National Aeronautics and Space Administration

NRP 

A Publication of NASA Research Park

POST

THE

2021 Issue 1

Full article on page 4

CMU Works on Wide 

Bandwidth to Avert 

Interference

USGS & SSA Research 

Smaller Earthquakes 

“With Ambition”

Full article on page 10
NRP Post

2 www.nasa.gov

IN THIS ISSUE

3 | Geoffrey Ament of STC Receives 

NASA Ames Contractor of the Year Award

NASA recognizes Mr. Geoffrey Ament’s accomplishments at Ames Research Center 

4 | CMU Reducing Interference

ECE researchers were awarded a $1M NSF grant to 

investigate new ways to avert interference

6 | Breakthrough Initiatives Help to Look 

for Life in the Clouds of Venus

Initiatives to fund study into search for primitive life 

in the clouds of Venus

8 |RMV’s Hands on Approach to Education on ESD 

RMV’s in person and virtual classes on electrostatic 

discharge by Bob Vermillion 

10 |USGS’s Study on the Movements of

Smaller Earthquakes

Study by USGS on how smaller quakes can actually 

shake more aggressively
www.nasa.gov/researchpark 3

NRP Post

Mr. Geoffrey Ament of STC 

Receives NASA Ames 

Contractor of the Year Award

Moffett Field, California, Summer 2020

Mr. Geoffrey Ament, an STC employee who works on the AEMMS contract at NASA Ames in Mountain View, 

CA, was recently awarded the NASA 

Ames Contractor of the Year Award. 

Mr. Ament is a Research Associatein 

the field of Mechatronics Engineering. 

The award citation reads, “Mr. Ament’s 

desire to explore, design, and innovate embodies the true spirit of what 

a NASA Engineer should be. He is articulate, meticulous with his work, and 

strives for excellence.” In their nomination letter the nominators cited that, 

“Since the start of his employment as 

a Science and Technology Corporation 

(STC) research associate in August of 

2015, Mr. Ament has made substantial 

contributions to NASA’s RLVT mission 

with respect to both terrestrial and Martian flight. In 2017, he was part of the 

Multicopter Unmanned Aerial Systems 

(UAS) performance test team, during 

which he designed and manufactured 

quadcopter mounting hardware for 

mounting to the 7-by-10 ft wind tunnel 

sting mount. He was the test director 

for the first-ever wind tunnel test of a 

simulated rotorcraft in forward flight at 

Mars atmospheric conditions, which led to a data 

report that he presented at the 2018 AHS 

conference in San 

Francisco, CA, and subsequently led 

to a NASA Contractor Report (NASA/ 

CR-2018-219736). Furthermore, as part 

of the Mars Helicopter risk reduction 

effort, he designed and assembled the 

test hardware for the rotor blade spinup in the JPL Space Simulator, a requirement for Mars Helicopter testing; 

moreover, he led efforts to build a dust 

chamber and coaxial rotor control system to perform dust studies in order to 

study saltation and the effects of dust 

on the helicopter’s on-board sensors. 

Currently, Mr. Ament is the lead for all 

rotorcraft testing performed at Martian 

atmospheric densities in the Planetary 

Aeolian Laboratory (PAL), and he designed (and is currently assembling) a 

2-by-2 meter wind tunnel for rotor testing at Martian atmospheric conditions 

as well as terrestrial UAV testing.” 

STC would like to congratulate Mr. 

Ament on this award and to thank him 

for the years of exceptional service that 

he has provided to NASA Ames through 

STC. 
NRP Post

4 www.nasa.gov

Detecting Wireless 

Interference

4 www.nasa.gov

I

n a time where countless devices are connected to the Internet 

wirelessly, interference is inevitable. Spectrum pollution in the Internet-of-Things (IoT) era is something 

all users experience—a lag in connecting to your favorite app, not being able to sync to a wireless printer, the dreaded loading circle when 

trying to stream your favorite show. 

But what if IoT devices could detect 

and respect the presence of other 

devices on a shared spectrum? 

This would allow for devices and 

users to have a seamless wireless 

experience.

