National Aeronautics and Space Administration

NRP 

A Publication of NASA Research Park

POST

Winter 2019

THE

USGS & NASA Ames

Dr. Jim Reilly, Director of USGS and former Astronaut 

visited Ames on February 5, 2019 to discuss further 

collaborative opportunities with Dr. Tu and toured the 

USGS space in Building 19
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1 www.nasa.gov

IN THIS ISSUE

COVER | USGS & NASA Collaboration

Dr. Jim Reilly, Director of USGS visited 

Ames on to discus collaborative opportunities 

with Dr. Tu Director of NASA Ames

2 | Planetary Ventures Building at NASA 

Ames to Build Bay View Campus

Building of new Bay View Campus on track 

3 | Airmap Working on Drone Recognition

Airmap continues to make mass use of 

drones a reality

5 | Bloom Energy

A closer look at Bloom Engery

7 | RMV iNARTE® ESD Aerospace & 

Defense Engineer

RMW receives highest level of ESD certification 

and training for NASA

9 | Verdigris Helping Save Energy

Verdigris Technologies announces latest smart 

building advancement

11 | Vasper - A Better Way to Workout

Vasper showing how a shorter workout using 

advanced technology is a better workout

13 | Bay Aera Environmental Research Institute

Numerical Model Simulates Entire Evolution 

of a Solar Flare for First Time

14 | NASA Ames Photo Ops

Photos from the NRP

1 www.nasa.gov
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Planetary Ventures (PV) Bay View Campus Project is making great 

progress with steel erection underway. The Bay View Campus 

sits on a 42-acre site under a long-term lease between PV and 

NASA Ames Research Park. PV has worked closely with NASA Ames 

since 2016 through the planning and permitting of the project. One of the 

innovative and sustainable features of the Bay View Campus is that it will 

have the largest ground-source heat pump system installation in North 

America. The system uses the heat from the surrounding ground to power 

the building’s climate control–and no fossil fuels. The steel canopy structure will incorporate large clerestories that optimizes natural daylight to 

interior workspace, and provides views out. The campus will also create 

20 acres of open space planted with native species.

Planetary Ventures Bay View Project in September, 2018.

Planetary Ventures Building and 

NASA Research Park working 

together to build the Bay View 

Campus

September 2018, Moffett Field, California
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3 www.nasa.gov 3 www.nasa.gov

L

ast month, AirMap, Alphabet’s Wing and Kittyhawk.io demonstrated a network-based remote ID application on the InterUSS PlatformTM. The successful demonstration illustrates that a remote ID solution exists today for drone 

operations in networked areas, without the need for additional infrastructure 

or technology.

About the Demonstration

AirMap, Wing, and Kittyhawk.io are each UAS Service Suppliers (USS) of the FAA’s 

Low-Altitude Authorization and Notification Capability (LAANC) for authorization to 

operate drones in U.S. controlled airspace. During the demonstration, multiple DJI 

and Wing drones were flown in controlled airspace, each connected to a unique USS, 

which exchanged data via a branch of the open source InterUSS PlatformTM.

Non-participating bystanders were able to visualize the drone operations in their 

vicinity in real time on a smartphone application, no matter which USS the drone was 

connected to. Only safety information was shared, protecting operator and consumer 

privacy.

Network-Based and Local Broadcast Remote ID

There is a global consensus among airspace stakeholders that remote identification is necessary before widespread advanced drone operations can be achieved. 

But many disagree on the best path forward in establishing and enforcing remote 

identification without imposing a burden on the operator or infringing upon privacy 

rights.

By validating an operator’s identity through their respective USS, network-based 

remote identification offers a trusted picture of who is flying a drone, without requiring 

any additional information or equipment from the operator. This makes network-based 

remote ID an easy and effective way to facilitate transparent and accountable UAS 

operations – which increasingly provide valuable and personal services to the public 

in highly-networked locations.
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Networked remote ID is also flexible. As new security needs arise, or technology implementations improves, network-based remote ID allows industry and operators to evolve to adopt 

new standards and realities, quickly and simply.

