Satellite Animation Shows February Return of the Pineapple Express

An animation of satellite imagery from NOAA's GOES-West satellite from Feb. 1 to Feb. 4, 2015 captured the movement of a stream of clouds associated with moisture called "The Pineapple Express." Image Credit: NASA/NOAA GOES Project, Dennis Chesters

The "Pineapple Express" has set up again and is bringing wet weather to the U.S. Pacific Northwest. An animation of satellite imagery from NOAA's GOES-West satellite from Feb. 1 to Feb. 4, 2015 captured the movement of a stream of clouds associated with moisture that is expected to bring rain and snow to the region over the next several days.

The ‘‘Pineapple Express’’ occurs when warm air and lots of moisture are transported from the Central Pacific, near Hawaii, to the Eastern Pacific Ocean.

A wide-field movie by NOAA's GOES-West satellite shows the Pineapple Express' stream of clouds and moisture moving into the Pacific Northwest. The video was created by NASA/NOAA's GOES Project at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland.

“Good news for Northern California and the Pacific Northwest," said Bill Patzert, climatologist for NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California. "Beginning Wednesday, a series of storms pumped up by a moisture-laden ‘Pineapple Express’ system surging out of the warm tropical Pacific will deliver some small relief to rain and snow starved California. Though not a drought buster, we Californians are hoping this might be a preview of coming attractions for February and March. We are in the fourth quarter of our winter rain season and need a ‘hail mary’ to beat this drought down,” Patzert said.

On Feb.4 NOAA's National Weather Service Weather Prediction Center (NPC) in College Park, Maryland issued a short range forecast discussion about the Pineapple Express. NPC noted: A weather system that's tapping into abundant moisture in the Pacific will bring moderate to heavy rainfall to the Pacific Northwest beginning Wednesday. The rain will spread into northern California on Thursday and is expected to continue through the weekend. Some areas could see in excess of 10 inches of rain through early Saturday.

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The Pineapple Express is expected to affect areas from northwest California into coastal Oregon and Washington State. NPC noted that the "Express" is expected to produce mostly light to moderate rainfall totals for the coastal Pacific Northwest on Feb. 4, with much heavier totals expected the following two days.

GOES satellites provide the kind of continuous monitoring necessary for intensive data analysis. Geostationary describes an orbit in which a satellite is always in the same position with respect to the rotating Earth. This allows GOES to hover continuously over one position on Earth's surface, appearing stationary. As a result, GOES provide a constant vigil for the atmospheric "triggers" for severe weather conditions such as tornadoes, flash floods, hail storms and hurricanes.

Source: Nasa

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The University of Rwanda Launch Agribusiness Program in Rwanda

                                                                   Image Credit: MSU
Michigan State University and the University of Rwanda recently launched a new Master of Science degree program in agribusiness in Kigali, Rwanda.  The gender-sensitive degree program will enroll its first cohort of students in February 2015.

The degree program was jointly developed with funding provided by the U.S. Agency for International Development through the Women’s Leadership Program, implemented globally by Higher Education for Development.

The graduate program prioritizes accessibility to women and midcareer professionals and will incorporate extensive experiential learning opportunities for students. The structure of the program requires all students to partake in an internship, thus better preparing them for leadership and entrepreneurial roles in agriculture in Rwanda. 

“Agriculture is vital to the people and economy of Rwanda, and many of those involved in agriculture are women,” said James McWha, UR professor emeritus and vice chancellor. “Their input to the business of agriculture is essential. It is also important that agriculture adopts a modern business strategy because it is a business and all those involved must learn the relevant skills. This program brings together all the components necessary for a major development of the future of the agriculture and food industries in Rwanda.” 

Using a collaborative approach, the Women’s Leadership Program is designed to support access of women to higher education and advanced degrees, strengthen institutional capacity in research and education on women’s leadership and promote women’s leadership through higher education extension/outreach efforts in underserved communities. 

“The empowerment of women through the expansion of their leadership opportunities and spaces for their voices to be heard is a top priority for USAID globally, including in Rwanda,” said Joseph Lessard, USAID/Rwanda economic growth director. “We really believe this program will give women rich opportunities to share their expertise and play major roles in the country’s economic development. We congratulate the University of Rwanda and Michigan State University on this achievement, and look forward to seeing how it will benefit Rwanda into the future.” 

MSU has a rich history of working collaboratively with the Rwandan government and its institutions of higher education. 

