October 5, 2018
Space weather research and forecasting has become an essential aspect for mission support and future mission development. NASA's Community Coordinated Modeling Center (CCMC) goal is to support and enable the research and development of the latest and future space weather models and facilitate deployment of latest advances in research in space weather operations. The CCMC is hosting an expanding collection of space weather models and disseminating simulation results of historic and on-going events through custom web-based systems. The CCMC is also evaluating models and tools for performance, robustness and value to end users of space weather information for potential transition to operational organizations. Since 2010 the CCMC has established a very diverse group of scientists from different space science fields working every day to provide space weather forecasting and anomaly analysis services in support of NASA’s space weather needs. As a part of its mission the CCMC is prototyping space weather models, new forecasting techniques and procedures, builds test beds for future missions planning (including missions to Mars and Deep Space), and also provides space weather training and hands-on educational opportunities. Over the years, the CCMC established great partnerships with NASA’s robotic mission specialists, the Space Radiation Analysis Group from Johnson Space Center, and other groups at NASA in need of custom space weather information. This presentation will describe the forecasting concepts of operations, notification processes, anomaly analysis, our partnerships and the tools used. The tools include systems that are completely open and available to the public’s use like the Integrated Space Weather Analysis (iSWA) tool and the Database of Notifications, Knowledge and Information (DONKI). We will also discuss the education and training activities like the Space Weather Research, Education and Development Initiative (REDI) Bootcamp that we have every year during the summer.
Dr. Yaireska (Yari) Collado-Vega is originally from Puerto Rico and her research focuses on solar wind-magnetosphere interaction instabilities and transient events. It includes data analysis of multi-spacecraft observations from different missions and analysis of Magnetohydrodynamic (MHD) simulations. She is also interested in dayside-magnetopause magnetic reconnection, magnetopause standoff position changes, and soft X-ray imaging of the magnetosphere where she is part of new project missions. She is part of the Community Coordinated Modeling Center (CCMC) team, is a senior space weather forecaster and the lead of the space weather forecaster team. She conducts education and public outreach for the CCMC team and the Heliophysics Science Division including social media events and live TV/radio interviews. She is the space weather subject matter expert and CCMC representative on the NASA Space Science Education Consortium. She has also been a Co-Investigator in several funded Science Innovation Fund proposals on a data mining tool development for vortices on the Earth's magnetopause.