In remote areas where network coverage is sparse, remote identification data broadcasted 

by drones can be integrated into the same network remote identification apps. In this case, 

drones share information using integrated ground control station or cellular tracking devices. 

The AirMap UTM Platform supports networked and local broadcast remote ID.

“Before such wide-scale drone operations as autonomous deliveries can take place, we need 

to ensure that regulators – and the public – can easily assess whether or not a particular 

drone belongs to a good actor or requires intervention,” said Ben Marcus, Co-Founder and 

Chairman of AirMap. “Network-based remote identification applications like AirMap’s Drone 

Aware, augmented by local broadcast solutions when available, help airspace managers 

enforce aviation regulations while cultivating public trust in drone and also protecting the 

privacy of drone operators.”

The Demo in Detail

•	 The demonstration involved three operators and three UAS (2 DJI and 1 Wing 

Delivery). Each operator logged into their respective USS (Wing, AirMap, and 

Kittyhawk.io) with a validated identity.

•	 Each operator requested airspace access authorizations for their flights via their

respective USS LAANC capabilities. Wing, AirMap and Kittyhawk.io are all LAANC 

providers.

•	 When the remote identification display applications were launched, the InterUSS

platform was used to discover which USS were operating UAS flights in the area.

Each USS provided relevant UAS data and the aggregated set was provided to 

both the Wing and AirMap remote identification applications. This allows for data

sharing only as needed, providing a complete picture without the need for a single 

entity to have access to drone operations everywhere.

•	 AirMap, Wing, and Kittyhawk.io used industry standard authentication (OAuth 2.0) 

and security (HTTPS) for communications to the InterUSS platform and between 

USSs. LAANC already provides OAuth 2.0 authentication, and those credentials 

(or similar) can be used to authenticate communication between USS and to the 

InterUSS platform.
NRP Post

5 www.nasa.gov

Why Bloom Energy 

Deserves More Scrutiny in 2019

Bloom founder K.R. Sridhar was inspired by a 

photograph snapped 

from outer space illustrating the vast swaths of planet 

Earth still in the dark, unconnected to the electric grid.

When rocket scientist K.R. Sridhar founded the technology 

startup that would become 

Bloom Energy in 2001 — and 

famously introduced its electricity-generating “box” to the world 

in 2010 during a “60 Minutes” segment — his inspiration 

was a photograph snapped from outer space illustrating 

the vast swaths of planet Earth still in the dark, unconnected to the electric grid.

He mused then, as he does now: If scientists 

could generate power for equipment on far-flung 

planets such as Mars, why can’t they light up rural communities here on Earth? “In a digital world, 

electricity, like food and shelter, is a human need,” 

said Sridhar, Bloom’s chairman and CEO, during a 

relatively rare formal media briefing last week at the 

company’s Sunnyvale, California, headquarters.

Almost 20 years later, that worldview looms large on 

a wall in the now-public company’s corporate briefing 

room. It’s a not-so-subtle reminder of Bloom’s long-term 

mission “to make clean, reliable and affordable energy 

for everyone in the world.” 

Right now, however, the company’s short-term concern 

is convincing high-profile commercial and industrial 

accounts to buy the Bloom Energy Server (the fancy 

name for its fuel cell technology) to reduce their reliance on the traditional grid. Bloom’s solid oxide fuel cells 

generate electricity through an electrochemical reaction, 

rather than through a combustion process, which distinguishes its approach from on-site cogeneration options. 

In the past year, it has scored some impressive wins, 

such as a contract with the world’s largest internet co-location company, Equinix. Increasingly, the company has 

forged lucrative deals with utilities including Southern 

Co., Constellation and Exelon. “Utilities are emerging as 

some of our very best partners,” said Matt Ross, executive vice president and chief marketing officer of Bloom.

