CDI-Type II: New Cyber Technologies to Enable Space Weather Forecasting

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Space Weather refers to conditions in the near-Earth space environment that can negatively impact the performance and reliability of technological systems or can endanger human life or health. Significant space weather impacts can be both costly and dangerous. The impacts of space weather include satellite memory errors, phantom commands, loss of communication with deployed troops and aircraft that are over the horizon, significant errors in GPS position determination, and failures of power grids. The development of a reliable space weather forecast capability is a high national priority for both civilian and national security purposes. Overcoming the limited availability of in situ and remote sensing data sources and finding ways to compensate for missing physics even in the most advanced Sun-to-Earth space weather models are fundamental challenges that must be solved to make advances to space weather forecasting models. This project employs computational thinking to carry out transformative research that addresses both of these challenges. It will pioneer new methods for space weather modeling that will be transformational and eventually lead to a reliable space weather forecast capability. The project is highly interdisciplinary and will pursue these important goals in space weather modeling by developing and utilizing frontier image reconstruction ideas from theoretical computer science together with novel adaptive model correction methodologies from control systems engineering. The results of this project will aid in establishing a reliable space weather forecasting capability for the nation. Present methods have very limited reliability beyond now-casting. This project would help achieve approximately 18-hour forecast capability, which would constitute a tremendous advance. Through collaboration with the NASA/NSF Community Coordinated Modeling Center the project will enable validation and transfer of the resulting knowledge, systems and tools to real space weather operations. Computer codes, algorithms, and tools will also be made freely available to other researchers, allowing the broader research community to utilize the tools that are developed for their own research needs. Four graduate students will be employed and trained under this project. In addition, the research results will be incorporated in undergraduate and graduate curricula at University of Michigan. The project will also strengthen and expand an ongoing collaboration with a local children's museum by creating exhibits about space exploration and space weather.