Swarun Kumar, Anthony Rowe, and 

Robert Iannucci from Carnegie Mellon University’s Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering 

in new window have been awarded a $1 million National Science 

Foundation (NSF) grant to investigate a system that allows teams of 

geo-distributed low-power devices 

to quickly and efficiently scan wide 

bandwidths to avert interference. 

“The core challenge is the low-power and simplicity of most IoT devices,” said Swarun Kumar, assistant 

professor and principal investigator. 

“They are narrowband and unable 

to sense and avoid incumbents on 

shared spectrum.”

The proposal presents a system 

designed for low-power devices to 

sense spectrum at minimal energy 

and cost, allowing these devices to 

behave as low-cost and distributed 

spectrum observatories.

Much like land and water, radio 

spectrum is a shared resource by 

many stakeholders; Wi-Fi routers, 

cellular companies, AM/FM radio 

stations, television towers, etc. 

Companies lease spectrum use under multi-year contracts. However, 

a lot of the spectrum is not used 

consistently, leading to significant 

wastage of a costly resource. What 

if there was a way to monitor the 

spectrum and signal when it’s available at a given location so that it 

could be leased on-the-fly when vacant? This would save companies 

BY Krista Burns June 23, 2020

ECE researchers were awarded a $1M NSF grant 

to investigate a system that allows devices to 

scan wide bandwidths to avert interference.
www.nasa.gov/researchpark 5

NRP Post

money, and increase the speed of 

our devices. However, building such 

a spectrum monitoring infrastructure can be costly. It would need 

to be replicated all over the country, and it would need to scan huge 

swaths of spectrum, increasing the 

cost further.

Referred to as Swallow, this project 

explores the use of low-cost and 

low-power IoT devices to serve as 

spectrum monitors that are cheap 

and can be placed anywhere. Globally, IoT devices are projected to 

be deployed in tens of billions and 

be ubiquitous in the coming years. 

Rather than viewing these as yet 

another part of the spectrum sharing problem, this project views them 

as part of the solution in effectively 

monitoring radio spectrum.

The project’s objective, if successful, could pave a new way to manage, monitor, and better exploit 

spectrum—a valuable national resource—as the world embarks on 

high-speed wireless beyond 5-G.

“The testbed developed through the 

project will serve as a vehicle for 

undergraduate and graduate-level 

projects as well as workshops for 

K-12 students in the city of Pittsburgh,” said Kumar. “The team has 

direct experience working with sensor deployments at Carnegie Mellon, the city of Pittsburgh, United 

States Geological Survey (USGS), 

and local industry partners and will 

leverage these connections to deploy Swallow at scale.”

The project will be implemented and 

evaluated on a large programmable 

Low-Power Wide-Area Networking testbed in the Carnegie Mellon 

University campus that serves large 

parts of the City of Pittsburgh. This 

award reflects NSF’s statutory mission and has been deemed worthy 

of support through evaluation using 

the Foundation’s intellectual merit 

and broader impacts review criteria.

“The core challenge is the low-power and simplicity of most IoT devices. They are narrowband 

and unable to sense and avoid incumbents on 

shared spectrum.”
NRP Post

6 www.nasa.gov

INITIATIVES TO FUND STUDY 

INTO SEARCH FOR PRIMITIVE 

LIFE IN THE CLOUDS OF VENUS

San Francisco – September 15, 2020

New evidence suggests presence of potential biosignature on closest 

planet to Earth.

Breakthrough Initiatives, the privately-funded space science programs founded by science and technology investor and philanthropist Yuri Milner, are funding a research 

study into the possibility of primitive life in 

the clouds of Venus. The study is inspired 

by the discovery, announced yesterday, of 

the gas phosphine, considered a potential 

biosignature, in the planet’s atmosphere.

The science team undertaking the research 

will comprise of world-class physicists, astronomers, astrobiologists, chemists and 

engineers, led by Sara Seager, Professor of 

Planetary Science, Physics and Aerospace 

Engineering at the Massachusetts Institute 

of Technology. The group will investigate 

the scientific case for life and analyze the 

technical challenges of an exploratory mission in the event that such evidence proves 

compelling.