Bloom’s scale is still relatively modest. During the third 

quarter, which ended Sept. 30, Bloom reported a net 

loss of $78.6 million on revenue of $190.2 million, which 

was at the “mid-point” of its sales estimates. In its 

investor update, Bloom said it closed a record 206 

“acceptances” during the three-month period. While 

more than half of Bloom’s business comes from new 

accounts, long-time clients such as Intel, The Wonderful Company, eBay, Apple and Walmart continue to add 

new Bloom energy servers, according to a corporate 

presentation distributed to reporters.

We are experiencing a post-climate-change world. You 

need to address electricity not in a single dimension, but 

in many: reliability; resiliency; sustainability.

The issue is not about renewables, it’s not about fossils, 

it’s about emissions,” Sridhar said. “Whether we like it or 

not, we are experiencing a post-climate-change world. 

You need to address electricity not in a single dimension, 

but in many: reliability; resiliency; sustainability.”

The next update to Bloom’s technology, coming online 

in early 2019, will continue to improve the generating 

capacity it can provide within the same footprint — its 

engineers cram more megawatts into each successive 

generation. In a strategy borrowed from the high-tech 

industry, Bloom is focusing on ways it can integrate 

its platform with other components, such as energy 

storage, and inverters that allow it to be installed 

alongside solar equipment.

What’s more, the company is actively testing a module 

that will help its energy servers run more efficiently on 

biogas by “scrubbing” the gas of contaminants. About 

9 percent of Bloom’s installed servers already run on 

biogas, but the company’s broader support of this option 

is meant to help assuage naysayers concerned over the 

company’s reliance on natural gas as a fuel source. 

Eventually, better support for biogas could be the 

missing link that helps open doors for Bloom’s technology in rural regions around the world — at least, that’s the 

hope of Bloom’s founder. “There are enormous sources 

of biogas that we have not exploited. This is different 

from biofuels,” Sridhar said, pointing to one possible 

scenario in which small hamlets, villages or communities 

could create small microgrids powered using local waste 

sources such as animal manure, human excrement or 

plant refuse. Individuals and businesses could “pay by 

the drink” for the electricity they use, in much the way 

many people in emerging nations are adopting mobile 

phone technology, he predicted.

One issue remains the distribution link: it’s incredibly 

expensive to “pipe” biogas across a region to a central 

location. That’s why Bloom is advocating an approach 

that would see its equipment colocated at capture 

sources. 

Here’s how Bloom plans to 

differentiate itself

Meanwhile, though, Bloom is out to make its mark in the 

commercial world. During the series of presentations in 

mid-December, Sridahar and other members of the Bloom 

executive team touted several factors that they say help 

the company close deals for its fuel cells. Chief among 

them:

The cost: The company has managed a 75 percent 

reduction in the material cost/watt since 2009, according to its presentation. That helps Bloom energy servers 

Published: Thursday, December 20, 2018 - 1:00am www.greenbiz.com

Heather Clancy

Editorial Director

GreenBiz Group

www.greenbiz.com
www.nasa.gov/researchpark 6

NRP Post

achieve a 5 percent to 15 percent discount below grid 

electricity costs in many places, according to Bloom 

executives. That has translated into a 29 percent reduction in Bloom’s costs per kilowatt-hour annually 

over the past three years, according to Bloom Chief 

Financial Officer Randy Furr.

All this is important because Bloom typically has 

relied heavily on incentive programs to help subsidize the cost of its installations. The February 2018 

update (PDF) of the federal investment tax credit 

could help boost its value proposition, but the executive team’s focus is on reducing costs enough for 

that to be a non-factor. Its utility relationships could 

also help its would-be customers tap into funding 

help. Now that it’s public, investors and would-be 

customers will have a view into whether Bloom can 

deliver. 

The density compared with on-site solar installations: A 250-kilowatt system is about the size of a 

shipping container. It typically takes 125x the space 

to generate as much power with solar photovoltaic.