“It has been a great honor to continue the tradition of our two universities working together to advance the agriculture sector in Rwanda,” said Gretchen Neisler, principal investigator on this project from MSU.  “Working collaboratively on the Rwanda Women’s Leadership Program has been very rewarding. I look forward to strengthening our partnership with the UR through the continued development of this degree program.  I am also excited to explore new and innovative ways for our two universities to work together to educate the next generation of thought leaders at both Michigan State University and the University of Rwanda.”

Source: MSU

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Competing in Robotics

RoboCup Junior is an international competition for the construction and programming of robots. It’s a part of the major RoboCup initiative – one of the biggest robot competitions in the world, with thousands of participants from over 40 countries.

Linköping students are organising the Swedish qualifying rounds for RoboCup Junior (in Swedish Junior-VM i robotik) where children and young people up to the age of 19 can take part. The winners get to represent Sweden in the 2015 international finals, which will be held in Hefei, China.

Mr Löfgren, who is in the fourth year of his studies for a master’s in Engineering Physics and Electronics, is a previous participant in the competition and current project leader for the RoboCup Junior finals in Linköping. He is the youngest ever member of the technical committee, which is mainly composed of eminent researchers and teachers.

“RoboCup Junior has been held in Sweden since 2009. I took part the very first year, won

the competition, and got to represent Sweden at the world championship in Austria.”

Since then, Mr Löfgren has won many competitions, in which he got to do things such as represent Sweden in Singapore and compete in the World Championships in Istanbul.

“After that I was too old; in 2012 I became team leader for one team and a judge for the national competition. I was also appointed to the international organizing committee of RoboCup Junior Rescue, and the technical committee.”

He has also been involved on the international stage, for example in Brazil where he wrote the rules for the next year’s competition. He was also team leader at the World Championships in Eindhoven. In 2013, Mr Löfgren started a student society whose aim was to organise RoboCup Junior in Sweden. The FIA student association (the Intelligent Autonomous Systems Society) grew, and now RoboCup Junior is just one of many events the society organises each year.

How do you select the participants?

“I was chosen as project leader for the competition by the board of the FIA, and then I appointed a project team of five people to help me plan and organise the competition in Linköping.”

The FIA is also organising a competition for university students and the public in conjunction with RoboCup Junior, so that more people can get the chance to compete with robots.

“I love to compete and I’ve competed in knowledge for a very long time,” Mr Löfgren says.

Robots around the dinner tableWhat has your involvement given you in practical terms?
“Being involved with robots has given me a great advantage in my studies here at the university. I have learned a great deal not only about electronics, programming and construction, but also about leadership and other cultures on my many travels, as well as how to collaborate on international projects.”

Mr Löfgren thinks it’s great to see how older researchers and professors listen to what he has to say, and he is looking forward to the next cooking competition that will be held in Madrid in November. It will consist of seeing how well the robots manage to cook tomato soup, write a shopping list and find and switch off a stove hob that has been left on.

He has already been offered jobs, but turned them down as he wants to finish his studies first before he starts his “real” working life.

Developing robots for space, robots that explore other planets and robots that work in caring for the elderly by doing all the heavy work so that staff can devote time to their personal contact with elderly people, are examples of dream jobs.

“I want to develop the technology of tomorrow and I’m open to everything that has to do with the development of technology. As I have worked with robots for 15 years, they are very dear to my heart.”

Text: Zen Dinah, student reporter
Photo: Julius Jeuthe, student photographer

Source: Linköping University

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Space Hubble's Little Sombrero

         European Space Agency Credit: ESA/Hubble & NASA

Galaxies can take many shapes and be oriented any way relative to us in the sky. This can make it hard to figure out their actual morphology, as a galaxy can look very different from different viewpoints. A special case is when we are lucky enough to observe a spiral galaxy directly from its edge, providing us with a spectacular view like the one seen in this picture of the week.

This is NGC 7814, also known as the “Little Sombrero.” Its larger namesake, the Sombrero Galaxy, is another stunning example of an edge-on galaxy — in fact, the “Little Sombrero” is about the same size as its bright namesake at about 60,000 light-years across, but as it lies farther away, and so appears smaller in the sky.

NGC 7814 has a bright central bulge and a bright halo of glowing gas extending outwards into space. The dusty spiral arms appear as dark streaks. They consist of dusty material that absorbs and blocks light from the galactic center behind it. The field of view of this NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope image would be very impressive even without NGC 7814 in front; nearly all the objects seen in this image are galaxies as well. 

Source: Nasa

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