338 1,272 67 38,612

1966 5.459 28,252 27,651 9,221 1,168 1,021 147 38,040

1967 5.345 26,543 25,816 8,894 1,138 983 155 35,849

1968 5.178 23,751 22,938 9,952 902 751 145 1 5 33,792

1969 5.000 19,957 19,112 10,066 852 590 100 1 5 156 30,029

1970 4.782 17,913 16,961 8,024 674 493 38 5 5 134 25,660

1971 4.534 15,013 14,061 6,856 734 431 122 9 5 167 21,651

1972 4.319 14,281 13,262 6,076 576 238 134 26 9 170 19,914

1973 4.124 14,046 12,755 6,693 608 223 165 41 8 171 20,056

1974 3.950 11,995 10,897 6,975 624 166 237 36 12 174 18,497

1975 3.684 11,895 10,738 6,970 581 111 236 29 7 198 18,289

1976 3.337 11,846 10,761 6,617 562 77 240 33 13 198 17,940

TQ* 3.112 2,901 2,642 1,432 134 16 68 9 3 37 4,208

1977 3.016 11,517 10,377 7,276 584 66 275 30 18 195 18,236

1978 2.895 11,755 10,490 7,927 654 98 298 29 23 206 19,072

1979 2.713 12,468 10,932 8,236 673 160 266 27 22 198 19,841

1980 2.510 13,155 11,749 9,660 580 100 233 30 35 181 21,989

1981 2.308 12,736 11,522 11,143 541 95 201 28 37 181 23,206

1982 2.102 12,706 11,621 14,041 657 128 305 25 32 168 26,319

1983 1.968 13,527 12,451 17,746 643 77 350 10 39 167 30,840

1984 1.884 14,054 12,923 19,211 744 64 445 6 36 194 32,878

1985 1.817 13,763 12,585 23,204 1,061 62 769 4 27 199 36,849

1986 1.760 13,742 12,612 24,864 839 62 544 4 40 190 38,315

1987 1.720 18,789 16,873 28,016 801 83 478 14 33 192 2 45,690

1988 1.676 15,191 13,951 29,637 1,242 404 590 23 30 193 2 44,830

1989 1.625 17,827 16,410 29,102 910 158 489 28 34 197 5 46,422

1990 1.564 19,280 17,929 24,431 791 124 380 48 39 194 6 43,151

1991 1.508 21,142 19,679 21,391 1,165 379 379 44 39 319 6 42,235

1992 1.454 20,815 19,189 21,841 1,160 324 475 49 42 263 6 42,190

1993 1.418 20,294 18,527 20,005 1,036 234 459 47 35 255 6 39,569

1994 1.387 20,205 18,058 18,258 877 103 433 43 43 249 7 37,193

1995 1.358 18,808 17,028 14,450 1,030 81 478 42 43 377 8 32,508

1996 1.330 18,460 16,711 15,309 1,101 61 628 48 49 307 8 33,121

1997 1.305 17,884 16,250 15,298 1,030 46 584 55 51 286 8 32,578

1998 1.282 17,499 15,797 15,846 1,076 132 558 55 50 274 8 32,720

1999 1.267 17,295 15,783 16,725 1,244 133 728 75 47 253 8 33,752

2000 1.250 17,006 15,656 16,181 1,320 205 719 75 55 258 8 33,157

2001 1.226 17,440 16,305 17,558 1,302 178 707 74 44 284 15 35,165

2002 1.197 17,802 16,608 18,846 1,413 199 771 77 34 318 14 36,867

2003 1.175 18,050 16,871 22,778 1,533 224 762 87 49 396 14 41,182

2004 1.152 17,710 16,493 22,012 1,686 241 858 82 70 421 14 40,190

2005 1.122 18,180 17,098 22,099 1,741 257 906 79 82 404 13 40,938

2006 1.087 18,077 17,144 24,049 1,791 266 935 89 91 396 13 42,984

2007 1.052 17,129 16,375 23,580 1,767 210 959 92 68 425 13 41,722

2008 1.024 17,525 16,895 25,385 1,738 200 883 92 60 490 13 44,019

2009 1.000 17,775 17,275 26,528 1,868 200 1,078 64 27 485 14 45,671

a. The Other column is the total of the non-NASA and non-DOD budget authority figures that appear in the succeeding columns. The total is 

sometimes different from the sum of the individual figures because of rounding. The Total Space column does not include the NASA Total 

column because the latter includes budget authority for aeronautics as well as in space. For the years 1989–1997, this Other column also includes 

small figures for the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). Also includes $2.1 billion for replacement of Space Shuttle Challenger in 1987.