The GHG proposition: The company claims virtually no nitrogen oxide, sulfur oxide or particulate 

emissions. That doesn’t address the methane leakage issue associated with natural gas production 

and distribution. But Bloom’s argument is that its 

technology emits 60 percent less carbon dioxide 

than the typical baseload options available on the 

U.S. power grid. The company is also hard at work 

on a biogas clean-up module that will help Bloom 

servers use biogas produced by landfills, wastewater treatment plants and agricultural operations. 

The uptime promise: A distributed Bloom server 

installation can be maintained without the entire 

system being taken offline, which isn’t the case for 

things such as co-generation equipment. Plus, it 

can be connected directly at a site, which reduces a company’s reliance on the grid transmission 

system.

During presentations in mid-December, Sridahar 

and other Bloom executives touted several factors 

that they say help the company close deals for its 

fuel cells. 

Jim Cowell, vice president of facilities for the 

California Institute of Technology (Caltech), which 

generates about 90 percent of its annual 120 gigawatt-hour power consumption on site, uses Bloom 

technology for about 21 percent of that electricity. 

(That’s 3 MWs so far.) During the eight years Caltech 

has been using the servers, they’ve never been 

offline, he said. The university’s new neuroscience 

research building, slated to open by 2020, will use 1 

MW of Bloom’s technology as its primary generation 

source. That will bring Caltech’s installations up to 

4 MW of capacity. 

One place you can expect to see Bloom ramp up its 

sales outreach during 2019 is in microgrid installations — the company is positioning its technology 

as both a viable standalone option as well as something that can be integrated cost-effectively with 

solar and energy storage. And unlike many microgrids powered by renewables, Bloom’s technology can help negate the need for a diesel backup 

generate, according to the company. 

In late August, for example, the company disclosed 

a deal with manufacturer JSR Micro. The contract 

covers a 1.1 MW installation that JSR will use as its 

primary power source.

Making friends with utilities

Another thing to watch in 2019: Bloom’s relationships with utilities. It’s already actively working with 

at least a half-dozen including Consolidated Edison, 

Constellation and Delmarva Power (both Exelon 

subsidiaries), Eversource and Southern.

Under the Southern deal, for example, Bloom Energy Servers are being combined with energy storage 

technology from Southern subsidiary PowerSecure 

to provide on-site generation to customers like 

the Home Depot. In this instance, you can think of 

Southern as a sales channel. 

In New York, ConEd has been using Bloom’s technology as part of the Brooklyn Queens Demand 

Management Program, an initiative that has been 

using fuel cells (among other technologies) to help 

defer the $1.2 billion capital expense associated 

with building another substation for the region. 

Instead, the utility deployed a combination of 

rooftop solar and fuel cells at a housing project to 

generate more onsite power for the surrounding 

neighborhood. It set aside a budget of about $200 

million to help customer fund onsite investments 

in both generation and energy efficiency measures.

A 1.8-MW installation of Bloom fuel cells also was 

used to accommodate about 45 percent of the base 

load required by a major new, 342-bed medical 

center. The center received a $1.3 million incentive 

to help fund the project; over the 15-year contract, 

Downstate expects to see its cost of electricity 

decrease substantially. 

What stands in the way of Bloom’s 

progress?

The most obvious obstacle is the company’s current 

reliance on natural gas as a fuel source. Not only 

are its installations dependent on the availability of 

distribution infrastructure, but Bloom also likely will 

be called upon more often to discuss how it handles 

methane, a super pollutant associated with natural 

gas and biogas that is a more potent contributor to 

global warming than carbon dioxide.

The company also continues to face many questions regarding the expense of its fuel cells and its 

ongoing reliance on financial incentives to get deals 

done — many of its big accounts are in California, in large part because of the generous incentive 

program that has been in place there in the state. 