Discovery of Phosphine

The new paper, from lead author Jane 

Greaves of Cardiff University, Seager and 

their collaborators, demonstrates the presence of phosphine (PH3) in the Venusian 

atmosphere via an analysis of millimeter-waveband observations by the Atacama 

Large Millimeter Array (ALMA) in Chile, with 

additional evidence from the James Clerk 

Maxwell Telescope (JCMT in Hawai’i).

The level of phosphine detected in the 

clouds of Venus – about 20 parts per billion 

– is completely unexpected for a gas susceptible to destruction by ultraviolet radiation, either directly or by ultraviolet-induced 

radicals. This suggests that some process 

is replenishing the gas. But what process?

Phosphine is a “biogenic” chemical: all 

samples encountered on Earth have been 

produced by biological or human-made 

processes requiring considerable energy inputs. Although the precise biological 

mechanisms generating phosphine are un-
www.nasa.gov/researchpark 7

NRP Post

For media inquiries: 

media@breakthroughprize.org

OR

Rubenstein Communications, Inc.

New York, New York

Kristen Bothwell

KBothwell@Rubenstein.com / +1.212.843.9227

known, they are associated with the breakdown of organic matter by bacteria, with 

the gas being found in oxygen-free environments such as marshlands and swamps, as 

well as the guts of animals. While the presence of phosphine on Venus may turn out 

to stem from a non-living process, no such 

process on a terrestrial planet is currently 

known to science.

“The discovery of phosphine is an exciting 

development,” said S. Pete Worden, Executive Director of the Breakthrough Initiatives. 

“We have what could be a biosignature, and 

a plausible story about how it got there. The 

next step is to do the basic science needed 

to thoroughly investigate the evidence and 

consider how best to confirm and expand 

on the possibility of life.”

“Finding life anywhere beyond Earth would 

be truly momentous,” said Yuri Milner, 

founder of the Breakthrough Initiatives. 

“And if there’s a non-negligible chance that 

it’s right next door on Venus, exploring that 

possibility is an urgent priority for our civilization.”

“We were stunned to find a molecule in Venus’s atmosphere that could come from organisms,” said Greaves. “We will continue 

to monitor and hunt for more clues, to pinpoint where exactly on the planet the phosphine is coming from.”

And Seager commented, “We are thrilled to 

push the envelope to try to understand what 

kind of life could exist in the very harsh Venus atmosphere and what further evidence 

for life a mission to Venus could search for.”

Project Leadership

Sara Seager – MIT – Principal Investigator

Janusz Petkowski – MIT – Deputy PI

Chris Carr – Georgia Tech

Bethany Ehlmann – Caltech

David Grinspoon – Planetary Science Institute

Pete Klupar – Breakthrough Initiatives

Chief Engineer

The Breakthrough Initiatives are a suite of 

space science programs investigating the 

fundamental questions of life in the Universe.

In July 2015, together with Stephen Hawking, Yuri Milner announced the launch of 

the $100 million astronomical program 

Breakthrough Listen, to reinvigorate the 

search for extraterrestrial intelligence in the 

universe; and in April 2016 they launched 

Breakthrough Starshot, a $100 million research and engineering program seeking 

to develop a new technology for uncrewed 

interstellar travel. Breakthrough Watch is 

an astronomical program to develop Earthand space-based technologies that can 

find evidence of primitive life on Earth-like 

planets in our cosmic neighborhood. All 

these philanthropic initiatives are funded 

by Breakthrough Foundation established by 

Yuri and Julia Milner.
8 www.nasa.gov

NRP Post

NEW “Virtual” & “Hands On” 

ESD Program Monitor Certifica- tion Training Developed by RMV

For USA high-tech companies rapidly adapting to the new business environment, Bob Vermillion, Founder 

RMV Tech Group LLC (RMV), has developed a two-day Virtual Interactive and 

one-day comprehensive “Hands On” ESD 

(Electrostatic Discharge) Program Monitor 

Certification Course specific to NASA requirements and tailored for Ames Research 

Center (ARC). The first class was held from 

the 12th-13th and 16th-17th of November 

2020 for NASA ARC prime contractors.