b. The DOE has recalculated its space expenditures since 1998.

c. The NSF has recalculated its space expenditures since 1980, making them significantly higher than reported in previous years.

* Transition Quarter
158Aeronautics and Space Report of the President

Appendix D-2

F

(in millions of dollars by fiscal year)

Federal 

Agencies

Budget Authority Budget Outlays

2008 

actual

2009 

actual

Recovery 

enacted

2010 

actual

2010 

ARRA

2011 

est.

2008 

actual

2009 

actual

2010 

actual

NASA1, 2 16,502 17,275 852 18,228 17,231 18,389 18,362

DOD 25,949 26,528 26,463 24,080 24,273 24,142

DOE3 195 200 1 203 217 192 193 204

DOC 862 1,078 75 1,261 603 991 1,221

DOI 64 64 0 67 64 64 67

USDA 26.8 26.3 26.6 22.6 21.6 21.6

DOT 13 14 0 15 15 12 14 15

NSF4, 5 464 485 142 484 146 361 310 515

(1) The 2008 Consolidated Appropriations Act rescinded $192.5 million in NASA prior-year unobligated balances, effectively reducing NASA’s 

total FY 08 budget authority by this amount.

(2) Beginning in 2009, NASA program budgets reflect only direct program costs. Indirect costs are budgeted within the Cross-Agency Support 

Programs account (captured within the Federal Space Activities Budget table).

(3) Beginning in 2007, Department of Energy budget figures do not include any physics research and operations funding for ground-based experiments managed in the High Energy Physics program.

(4) The 2008 Actuals that NSF reported in June 2009 were $479 million in authority and $361 million in outlays.

(5) $146 million in FY 10 American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA) authority is carried over from FY 09 ARRA authority.
159 Fiscal Year 2009 Activities

Appendix D-3

F

(in millions of dollars by fiscal year)

Federal 

Agencies

Budget Authority Budget Outlays

2008 

actual

2009 

actual

Recovery 

enacted

2010 

actual

2011 

est.

2008 

actual

2009 

actual

2010 

actual

NASA1, 2 615 500 150 497 603 778 542

USDA 33.2 48.9 55.4 30.1 47.5 52.6

DOD 10,873 13,248 49 14,166 10,994 12,252 13,573

DOI 26 22 15 30 26 22 30

DOT 2,646 2,897 200 3,104 2,886 2,562 2,587 2,742

(1) The 2008 Consolidated Appropriations Act rescinded $192.5 million in NASA prior-year unobligated balances, effectively reducing NASA’s 

total FY 08 budget authority by this amount.

(2) Beginning in 2009, NASA program budgets reflect only direct program costs. Indirect costs are budgeted within the Cross-Agency Support 

Programs account (captured within the Federal Space Activities Budget table).
.
161 A Fiscal Year 2009 Activities

