NASA's Sensor Web 89
ddtstudio writes "PC Mag has a story about the Sensor Web: 'a cutting-edge application of networked sensor technology currently on the fast track at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL).' Not only a new way to test tech, but also perhaps a pervasive and inexpensive way to explore remote places such as Antarctica -- or Mars."
Interesting technology (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Interesting technology (Score:1)
Why? They seem to be reasonably accurate these days. I have a kernel module that uses them as a random number generator.
Re:Interesting technology (Score:5, Insightful)
We can already track weather patterns all over the planet. The trouble is that this does not really solve the problem of predicting what will happen in the future - there are simply too many unkown factors affecting weather patterns for us to understand how and why they do what they do at this point. This isn't to say that a worldwide network of these semsors wouldn't be helpful, I just don't think they would solve the problems we have - satellites already give us a lot of worldwide data, but our weather forecasts beyond a few days out are still pretty unreliable (and often over much shorter time periods). If we want better weather forecasting we need to put more effort into figuring out all the factors that affect weather, which will probably require huge leaps in processing power over what is currently available - many of the world's most powerful supercomputers are already used for atmospheric modelling.
Re:Interesting technology (Score:5, Insightful)
For instance, a sensor web could be spread over a 100 square mile area around a waste dump to help determine the regional impact of high carbon dioxide concentrations and other gasses leaching into the surrounding environment on a seasonal basis.
Or, another type of sensor web could be setup in a metropolitan area to measure the impact of environmental pollution laws and programs before and after they are implemented. For instance, in the San Francisco Bay Area, does a "spare the air" marketing campaign have a material impact on air quality within a few hours of being broadcast? Or, would other types of campaigns to achieve the same goals be more effective. It seems that an appropriately configured sensor web could provide firm data to answer such difficult questions.
Predicting rain next week is a very small aspect to the overall benefit of developing low-cost, commodity sensors that can be deployed in the manner described in the article. The exciting part is the technology is standardized, inexpensive, redundant, and easy to configure to continuously measure the specific aspects of an environment at whatever resolution is required.
Re:Interesting technology (Score:3, Insightful)
The weather... (Score:2)
And the stakes are actually huge - about 20% of the US economy would benefit from weather derivatives, and en
Re:Interesting technology (Score:2)
Isn't the real problem that weather patterns are a chaotic system? You probably heard of the "butterfly effect": a butterfly flapping its wings in Tahiti can produce a tornado in Kansas. So, even if we knew
Re:Interesting technology (Score:3, Funny)
Re:Interesting technology (Score:3, Interesting)
At least in severe weather, what's going on above the surface is very important. For example, it's important to know if there's wind shear. This is winds moving in significantly different directions or at different speeds at different levels, which leads to rotation. It's very important to severe storms. And it's also very important to know if there's any inversions, such as
Why sensors and cpus when we have a free market? (Score:1, Offtopic)
As everyone knows, a free efficient market will factor in all knowledge and forecase everything within seconds.
This is a terrible waste of taxpayer money so long as we can trade Orange Juice, Pork Belly, and Osama Bin Laden Futures.
Re:Why sensors and cpus when we have a free market (Score:1, Insightful)
traffic applications (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:traffic applications (Score:1)
not just for cars.... (Score:1)
Re:not just for cars.... (Score:2)
The city (with IBM) has fitted a number of intersections with audio walk signals for north-south, east-west. Verbal signals would have been more interesting: "You've got 2 seconds left, run you sucker!" (Perhaps
Re:traffic applications (Score:3, Funny)
Pizza time!!!
Re:traffic applications (Score:2, Informative)
NASA's Web Sensoring (Score:5, Funny)
Quick, call the EFF!!!
They need to be more outspoken (Score:5, Interesting)
NASA might win more more public approval if they loudly proclaimed their endeavours while they worked on them. As it stands, only their failures get much notice.
Re:They need to be more outspoken (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:They need to be more outspoken (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:They need to be more outspoken (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:They need to be more outspoken (Score:1)
Anyway, yes, they do have some personell devoted to non-research tasks like PR. The call for more disclosure of NASA's projects would require more attention from those individuals, perhaps so much as to require more personell.
Also, preparing reports and such intended for the use of public relations would still take more time away from the research, and thus drive up cost. (God forbid the layman prepare a report by themselves.) It makes more sense fo
Re:They need to be more outspoken (Score:2)
Re:They need to be more outspoken (Score:2)
Re:They need to be more outspoken (Score:1)
How about an air quality net spread across a city? That could be useful in detecting where local polluters are, and when they're doing it.
Re:They need to be more outspoken (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:They need to be more outspoken (Score:5, Funny)
Isn't that the way we want it to work? "Today NASA received transmissions from what appears to be intelligent lifeforms! Scientists are working around the clock to decode their communications which appear to be mostly grunts and whistles."
....two weeks later...
