NOAA’s Global Systems Laboratory Welcomes Dr. DaNa Carlis As New Deputy Director

BOULDER, CO — DaNa L. Carlis, Ph.D., joined GSL as the Deputy Director in September 2020. He comes to GSL from the NOAA Weather Program Office (WPO), where he established the Earth Prediction Innovation Center (EPIC) Program. DaNa enjoys working between science, policy, and society to ensure better products and services for the American people. He is also passionate about leadership, diversity, and inclusion, and mentoring the next generation of scientists.

“I couldn’t be more grateful and excited to join GSL because of its focus on applied research and development, advanced technologies, and transitioning and improving research-to-operations with the National Weather Service (NWS). GSL aligns perfectly with my desire to provide better products and services to the American people. I’ve always wanted to do research that impacts people’s lives, and GSL is a premier NOAA research laboratory that provides innovative tools and services that lead to better decisions and ultimately save lives,” said Carlis. “As the GSL’s Deputy Director, I am committed to bringing strong leadership and listening skills along with a creative mind to continue to advance the GSL mission. In addition, I plan to continue to uphold GSL’s scientific prowess, which is displayed in our cutting-edge research portfolio that is widely recognized by the Weather Enterprise.”

DaNa attended Howard University in Washington, DC, and earned his B.S. degree in Chemistry (1999), and an M.S. (2002) and Ph.D. in Atmospheric Science (2007) as a graduate student of the NOAA Center for Atmospheric Science and Meteorology (NCAS-M). In 2002, DaNa accepted a fellowship from the NOAA Office of Education Educational Partnership Program (EPP) as a member of the Graduate Sciences Program and completed his M.S thesis research at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center (GSFC) conducting an analysis of SO2 cross-sections for the Total Ozone Mapping Spectrometer (TOMS) satellite. He completed his Ph.D. dissertation on the beautiful island of Oahu, Hawaii, titled “Numerical Simulations of Island-Scale Airflow and the Maui Vortex Under Summer Trade-wind Conditions.” DaNa was the second male to receive a Ph.D. in Atmospheric Sciences since Howard’s inception in 1867.

DaNa credits NCAS-M and NOAA’s Educational Partnership Program/Minority-Serving Institution EPP/MSI Program for allowing him to pursue what he loves and providing a pathway to federal employment. DaNa has held positions at the NWS National Centers for Environmental Prediction (NCEP) Environmental Modeling Center (EMC) as a research meteorologist working on NOAA’s Global Forecast System (GFS) Model (2007-2014), and as a policy advisor to NOAA’s Chief Scientist and NOAA’s Assistant Secretary of Environmental Observations and Prediction (2014-2016). DaNa is a graduate of NOAA’s Leadership Competency Development Program (LCDP) Class IX where he learned a great leadership lesson that’s been his mantra for the last few years and that’s to work in an environment where he’s comfortably uncomfortable.

DaNa is originally from Tulsa, OK. In his spare time, he enjoys cheering for his favorite sports team, the Oklahoma Sooners, mentoring boys from underrepresented communities that come from single-parent households, and traveling the world with his family. In 2016, he wrote a children’s book titled “MIT: Meteorologist in Training” and he’s published peer-reviewed papers. DaNa is married to Dr. Lydia Carlis, and they have a daughter, Dia Dannielle, who is a senior at Georgia State University. — bt

^{— Source and photo: National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA)}
^{Cover photo (above): Dr. DaNa Carlis keynotes BDPA’s 2019 annual Regional Earth Day Tech Summit}
^{with Jr. Devs (coders and developers) and Regional High School Coding Competition (HSCC) finalists}

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**Tablets For Teens** | tabletsforteens.org

SpaceX crew docks after historic commercial transportation launch with NASA

HAWTHORNE, CA — Space Exploration Technologies Corp., trading as SpaceX, is a private American aerospace manufacturer and space transportation services company founded in 2002 by Elon Musk. Musk, also the CEO of Tesla, set a goal of reducing space transportation costs enabling the colonization of Mars.

Today’s successful docking of SpaceX’s Dragon Endeavour spacecraft with the International Space Station (ISS), crewed by NASA astronauts (L-R) Bob Behnken and Doug Hurley, is another major milestone for Demo-2’s historic mission.