3D-PAM 3D-Path Arrival Management

A

AAD Aircraft Aging and Durability

AATSR Advanced Along-Track Scanning Radiometer

ABI Advanced Baseline Imager

ACD Advanced Capabilities Division

ACE Advanced Composition Explorer; Aerosol-Cloud-Environment

ACES Airspace Conflict Evaluation Simulator

ACJV Atlantic Coast Joint Venture

ACT Atacama Cosmology Telescope

ADD Architecture Definition Document

ADS-B Automatic Dependent Surveillance-Broadcast

AEDT Aviation Environmental Design Tool

AGEDI Abu Dhabi Global Environmental Data Initiative

AGRHYMET Agricultural-Hydrological-Meteorological

AGS Alternating Gradient Synchrotron

AGS Division of Atmospheric and Geospace Sciences

AHS American Helicopter Society

AIAA American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics

AIRS Atmospheric Infrared Sounder

ALMA Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array

AMD Aviation Management Directorate

AMISA Arctic Mechanisms of Interaction between Surface and Atmosphere

AMISR Advanced Modular Incoherent-Scatter Radar

AMPERE Active Magnetosphere and Planetary Electrodynamics Response Experiment

AMS Alpha Magnetic Spectrometer

AO Announcement of Opportunity

AOML Atlantic Oceanographic and Meteorological Laboratory

AP Associated Press

APLC Aerospace Products Literature Centers

ARM Atmospheric Radiation Measurement

ARMD Aeronautics Research Mission Directorate

ARRA American Recovery and Reinvestment Act

ARS Agricultural Research Service

ASAR Along-Track Scanning Radiometer

ASCOS Arctic Summer Cloud Ocean Study

ASCR Office of Advanced Scientific Computing Research

ASME American Society of Mechanical Engineers

AST Office of Commercial Space Transportation; Division of Astronomical Sciences

ASTER Advanced Spaceborne Thermal Emission and Reflection Radiometer

ASTS Aeronautics Science and Technology

ATM Division of Atmospheric Sciences

ATP Aeronautics Test Program

ATRR Advanced Technology Risk Reduction

ATST Advanced Technology Solar Telescope

AWiFS Advanced Wide Field Sensor
162Aeronautics and Space Report of the President