"Sorry, it was a hip hop video transmission that bounced off the moon and back to earth."
Re:They need to be more outspoken (Score:1, Funny)
Re:They need to be more outspoken (Score:1)
But vaporware is a bitch, when it comes back to bite you in the arse. If programs get cancelled, the cry-wolf factor comes into play and nobody pays attention to their proclamations anymore.
Just say no to Sensorship (Score:3, Funny)
Bad spellers of the world untie!
Re:Just say no to Sensorship (Score:1)
Yet another reason for IPV6 (Score:5, Insightful)
These things should have Internet presense, of course. Otherwise what are they really good for? Given the sort of things they might be used for, I can see 4 billion IP addresses being used up real quick! And putting them on the Internet seems like a really small step from what is described in the article (I didn't follow the rest of the links... maybe they are already doing this?).
If this sort of thing becomes ubiquitous, they could be really useful for a lot of things that we don't tend to like: e.g. surveillance.
Bad Manners! (Score:1, Funny)
Think of the Martians. Won't somebody think of the Martians?
One good use for these things (Score:1, Funny)
Re:One good use for these things (Score:1)
Bless you. +20 Insightful.
Go There Yourself (Score:2, Funny)
If you want to see it, see it the way God intended; from the deck of a ship with very, very strong hull plating.
(By the way, it's all water, rocks, sea lions and penguins.)
Re:Go There Yourself (Score:1)
Getting this post back to the topic at hand though, a good sensor web would definitely be useful in antarctica. Face it, it's brutal out there, and the brutality does funny things to a person's mind. Losing focus and concentratio
sensorweb@home anybody? (Score:5, Interesting)
If such a sensorweb@home program were successful with 10,000's of pods deployed, a vast quantity of environmental data could be collected on a global scale at a relatively low cost. Such a global network could provide greater context for data captured by planned regional sensor webs or the data could be filtered to create virtual sensor webs for testing hypothesis without the effort and expense of deploying an actual sensor web.
Do others think that people would participate in such a project that would provide any direct benefit to the participants? Downloading and installing seti@home is one thing, actually purchasing and installing a sensor pod is another.
Re:sensorweb@home anybody? (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:sensorweb@home anybody? (Score:2)
Double standard?
Re:sensorweb@home anybody? (Score:2)
Sensorship? (Score:4, Funny)
NOTE TO SELF: Do not drink heavily and browse Slashdot at the same time. When your judgment is so impaired that the grinning Tux icon starts looking sexy, it's time to put the cognac down.
Rocket Science (Score:3, Funny)
I tend to agree. I learned this about 28 years ago, playing in the backyard with a garden hose.
I'm currently working on a grant regarding my theory that branches tend to grow up and roots tend to grow down.
My next project will be on my theory that lousy engineers tend to flow upwards toward management.
Forget Bewoulf... (Score:1)
"Imagine a sensor web of... ipods!!
or something like it.
What's With This Quote? (Score:2, Insightful)
Ok, to me this quote seems to not make sense. Do they expect li
Re:What's With This Quote? (Score:2)
When it's evolved for it, life on Earth can be pretty good at staying dormant for a long period of time, then living la
Re:One huge step backwards... (Score:1)
Re:One huge step backwards... (Score:1)
Heh, this is just 'stupid cameras on light posts'. It's typical of gov't funded science, really. During the cold war, they developed and deployed radiation-detecting satellites under the guise of 'looking for sunspots' or whatever, when really the satellites were all pointed at the USSR to detect nuclear weapons tests.
Now they'll be 'inventing' all sorts of new 'super-aware' networks of cameras and tracking systems that are s
Reverse that... (Score:3, Insightful)
Like many others, you seem to reverse the implementation of this technology in your head. It's primary purpose is not to "test tech", and the possibility of exploring remote places is above just a simple "perhaps". If you read the article you would realise that:
One of our first applications for a Sensor Web has been to put one in remote regions of Antarctica.
You, like many others, are continually making the mistake that all this new and grand technology is made for "tech", computing, and advances in video hardware so you can get a couple more FPS's out of your favorite first-person-shooter.... You need to see the real importance behind the technology.
Scientist: We just developed a communication system that will allow us to instantly transfer data to and from satellites no matter what their distance is, with no data loss! Now we'll be able to control robots on Mars and even planets in other solar systems in real-time!
Computer Geek: Woah! Imagine the ping rates I'll get when playing Unreal online!
*cough* skynet *cough* (Score:2)
PlanetX (Score:1)
Interact with the environment, on Mars? (Score:2)
A Sensor Web on Mars isn't going to have control over water hoses. Exactly how a Mars web will "interact with the environment" is left unstated. It is fun to speculate, however. I imagine a few assisting robots, shaped more like spiders than the present baby buggies. Perhaps they could return interesting samples to a cen
Valley Forge coulda used a sensor web (Score:1)