NSF Award Abstract - #0120950 | AWSFL008-DS3 |
NSF Org | ATM |
Latest Amendment Date | July 30, 2004 |
Award Number | 0120950 |
Award Instrument | Cooperative Agreement |
Program Manager |
Robert M. Robinson ATM DIVISION OF ATMOSPHERIC SCIENCES GEO DIRECTORATE FOR GEOSCIENCES |
Start Date | August 1, 2002 |
Expires | July 31, 2007 (Estimated) |
Expected Total Amount | $24407590 (Estimated) |
Investigator | W. Jeffrey Hughes hughes@bu.edu (Principal Investigator current) |
Sponsor |
Boston University 881 Commonwealth Avenue Boston, MA 021151303 617/353-4365 |
NSF Program | 7213 STC CLASS OF 2002 |
Field Application | 0205000 Space |
Program Reference Code | 0000,4202,OTHR, |
This award will establish a Center for Integrated Space Weather Modeling (CISM). The overall goal of CISM is to develop advanced computer models to specify and predict space weather from the surface of the sun to the surface of Earth. "Space Weather" is a term rapidly entering the common lexicon. It describes the ways in which the Sun, acting through the intervening space encompassing the solar wind, the magnetosphere, and the upper atmosphere, adversely affects the performance and reliability of space borne and ground based technological systems, or can endanger human life or health. CISM will focus on building a comprehensive, physics-based, numerical model that describes the environment from the Sun to the Earth, and can predict arrival time, intensity and duration of space storms. The Center will achieve three complementary goals: 1) it will do fundamentally new science, increasing our understanding of the complex, but closely coupled Sun-Earth system; 2) in partnership with other groups, it will convert the results of its research into robust and operationally useful forecasting tools to be used by both civilian and military space weather forecasters; and 3) it will educate the next generation of space scientists - taking advantage of the ability of space weather to capture imaginations through models and visualization tools. The principal knowledge transfer goal of CISM is to convert research results and models into robust operationally useful forecasting tools to be used by space weather forecasters and private industry. The most important legacy of the center will be improvements in the ability to respond to potential space weather hazards, thus protecting the nation's technological systems that are increasingly susceptible to conditions in the space environment.