Starting virtually with live videos and interactive experiments, Vermillion then led 

the “Hands On” Workshop over the next 

two days with social distancing in the RMV 

Building 19 ESD Laboratory. 

An RMV Personnel Safety Plan and PPE 

were required for each student during the 

“Hands On” Workshop. Vermillion emphasized the correct usage of ESD instruments 

in a “learn-by-doing” team approach. Verification of static control materials, consumables, hand tools and products in the 

Electrostatic Protective Area (EPA) were 

practiced by each student during the session. A big “take away” was materials 

manufactured and labeled as “ESD Safe” 

constitute no guarantee of ANSI/ESD performance to NASA standards. 

Reliance upon supplier technical data 

sheets, the Internet and catalog buys is 

a common practice from procurement to 

R&D and support staff. 

A traceable Material Qualification List 

(MQL) will mitigate the number of non-compliant and suspect counterfeit products in 

the NASA supply chain. 

Located on-site to verify EPA compliance, 

the ESD Program Monitor provides real-time value in support of current and future mission success for NASA and other 

science and technology companies within 

the Bay Area and even across the nation.

RMV implements new Space & Defense 

Virtual Four-Hour ESD Operator Certification Training to meet future NASA 8739.6B 

requirements

Bob Vermillion, named the Agency ESD 

Technical Authority at the Quality Leadership Forum in 2018, is conducting a fourhour Space & Defense Virtual ESD User/

Operator Certification Training with live 

demonstrations that started in 2021. 

 

For example, ESD fundamentals of grounding, the consequences of non-compliant 

Moffett Field, California November, 2020
www.nasa.gov/researchpark 9

NRP Post

materials in proximity to flight hardware 

and safe material handling techniques in 

the EPA are covered with live demos for 

better engagement. 

Wrist straps, garments, footwear, consumables and hand tools for the handling 

of devices are discussed with interactive 

software to demonstrate the elements of 

a successful ESD program. 

In the program, Users and Operators will 

learn the elemental differences between 

anti-stats and static dissipative polymers 

from the workstation to design and build 

CubeSats for mission success. Just as 

important to understand is the risk of a 

charge board effect (CBE) at the workstation for ESD Awareness. Bob Vermillion’s 

use of live demos further enhance the 

learning process. 

Although multiple companies offer ESD 

Awareness Training, RMV has realized 

from participant feedback that its training 

needs to be “specific” to be effective for 

NASA requirements. 

As Renee Mitchell, RMV President stated, 

“What NASA requires, the Department of 

Defense also requires. Because of our collaboration with NASA, it in turn benefits the 

US Military.” 

For more information on RMV “Virtual and 

“Hands On” ESD Programs, contact: 

Renee Mitchell

renee@esdrmv.com 

650-964-4792

You can also visit:

www.esdaerospacetraining.org 

to learn more about our company and 

the range of Application Specific training programs from our NASA Research 

Park location.

www.nasa.gov/researchpark 9

””We didn’t know how much there was to 

learn about ESD” ... “It is like drinking out of a 

fire-hose” 
10 www.nasa.gov

NRP Post

Smaller Earthquakes “With Ambition” 

Produce the Most Ground Shaking

Published on 4 November 2020

Seismological Society of America

An earthquake of magnitude 8.0 or larger 

will almost always cause strong shaking, 

but a new study suggests that smaller 

earthquakes—those around magnitude 5.5 or 

so–are the cause of most occurrences of strong 

shaking at a 60-kilometer (37-mile) distance.

Small earthquakes are expected to produce 

relatively weak shaking, and for the most part 

that’s true, said Sarah Minson of the U.S. Geological Survey. However, ground motion is 

highly variable, and there are always outlier 

earthquakes at every size that generate more 

shaking than expected.

Combine that with the fact that there are more 

smaller magnitude earthquakes than large 

magnitude earthquakes, and most shaking 

comes from these “little earthquakes with ambition,” Minson and her colleagues report in 

Seismological Research Letters.