B 

BIA Bureau of Indian Affairs

BIS Bureau of Industry and Security

BLM Bureau of Land Management

BNL Brookhaven National Laboratory

C

C-CAP Coastal Change Analysis Program

C2 Command and Control

CAAFI Commercial Aviation Alternative Fuel Initiative

CAASD Center for Advanced Aviation System Development

CCDev Commercial Crew Development

CCMC Community Coordinated Modeling Center

CCRS Canada Centre for Remote Sensing

CDL Cropland Data Layer

CDTI Cockpit Display of Traffic Information

CEDAR Coupling, Energetics, and Dynamics of Atmospheric Regions

CEOS Committee on Earth Observing Satellites

CEPS Center for Earth and Planetary Studies

CERN European Organization for Nuclear Research

CfA Center for Astrophysics

CFC chlorofluorocarbons

CIBER Cosmic Infrared Background Experiment

CILSS Inter-Governmental Authority on Combating Drought in the Sahel

CIR Combustion Integrated Rack; color infrared

CIRA Cooperative Institute for Research in the Atmosphere

CISM Center for Integrated Space Weather Modeling

CLARREO Climate Absolute Radiance and Refractivity Observatory

CLU Common Land Units

CMB cosmic microwave background

CMC carbon matrix composite

CME coronal mass ejection

CMM coordinate measuring machines

CNES Centre National d’Études Spatiales

CNN Cable News Network

COLBERT Combined Operational Load Bearing External Resistance Treadmill

CONUS Contiguous United States

CORS Continuously Operating Reference Station

COSMIC Constellation Observing System for Meteorology, Ionosphere, and Climate

COTS Commercial Orbital Transportation Services

CRISM Compact Reconnaissance Imaging Spectrometer for Mars

CRM Coastal Relief Model

CRS Commercial Resupply Services

CS Commercial Service

CxP Constellation Program

D

DAC Dynamic Airspace Configuration

DARPA Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency

DEM digital elevation model

DEMO Space Tracking and Surveillance System Demonstrators

DFG derelict fishing gear
163 DLR German Aerospace Center

DOC Department of Commerce

DOD Department of Defense

DOE Department of Energy

DOGAMI Department of Geology and Mineral Industries

DOI Department of the Interior

DOM dissolved organic material

DOS Department of State

DSN Deep Space Network

E

EAD Abu Dhabi Environment Agency

EBIS Electron Beam Ion Source

ECMWF European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts

EELV Evolved Expendable Launch Vehicle

EFICA Efficient Flow into Congested Airspace

EKV Exoatmospheric Kill Vehicle

ELV expendable launch vehicles

EOS Earth Observing System

ERAM En Route Automation Modernization

ERMATM Environmental Response Management Application

EROS Earth Resources Observation and Science Center

ESA European Space Agency

ESMD Exploration Systems Mission Directorate

ESPC Environmental Satellite Processing Center

ESV Earth station on vessel

ET external tank

ETDP Exploration Technology Development Program

ETM+ Enhanced Thematic Mapper Plus

EUMETSAT European Organization for the Exploitation of Meteorological Satellites

EUPOS European Position Determination System

EUV extreme ultraviolet

EVA Extravehicular Activity

EVE Extreme Ultraviolet Variability Experiment

F

FAA Federal Aviation Administration

FAS Foreign Agricultural Service

FASR Frequency Agile Solar Radiotelescope

FBTM Flow-Based Trajectory Management

FCC Federal Communications Commission

FCDAS Fairbanks Command and Data Acquisition Station

FCF Fluids and Combustion Facility

FEMA Federal Emergency Management Agency

FEWS Future En Route Workstation

FFRDC Federally Funded Research and Development Center

FGST Fermi Gamma-ray Space Telescope

FIR Fluids Integrated Rack

FSA Farm Service Agency

FT Fischer-Tropsch

FTS Fourier Transform Spectrometer

FWS U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service

FY fiscal year
164 G

GCJV Gulf Coast Joint Venture

GDP Gross Domestic Product

GEM Geospace Environment Modeling

GFL Global Fiducials Library

GHWG Global Harmonization Working Group

GHz gigahertz

GIS Geographic Information System

GLAM Global Agriculture Monitoring

GLAST Gamma-ray Large Area Space Telescope

GLONASS Global Navigation Satellite System

GLS Global Land Survey

GNSS Global Navigation Satellite System

GOES Geostationary Operational Environmental Satellite

GPS Global Positioning System

GRAV-D Gravity for the Re-definition of the American Vertical Datum

GSFC Goddard Space Flight Center

GV Gulfstream V

H

HAB Harmful Algal Bloom

HEO Highly Elliptical Orbit

HFI High Frequency Instrument

HIAPER High-performance Instrumented Airborne Platform for Environmental Research

HIFI Heterodyne Instrument for the Far Infrared

HIPPO HIAPER Pole to Pole Observations

HiRISE High Resolution Imaging Science Experiment

HITL Human-in-the-Loop

HRP Human Research Program

HST Hubble Space Telescope

HTV H-II Transfer Vehicle

HyspIRI Hyperspectral Infrared Imager

I

I&M Inventory and Monitoring Program

IADS Integrated Arrival/Departure/Surface

IBC Individual Blade Control

IBEX Interstellar Boundary Explorer

IBTrACS International Best Track Archive for Climate Stewardship

ICG-3 International Committee on Global Navigation Satellite Systems

IEC International Electrotechnical Commission

IfSAR or InSAR Interferometric Synthetic Aperture Radar

IGS International Global Navigation Satellite System Service

IIFD Integrated Intelligent Flight Deck

IIWG Interagency Infrastructure Working Group

IOOS® Integrated Ocean Observing System

IP International Partner

IPCC Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change

IRAC Integrated Resilient Aircraft Control Project

IRVE-2 Inflatable Reentry Vehicle Experiment

ISDAC Indirect and Semi-Direct Aerosol Campaign

ISO International Organization for Standardization
165 ISOC Instrument Science Operations Center

