| The Engineering Research
Center for Collaborative Adaptive Sensing of the Atmosphere (CASA), headquarted
at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst (UMass), simultaneously achieves
several goals of NSF through its work at partner University of Puerto Rico,
Mayagüez (UPRM): advancing weather-monitoring technology in the U.S.;
conducting outreach to students to develop the next generation of scientists
and researchers; and developing under-represented populations in the sciences.
Beginning in 2006, an all-student
team of graduate and undergrad students at CASA began creating an experimental
radar system to monitor weather in an important 1.5 km area of western
Puerto Rico that traditional radar technology cannot sense. Comprised
of an array of miniature radar sensors, the system produces accurate rainfall
data to be used to predict flooding, and support other applications such
as crop hydrology that require accurate rainfall estimates. The testbed
could be used as a back-up to the current radar system if the Puerto Rican
electrical grid blacks out in heavy weather.
During 2008, CASA students
continued to develop off-the-grid testbeds in Mayagüez. and Amherst.
One of many student design innovations is a system for allocating power-hungry
activities (such as computation) to nodes with more reliable access to
power, to minimize downtime. The radar node has minimal reliance
on existing infrastructure by incorporating wireless networking and solar
power generation. The off-the-grid nodes sit under the “umbrella” of larger
radars providing ground truth data. The Mayaguez testbed added a
second umbrella node – donated by CASA industrial partner EWR Weather Radar
– in northwest Puerto Rico, and a first set of data was collected in summer
2007. Also in 2007, FCC-licensed off-the-grid nodes were installed
on the UMass campus, and one on a firetower 10 km north of campus.
A third node is being deployed, with all nodes communicating via wireless
links with directional antenna. |