The researchers found that for all distances 

and for all levels of shaking, “the earthquakes 

that cause that level of shaking are systematically smaller magnitude than the earthquakes 

that should cause that level of shaking,” said 

Minson, noting that this makes these smaller 

earthquakes a significant source of earthquake 

damage.

The findings could change how people think 

about and prepare for the “Big One,” the large 

magnitude earthquakes that loom large in the 

imaginations of people from California to Chile, 

said Minson.

A future magnitude 8.0 San Andreas Fault 

earthquake will cause more total damage 

across the Los Angeles Basin than a smaller, 

local earthquake like the 1933 magnitude 6.4 

Long Beach earthquake, simply because the 

larger earthquake causes shaking over a wider 

area. But that just means that there will be more 

overall shaking, not that the shaking will necessarily be stronger in any particular locality, she 

explained.

While waiting for the Big One, places like Long 

Beach are likely to have multiple damaging medium earthquakes, “and thus most damage at 

any location is probably coming from smaller 

earthquakes with ambition,” Minson added.

The 1969 Santa Rosa, California earthquakes, 

around magnitude 6, caused about $50 million 

damage in today’s dollars, while the magnitude 

5.7 Magna, Utah earthquake earlier this year 

caused similar amounts of damage just to 100 

government buildings, the researchers noted.

“For a lot of us, if we do look back over our personal experiences, the earthquake that we had 

the greatest amount of damage from is not the 

largest magnitude earthquake that we’ve felt at 

all,” Minson said.
www.nasa.gov/researchpark 11

NRP Post

It’s a “sharks versus cows” concept, she added. “Sharks are scary, and cows are not, but 

cows kill more people every year than sharks 

do.”

The researchers began with calculations of 

the variation of expected ground acceleration from an earthquake of a certain magnitude and distance away from the shaking, 

along with the well-known Gutenberg-Richter magnitude-frequency relationship. The 

relationship demonstrates how the frequency 

of earthquakes decreases as the magnitude 

grows, so that for each magnitude 8 earthquake that occurs within a given region and 

time period, there will be 10 magnitude 7 

earthquakes, 100 magnitude 6 earthquakes, 

and so on.

Together, these two factors suggest that 

most shaking should come from smaller 

earthquakes that are “ambitious outliers” in 

terms of the amount of ground acceleration 

they cause. “The probability of any of these 

small earthquakes producing shaking is tiny, 

but there are many of them,” Minson said.

Minson and colleagues confirmed this hypothesis after examining three data sets of 

earthquakes from across the globe, ranging 

from magnitude 0.5 to 8.3.

Ambitious little earthquakes may cause difficulty for some earthquake early warning systems, which alert users to potential damaging shaking after an earthquake begins, the 

researchers write. The closer users are to the 

earthquake source, the less likely it is that the 

alert arrives before they feel the shaking.

“If it turns that most of our shaking is coming 

from smaller magnitude earthquakes, well, 

smaller magnitude earthquakes are spatially more compact,” Minson said, who noted 

that some systems also may not send out an 

alert at all for small earthquakes that aren’t 

expected to produce damaging shaking.

The findings do not change the total amount 

of earthquake hazard calculated for a region, 

Minson stressed. “All we did is say, OK, when 

that shaking comes, what is it likely to come 

as? And it’s much more likely to come as little 

earthquakes with ambition than a big earthquake doing what big earthquakes do.”

This means, as Minson’s USGS co-author 

Sara McBride says, that “it’s time to talk 

about the medium ones.” Surveys and studies show that people often are demotivated 

by efforts to prepare for the Big One, overwhelmed by fatalism in the face of such an 

event. Focusing on smaller but significant 

events could encourage people to devote 

more time and effort to earthquake preparedness, the researchers suggest.

“If we talk about earthquakes like Loma Prieta and Northridge, and ask people to be prepared for that, it’s more tractable,” Minson 

said. “Those are the earthquakes that people 

have experienced and know how to prepare 

for and survive.”
12 www.nasa.gov

NRP Post

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