Contact:

Michael Braukus
Headquarters, Washington
(Phone: 202/358-1979)

September 2, 2003 - RELEASE: H03-279

NASA HONORS AGENCY SOFTWARE DEVELOPMENT

NASA selected a data analysis system for an Earth observing satellite instrument and a software program used on the International Space Station and Space Shuttle as winners of the agency's 2003 Software of the Year Awards.

The data analysis system is for the orbiting Sea-viewing Wide Field-of-View Sensor (SeaWIFS) instrument. It makes the data collected about oceans and climate available to thousands of
scientists around the world over the Internet. It also provides the necessary tools to break down and analyze the data in a consistent, scientific manner. It also ensures the data down linked from the instrument are of the highest quality. The SeaWiFS Data Analysis System (SeaDAS) is used at more than 500 sites in 50 countries. The SeaDAS team leader is Gene C. Feldman of NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, Md.

The SeaWiFS project is funded by NASA's Earth Science Enterprise, a long-term, coordinated research effort to study the Earth as a global system. Using the unique perspective available from space, NASA is observing, monitoring and assessing large-scale environmental processes, such as the oceans' productivity, focusing on climate change.

The other winning software is NASGRO, an internationally accepted standard code for fracture control analysis of space hardware. It is a classic engineering software design and analysis tool that was developed over a number of years. It was distributed to virtually every design firm in the world that must deal with metallic structures.

At NASA, the code has important use in the Space Shuttle and Space Station programs, including analysis of payloads and resolution of crack-like anomalies. NASGRO is used in
numerous other industries and by other government agencies. It is receiving significant support from the Federal Aviation Administration for development of improved capabilities for damage tolerance analysis of aircraft.

The NASGRO team leader is Royce Forman of NASA's Johnson Space Center, Houston.

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