There’s also the question of how it will handle the 

disposal of aging technology. The latter is an issue 

in Delaware, for example, where the company hopes 

to swap out old fuel cells in favor of its newer, more 

efficient editions. 
NRP Post

7 www.nasa.gov

I

t was a rare combination of a balmy day, 

an endless line of Cumulonimbus clouds 

above the Kennedy Space Center and a 

glimpse of an endangered bird species 

flying overhead. Led by Russ DeLoach, 

SMA director, ISF Assistant Chief, KSC 

Program Managers and NASA Safety 

Center, the first official KSC photos were 

taken in celebration of the new iNARTE® 

ESD Aerospace & Defense EngineerTM 

recipients. The highest level of ESD certification and training for NASA, this technology centered program was developed 

over the past 5 years by RMV Technology 

Group LLC, a NASA Industry partner, to 

meet the evolving nonconformance and 

suspect counterfeit ESD material issues, 

EEE (ESD sensitive) part damage, electrostatic attraction challenges, ESD program 

implementation and other static electricity 

related flight hardware failure issues. The 

NASA ESD program managers under the 

leadership of Gene S. Monroe, NASA Langley, participated in the course instruction to 

secure their ESD engineering credentials. 

This stand-alone training program 

is in line with the NASA ESD StanCongratulations to Mercedes Zuk & Chris Berg, SMA Engineers on 24 October 2018 at NASA KSC.

7 www.nasa.gov
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dard 8739.6 revision for more rewarding project deployment and mission

success and to address the clearly 

defined shortcomings of current industry 

standards that do not meet NASA and US 

Military requirements in practice today. 

The first class certified in the NEW 

iNARTE® Certified ESD Aerospace & 

Defense program was the NASA ESD 

Program Managers, JPL and NASA Safety Center. The initial kickoff celebration 

was held at GSFC on 24 August, followed 

by ARC on 19 September, culminating 

in this week’s event on 24 October 2018 

to recognize those that received their 

iNARTE® Certified ESD Aerospace & 

Defense EngineerTM certification. Classes 

are now scheduled for the prime contractor 

community including DoD civil servants and 

support suppliers, distributors and 

other federal agencies that may have similar requirements to lower risk while meeting the objectives for supply chain quality 

assurance and program success. For more 

information on the upcoming NASA technology training classes, please contact 

Renee Mitchell at renee@esdrmv.com or 

call Renee at 650-964-4792.

NASA ESD Program Manager Training 26-30 March 2018
9 www.nasa.gov

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Verdigris Technologies announces latest smart 

building advancement revolutionizing building 

transparency and energy savings: 

Disaggregation

MOUNTAIN VIEW, Calif., Nov. 14, 2018 /PRNewswire/ 

-- Verdigris Technologies ("Verdigris," verdigris.co), 

innovator of the artificial intelligence (AI) platform for 

responsive energy management, announces the launch 

of our newest capability advancing IoT, Disaggregation. 

This feature enables X-ray-like vision into the built 

environment. With just one of our proprietary sensors, 

customers can get visibility into their various building 

equipment. One sensor has the power to see beyond a 

floor, beyond an electrical panel, beyond a circuit, to 

all individual devices plugged into that circuit. Other 

solutions require installing numerous hardware devices 

to see rough data. This leads to high installation and 

maintenance costs, and wasted time discerning causes 

of electrical consumption or device malfunction.

Disaggregation allows device-level visibility so customers can pinpoint ways to save energy, optimize building 

efficiency, and avoid costly hardware and maintenance 

fees.

"Verdigris is a fantastic tool that provides a phenomenal 

amount of data. We really liked the granularity of data 

because it allowed us to drill down and identify the 

issues that we would not have otherwise been able to 

catch.....we were able to spot times when chillers were 

running when they shouldn't be." 

-Jim Hussey, CEO, Marina Mechanical

How does it work? Each piece of equipment- whether 

a light, refrigerator, HVAC system or coffee pot, has a 

unique electrical signal or energy pattern they emit. 