ISRSE International Symposium on Remote Sensing of Environment

ISS International Space Station

ITA International Trade Administration

ITAR International Traffic in Arms Regulations

IVHM Integrated Vehicle Health Management

J

JAXA Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency

JDEM Joint Dark Energy Mission

JPDO Joint Planning and Development Office

JSpOC Joint Space Operations Center

K

KACST King Abdulaziz City for Science and Technology

L

LANDFIRE Landscape Fire and Resource Management Planning Tools

LAT Large Area Telescope

LBNL Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory

LCROSS Lunar CRater Observation and Sensing Satellite

LDCM Landsat Data Continuity Mission

LEO Low-Earth Orbit

LER Lunar Electric Rover

LFI Low Frequency Instrument

LIDAR LIght Detection And Ranging

LMMP Lunar Mapping and Modeling Project

LPRP Lunar Precursor Robotic Program

LRO Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter

LSP Launch Services Program

LSST Large Synoptic Survey Telescope

M

M3 Moon Mineralogy Mapper

MAF Michoud Assembly Facility

MENA Middle East North Africa

MEP Manufacturing Extension Partnership

MER Mars Exploration Rover

MERIS Medium Resolution Imaging Spectrometer

MESSENGER MErcury Surface, Space ENvironment, GEochemistry, and Ranging

Mini-SAR Miniature Synthetic Aperture Radar

MIT Massachusetts Institute of Technology

MLAS Max Launch Abort System

MMC Multipurpose Marine Cadastre

MMRCA Medium Multi-Role Combat Aircraft

MMS Minerals Management Service

MOA Memorandum of Agreement

MOBY Marine Optical Buoy

MODIS Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer

MOU Memorandum of Understanding

MPB mountain pine beetle
166 MRLC Multi-Resolution Land Characteristics

MRO Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter

MRSA Methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus Aureus

MSL Mars Science Laboratory

MSS Multispectral Scanner

MTBS Monitoring Trends in Burn Severity

MTS Marine Transportation System

MWA Murchison Widefield Array

N

NAIC National Astronomy and Ionosphere Center

NAIP National Agriculture Imagery Program

NARSS National Authority for Remote Sensing and Space Sciences

NAS National Airspace System

NASA National Aeronautics and Space Administration

NASM National Air and Space Museum

NASS National Agricultural Statistics Service

NCAR National Center for Atmospheric Research

NCBN Northeast Coastal and Barrier Network

NCDC National Climatic Data Center

NCEP National Centers for Environmental Prediction

NDEP National Digital Elevation Program

NDOP National Digital Orthophoto Program

NERSC National Energy Research Scientific-computing Center

NESC NASA Engineering Safety Center

NESDIS National Environmental Satellite, Data, and Information Service

NextGen Next Generation Air Transportation System

NFMTC National Force Measurement Technology Capability

NGA National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency

NGDC National Geophysical Data Center

NGS National Geodetic Survey

NIFA National Institute of Food and Agriculture

NIRSpec near infrared spectrograph

NIST National Institute of Standards and Technology

NLCD National Land Cover Dataset

NNSA National Nuclear Security Administration

NOAA National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration

NOAO National Optical Astronomy Observatory

NODC National Oceanographic Data Center

NOS National Ocean Service

NPAT National Partnership for Aeronautical Testing

NPOESS National Polar-orbiting Operational Environment Satellite System

NPP NPOESS Preparatory Project

NPS National Park Service

NRA NASA Research Announcement

NRAO National Radio Astronomy Observatory

NRCS Natural Resources Conservation Service

NRI National Resources Inventory

NRO National Reconnaissance Office

NSBRI National Space Biomedical Research Institute

NSCOR NASA Specialized Center of Research

NSDI National Spatial Data Infrastructure

NSF National Science Foundation

NSO National Solar Observatory
167 NSOF NOAA Satellite Operations Facility

NSPO National Space Organization

NSRL NASA Space Radiation Laboratory

NSRS National Spatial Reference System

NSTC National Science and Technology Council

NSTX National Spherical Torus Experiment

NSWP National Space Weather Program

NTX North-Texas Research Station