The spacecraft launched atop a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket from Kennedy Space Center Saturday, May 30. The mission is the first time astronauts have launched from American soil since the final Space Shuttle flight in 2011.

The mission is also the first time a private company, rather than a national government, has sent NASA astronauts into orbit. NASA’s Commercial Crew Program is working with the American aerospace industry as companies develop and operate a new generation of spacecraft and launch systems capable of carrying crews to low-Earth orbit and the International Space Station. Commercial transportation to and from the station will provide expanded utility, additional research time and broader opportunities for discovery on the orbiting laboratory.

The station is a critical testbed for NASA to understand and overcome the challenges of long-duration spaceflight. As commercial companies focus on providing human transportation services to and from low-Earth orbit, NASA is freed up to focus on building spacecraft and rockets for deep space missions.

The Commercial Crew Program represents a revolutionary approach to government and commercial collaborations for the advancement of space exploration.

— Sources and photos: NASA and SpaceX

Coders discuss models and forecasts with NOAA during annual Earth Day Tech Summit

WASHINGTON—BDPA’s annual Earth Day Tech Summit, #CyberEarth19, was presented in Washington, D.C. to Industry, BDPA Members, Student Members, parents, and regional high school coding competition (HSCC) team leaders (cover photo) during Earth Day weekend.

This year’s tech summit special guest was Dr. DaNa L. Carlis from the Department of Commerce’s National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA).

Dr. Carlis is a meteorologist and mathematician serving as a Program Manager at NOAA’s Office of Weather and Air Quality (OWAQ). During one of the event’s Industry Day sessions, Dr. Carlis highlighted missions of NOAA’s “Hurricane Hunter” aircraft with footage from recent flights. He also discussed the roles of drones and new Geostationary Operational Environmental Satellite (GOES) systems to support meteorological research, capture weather forecasting data, and how supercomputers are used to advance weather modeling and simulations.

At OWAQ, Dr. Carlis manages the Forecasting a Continuum of Environmental Threats (FACETs) and Next Generation Global Prediction System (NGGPS) programs. Dr. Carlis enjoys the fact that he’s able to work between science, policy, and society to ensure better products and services to the American people.

During the event’s training sessions, Dr. Carlis met with BDPA Student Members, gamers, and graphic designers from the Host Chapter’s bdpatoday and PTTV multimedia teams. National BDPA’s HSCC was launched in 1986. Local BDPA Chapters conduct training programs designed to share industry trends with parents and expose youth to emerging concepts of computers and technology to provide expertise for software and application development. BDPA Chapters also participate in regional coding and cyber competitions throughout the country to further prepare participating students. BDPA Chapters send one (1) team of 3 to 5 students to annual National BDPA Technology Conferences to compete against teams from other BDPA Chapters for scholarships and internships.

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Event/Photo gallery: https://bdpadc.org
Earth Day summit archives: https://www.pinterest.com/bdpatoday/boards/

-— Source: BDPADC

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Know how to read a map? Industry prepares for April’s GPS Rollover event

WASHINGTON—The Global Positioning System (GPS) is a global public service provided by the U.S. government. On April 6, 2019, there will be an event affecting the electric transmission and distribution system that has industry concerned about the potential for a major disruption. During the Week Number rollover of the Global Positioning System (GPS), the week number that uses the 10-bit binary system will reach its limit of 1,024 weeks and will be forced to roll over and be reset to week 0.

U.S. Air Force photo

DHS Memo
The U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has released a memorandum about this year’s GPS rollover event.The memorandum, U.S. Owners and Operators Using GPS to Obtain Time, is intended to provide an understanding of the possible effects of the April 6, 2019, GPS Week Number Rollover on Coordinated Universal Time (UTC) derived from GPS devices. DHS recommends critical infrastructure (CI), other owners, and operators prepare for the rollover.

Owners, operators, and technical teams should:

investigate and understand all possible dependencies on GPS for obtaining UTC
contact original equipment manufacturers (OEMs) and GPS manufacturers of devices currently in inventory (or backorder) used to obtain UTC
understand each manufacturers’ preparedness for this rollover
for continuity of operations, understand all actions required by CI, other owners, and operators to ensure proper operations through any rollover or possible service disruptions
ensure ALL firmware of such devices are patched correctly, tested, and up to date.