Our in-house sensors sense and collect data from electrical panels at such high frequencies that they can tease 

apart the unique waveforms corresponding to each 

device. Imagine the enormous implications this has for 

the facilities manager wanting to find the dead lightbulbs in a hotel without checking each by hand or the 

factory manager wanting to identify when industrial 

equipment is lagging. The executive trying to reach 

corporate sustainability goals too can benefit by 

mandating non-critical loads are turned off. In all these 

scenarios, disaggregation identifies ways to reduce cost 

that were previously unseen.

What if a building manager wanted to know which 

lights are on at low occupancy periods? Currently our 

customers can set alerts at a circuit level. When a circuit is using energy beyond or below a certain threshold, ping! They can check what devices the circuit is 

connected to for trends and anomalies. At a device 

level, our engineering teams can work with key customers to create tailored alerts.

What's on our roadmap? This is just the beginning. 

Our roadmap includes making Disaggregation Alerts 

a core product and using AI to auto classify devices 

(right now labeling is manual). For more information 

on Disaggregation click here. Check out our website for other ways we are helping companies reduce 

energy consumption, cut costs, and reduce their carbon 

footprint. Please email info@verdigris.co for inquiries.

About Us: Verdigris makes equipment-level electricity monitoring inexpensive and simple. Leveraging the 

power of AI, Verdigris helps transform dumb buildings into smart buildings that are more reliable, efficient, and automated. Powerful analytics scan rich data 

streams, obtained via our IoT sensors, to find hidden 

inefficiencies, produce itemized utilities reports and 

empower building managers to optimize facilities 

management. Verdigris was named one of the top ten 

Most Innovative Companies in Energy by Fast Company and has a customer base which spans nine countries 

and 80+ enterprise customers. Headquartered at the 

NASA Ames Research Park in Moffett Field, Mountain View, California, Verdigris is a venture-backed 

company established in 2012 and has raised $22 million 

to date. For more information, visit www.verdigris.co.

SOURCE Verdigris Technologies

www.verdigris.co
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11 www.nasa.gov

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Vasper is a new exercise technology that is now commercially 

available. The Vasper system 

combines compression, liquid 

cooling, and interval training to drive your 

body’s production of growth and recovery 

hormones, delivering the most significant 

benefits of high-intensity exercise in an 

efficient and low-impact 21-minute workout.

Vasper’s headquarters are located at the 

NASA Ames Research Park. Here, we have 

a Vitality Center that serves as a fully operating Vasper gym. We serve people from 

all walks of life who are interested in engaging with their health in a new way. Come 

visit our headquarters to get the full Vasper 

experience, meet the team, become a member, and be inspired by all that is Vasper.

In the meantime, take a look at our recent 

scientific benchmarks:

CANTU CONCUSSION STUDY

Vasper was studied at the Cantu Concussion Center for work with people who 

suffer from prolonged concussion symptoms, a condition called Post-Concussive 

Syndrome. The study involved six weeks 

of exercise sessions (Vasper and control) 

followed by six weeks without exercise. The 

Vasper group demonstrated significantly 

improved quality of life and also showed 

improvements in the follow-up period. 

The Vasper group had a significantly more 

stable recovery and specifically more 

stability in emotional and sleep contributions 

after 6 weeks of no rehabilitation. Symptom variability and stability of recovery is a 

particularly difficult issue in Post-Concussive Syndrome rehabilitation and this study 

demonstrates that Vasper is an effective way 

to address this.

C O V E N A N T H E A L T H 

DIABETES STUDY

The most potent lifestyle intervention for 

treatment of Type II Diabetes (T2D) is 

consistent exercise. However, for many 

patients with the condition, other comorbidities such as osteoarthritis, hypertension, and 

high body mass indexes prevent them from 

being able to exercise intensively and consistently 

enough to experience 

optimal metabolic 

benefits. Vasper 

was selected as a 

technology that 

could specifically 

address the needs 

of this population 

and was studied at 

Covenant Health in 
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Type II Diabetics. In this study, three months 

of Vasper sessions, three times a week, were 

completed by subjects and the baseline weight 

and Glycohemoglobin was measured. There 

were significant improvements in weight 

and Glycohemoglobin after three months 

of Vasper sessions. The preliminary results 

of this study suggest Vasper has promise in 

contributing to effective management of T2D 

with a low physical burden. 