NVLAP National Voluntary Laboratory Accreditation Program

NWS National Weather Service O

OAR Office of Oceanic and Atmospheric Research

OASIS Optimized Autonomous Space In-Situ Sensor-web

OCO Orbiting Carbon Observatory

OECD Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development

OES/SAT Office of Space and Advanced Technology

OFCM Office of the Federal Coordinator for Meteorology

OFDA Office of Foreign Disaster Assistance

OFES Office of Fusion Energy Sciences

OGA Office of Global Analysis

OGDR Operational Geophysical Data Record

OLI Operational Land Imager

OMAO Office of Marine and Aviation Operations

OMB Office of Management and Budget

OMI Ozone Monitoring Instrument

OPP Office of Polar Programs

OPUS Online Positioning User Service

ORS Operationally Responsive Space

OSC Office of Space Commercialization

OSM Office of Surface Mining

OTM Office of Transportation and Machinery P

PBO Plate Boundary Observatory

PJMIF plasma-jet-driven magnetic-inertial fusion

PLX Plasma Liner Experiment

PNT Positioning, Navigation, and Timing

POES Polar-orbiting Operational Environmental Satellite

PPPL Princeton Plasma Physics Laboratory Q

QZSS Quasi-Zenith Satellite System R

R&D research and development

RATS Research and Technology Studies

RAVAR Rapid Assessment of Values at Risk

RAX Radar Aurora Explorer

RDT&E research, development, test, and evaluation

RHIC Relativistic Heavy Ion Collider
168 RMP resource management plan

RNAV Area Navigation

RO radio occultation

RPIF Regional Planetary Image Facility

RPT Rocket Propulsion Test

RSAC Remote Sensing Applications Center

RSIWG Remote Sensing Interagency Working Group

RTN Real-Time Networks

RTP Research Transition Product

RTT Research Transition Team

RWBJV Rainwater Basin Joint Venture

S

SAA Space Act Agreement

SAFIRE Submillimeter and Far-InfraRed Experiment

SAME Smoke Aerosol Measurement Experiment

SAO Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory

SAR synthetic aperture radar

SARJ Solar Alpha Rotary Joint

SARSAT Search and Rescue Satellite-Aided Tracking

SBIRS Space Based Infrared System

SC Office of Science

SCaN Space Communications and Navigation Program

SciDAC Scientific Discovery through Advanced Computing

SDO Solar Dynamics Observatory

SHAAC Shuttle Hazard Area to Aircraft Calculator

SHINE Solar, Heliospheric, and INterplanetary Environment

SIA Satellite Imagery Archive

SLACNAL Stanford Linear Accelerator Center National Accelerator Laboratory

SMA Submillimeter Array

SMAP Soil Moisture Active-Passive

SMD Science Mission Directorate

SOAR Summer Opportunity in Aeronautics for High School Scholars

SOCC Satellite Operations Control Center

SOFIA Stratospheric Observatory for Infrared Astronomy

SpaceX Space Exploration Technologies

SPIRE Spectral and Photometric Imaging Receiver

SQUID Superconducting Quantum Interference Device

SRM Standard Reference Materials

SSA Space Situational Awareness

SSME Space Shuttle Main Engine

STEM science, technology, engineering and mathematics

STP Space Test Program

STSS Space Tracking and Surveillance System

SuperDARN Super Dual Auroral Radar Network

SXI Solar X-Ray Imager

T

TARGETS Terminal Area Route Generation, Evaluation, and Traffic Simulation

TES transition-edge sensor

TIMED Thermosphere Ionosphere Mesosphere Energetics and Dynamics

TIR thermal infrared

TIROS Television Infrared Observation Satellite
169 TM Thematic Mapper

TPW Total Precipitable Water

TWP Tropical Western Pacific

U

UAF Upper Atmospheric Facilities

UARS Upper Atmospheric Research Section

UAS Unmanned Aerial System; Unmanned Aircraft System; Uninhabited Aerial Systems

UCAR University Corporation for Atmospheric Research

UFO Ultra High Frequency Follow-on

ULA United Launch Alliance

UNCOPUOS United Nations Committee on the Peaceful Uses of Outer Space

USDA U.S. Department of Agriculture

USFS U.S. Forest Service

USGS U.S. Geological Survey

USTR U.S. Trade Representative

UVCS Ultraviolet Coronagraph Spectrometer

V

VASIMR Variable Specific Impulse Magneto-plasma Rocket

VDatum Vertical Datum

VIIRS Visible Infrared Imager Radiometer Suite

W

WARP Web-based Access and Retrieval Portal

WLCI Wyoming Land Conservation Initiative

WRP Wetland Reserve Program

X

XRT X-Ray Telescope
.
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