Marine Administrative Message
In January, the United States Marine Corps issued MARADMIN 059/19 advising Marine Corps Global Positioning System (GPS) users about the GPS week number rollover event that may affect GPS receiver operation. The Corps’ MARADMIN directed all Marine Corps GPS users to verify that all of their receivers are running software that will correctly increment the date through the week rollover, contact Marine Corps Tactical Systems Support Activity (MCTSSA) if necessary, or directly contact original equipment manufacturers (OEMs) when applicable. MARADMIN 059/19’s release was authorized by Brigadier General Lorna M. Mahlock (above, center), the Marine Corps’ CIO and Director, Command, Control, Communications, and Computers (C4).

The Power Grid
It may seem odd that the stationary electric grid relies so heavily on GPS, but in fact, GPS supports a wide variety of critical grid functions that allow separate components on the electric system to work in unison. This is made possible because the GPS signal contains a running timestamp that identifies the current week and current second within that week, which is converted by the signal receiver to the proper date and time which we recognize as day, month, year, and time of day.

For our Coders, Geeks, and Nerds
The initial week 0 started on January 6, 1980, and the first week rollover occurred a few months before “Y2K” on August 21, 1999. However, a lot has changed on the electric grid since the last rollover such as the addition of Phasor Measurement Units (PMUs) and the North American Electric Reliability Corporation’s (NERC) requirements of synchronizing sequence of event, fault, and dynamic disturbance recording. Synchrophasors, which use systems of phasor measurement units (PMUs) to measure data and time-synchronize it using GPS satellites, provide system operators with a near real-time snapshot of the grid’s operating status. These changes to grid technology and functions have brought tremendous new insights to manage and assess the bulk power system, but they also open the door to a concern in the industry that the GPS week rollover could impact an operator’s ability to accurately assess grid reliability conditions in real-time.

Updating GPS firmware and patching GPS software
Similar to the MARADMIN cited above, the good news across industry is many signal receiver manufacturers understand the rollover very well and already have prepared for it. As a result, most of our equipment should operate without any issues on April 6, 2019. However, now is the time to make sure that all equipment in the field or vehicles in the fleet have received the proper firmware updates. Operators also must be taking extra care to address core components where any prolonged GPS outages would significantly have negative impacts on systems.

Original article written by Michael Pesin, DOE’s Office of Electricity

— Sources: DHS.gov, Energy.gov. and GPS.gov
Images: U.S Air Force, Ford, NASA, and US. Marine Corps

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Youth STEM Summit & Regional HSCC

May 4th, 2019 | Bowie State University

Ai down on the farm at CES

LAS VEGAS, NV — This year’s CES was huge for John Deere. Located on the lower level of the Las Vegas Convention Center’s South Hall within the artificial intelligence (AI) section, attendees had opportunities to speak with Deere’s team and see up close and personal intricate technologies today’s farmers are using to supply and feed us – from sensors to AI, GIS, GPS, and 5G connectivity.

CES attendees previewed what John Deere calls their “interconnected factory on wheels” on this year’s show floor. Attendees also saw the ‘big green tractor’ driving around one of the CES lots with advanced automated technology.

What’s next for Deere? John Stone (right) is senior vice president at Deere and leads the company’s Intelligent Solutions Group. He says farmers today need to contend with a lot of challenges stemming from a growing population and unpredictable weather.

At the same time, they are seeing an increase in urbanization with a decrease in arable land and skilled workers in rural areas. In a recent article from CTA, Stone emphasized Deere’s goals revolve around their farmer customers. Deere strives to bring leading edge technologies for solving problems and capturing new opportunities that will make Deere customers the most profitable and sustainable farmers in the world.

Deere’s global growth is not simply rooted in products, but in bringing connectivity to rural areas in South America, Africa and India so that their technology works. Tavonga Siyavora (above, cover photo), Program Manager at Deere, shares these success stories with CES 2019 attendees. Last year, Deere surpassed a significant milestone of having their precision agriculture technology adopted in more than 100 countries and Deere has over 100 million acres engaged in their digital ecosystem.

Today, 25 percent of the world’s arable land is being farmed with Deere technology.