J A G I E L L O N I A N 

UNIVERSITY STUDY

Peripheral Artery Occlusive Disease is a 

chronic inflammatory vascular disease. PAOD 

is diagnosed in 20% of Europeans and Northern Americans above 55 years old and is one 

of the main causes of death and disability in 

highly developed countries. This study seeks 

to understand if the intervention of Vasper has 

the potential to increase endothelium function and angiogenesis in patients with PAOD. 

The results from the healthy subject trial 

demonstrated improved markers of neoangiogenesis activation (VEGF, CD31, CD34) and 

improved acute changes in endothelial function, including arterial stiffness parameters. 

This means that Vasper could be a safe and 

effective way for those with Peripheral Artery Occlusive Disease to safely exercise and 

increase the resilience of their cardiovascular 

system.
13 www.nasa.gov

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F

or the first time, a numerical model has simulated the entire evolution of a solar flare. In these 

events, a huge amount of energy is released in several ways: thermal and magnetic energy, 

and kinetic energy in the form of energized particles. The simulated evolution of the flare and 

eruption starts with the rise of magnetic field through thousands of kilometers below the solar 

surface and finishes with an explosive release of energy in a brilliant flash in the outer solar atmosphere. The work describing this sequence of events has been published in Nature Astronomy. NCAR 

has recently released this news (https://news.ucar.edu/132648/emergence-eruption).

Dr. Mark Cheung at Lockheed Martin Solar and Astrophysics Laboratory (LMSAL) and a visiting scholar 

at Stanford University and Dr. Matthias Rempel at National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR) 

led the research supported by the NASA’s Heliophysics Grand Challenges Research opportunity. This 

investigation has been possible thanks to a large collaboration involving several institutions and universities, including two co-authors from Bay Area environmental Research Institute (BAERI): Dr. J. 

Martinez-Sykora (left) and Dr. A. Sainz Dalda (right).

This work is relevant for understanding the appearance of sunspots and how they sometimes can produce 

flares which could lead to a coronal mass ejections. The mass expelled can reach up to 10^12 g which is 

comparable to Mount Everest which sometimes may eventually impact the Earth magnetosphere. Particles on these events can reach velocities up to a fraction of the speed of light. The physics responsible for 

this evolution and energy release is extreme and not possible to reproduce in the laboratory, requiring the 

combination of many different physical processes all playing in concert. Flare eruptions may have widespread impacts on the Earth, producing auroras, disrupting power grids and communications networks, 

damaging satellites, and endangering astronauts. Consequently, this study is of great interest for space 

weather; but, not only that, flares are also of great interest for understanding fundamental physics such as 

reconnection of magnetic field and particle acceleration.

Numerical Model Simulates Entire

Evolution of a Solar Flare for First Time

13 www.nasa.gov
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NASA Ames Photo Ops

NASA CFO Jeff DeWitt visits Ames 

and take a tour of the NRP

Ames Deputy Director Carol 

Carroll provided welcome and 

ARC Overview to the Young 

Innovators, and a Global

Entrepreneurship Ecosystem

August 6, 2018

October 22, 2018

NRP Deputy Director Mejghan 

Haider briefing to Brazilians

September 11, 2018

September 11, 2018

www.nasa.gov/researchpark 14

Dr. Reilly of USGS and

Dr. Tu of NASA visit NRP 

Building 19 second floor 

under construction by USGS
15 www.nasa.gov

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National Aeronautics and Space Administration

NRP 

A Publication of NASA Research Park

POST

NP-2019-02-01-ARC

National Aeronautics and Space Administration

NASA Research Park

Editor, Layout and Design: TED TRIANO

Phone: (650) 604-2NRP

Email: arc-dl-nrp-post@mail.nasa.gov

www.nasa.gov/researchpark