NEWS—Archives

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June 20, 2007—NASA Langley Research Center Helps SSAI
to Open New Facility in Hampton, VA

Officials from the Langley Research Center and the City of Hampton were on hand as SSAI opened its newly renovated offices in Hampton, Virginia on June 20, 2007. The facility houses the program office and part of the staff working on the Science, Technology, and Research Support Services (STARSS) contract with NASA Langley Research Center, which SSAI won in October 2006.

Highlights of the ribbon-cutting ceremony included comments by Dr. Lelia Vann, Director of the Science Directorate, who praised SSAI for their “absolutely flawless transition” to the contract, and Deputy Center Director Stephen Jurczyk, who noted that Langley relies on contractors to get work done and stated that “SSAI is important to the success of science at NASA.”

Hampton mayor Ross Kearney also took the podium to highlight SSAI’s role in the development of the community. He explained that the arrival of the small, Maryland-based company means big things for the city of Hampton. “They will help support one of the city’s largest assets.” The mayor also recognized the diversity of the company, with employees of all ages and backgrounds.

As the ceremony at the entrance of SSAI’s new office space at One Enterprise Parkway took place, every person in the crowd was smiling. “We have officially planted our roots here, and now we can continue to grow,” SSAI President Om Bahethi said proudly.

August 20, 2007—SSAI Employee Rob Simmon Wins Avenza Map Award

Every year Avenza, a company that develops and markets mapping applications, recognizes outstanding applications of their flagship software packages. This year SSAI’s Rob Simmon won first place in the raster projects category. Rob’s project involved mapping Landsat data for the New York City area to allow visual comparison of temperature to amount of vegetation. This work supported research into the benefits of “green” roofs—roofs on which plants are growing. The maps were featured in an article on the Earth Observatory at http://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/Study/GreenRoof/greenroof2.html. Earth Observatory, which is supported by a team of SSAI outreach specialists and Web developers, is a Goddard Space Flight Center Web site where the public can obtain new satellite imagery and scientific information about our home planet, with a focus on Earth’s climate and environmental change. Awards are nothing new for Rob. The Earth Observatory, with the help of Rob and his colleagues, has won several Webby awards in the past.

August 20, 2007—Top-Rated Science Papers Include SSAI Co-Authors

In-Cites, a Web site managed by Thomson Scientific that tracks information on scientific publications, has listed papers that include SSAI researchers as co-authors in the top two spots of their “Super Hot” Papers in Science. The listing identifies papers published since 2003 that received citations at a notably high level in recent indexes. The number 1 and number 2 papers of the top 103 cited are two articles on First-year Wilkinson Microwave Anisotropy Probe (WMAP) observations. Determination of Cosmological Parameters by David N. Spergel et al. includes SSAI employees Michele Limon and Janet Weiland as co-authors. Additional co-authors who are SSAI customers include Chuck Bennett, Gary Hinshaw, Al Kogut, and Lyman Page. The second paper, Preliminary Maps and Basic Results, lists Chuck Bennett as first author, and co-authors include Michele Limon, Mike Greason, Bob S. Hill, Nils Odegard, and Janet Weiland from SSAI, as well as SSAI customers Gary Hinshaw, Al Kogut, and Lyman Page. We are very pleased to see this work receive such attention and interest from the scientific community, and extremely proud of the contributions of SSAI personnel to these investigations.

August 23, 2007—SSAI Awards 29 Scholarships to Employees' Dependents

At SSAI’s annual picnic at Paramount’s King Dominion amusement park, Om and Sara Bahethi awarded scholarships to 29 college-bound children of SSAI employees. This year saw the largest group of scholarship recipients since the inception of the program twelve years ago and also marked the $250,000 milestone for the program. The ceremony included naming the recipient of the Dr. Yoram J. Kaufman scholarship, awarded in memory of a Goddard Space Flight Center scientist to a student demonstrating exceptional character, personal accomplishment, and passion for science. This year’s Kaufman scholar is Elizabeth Chen, who will be a freshman at the University of Pennsylvania this fall. Elizabeth is the daughter of Jenny Wu, who works on SSAI’s Laboratory for Atmospheres contract at Goddard Space Flight Center. SSAI also underwrites four scholarships administered by the American Meteorological Society to students studying the atmospheric sciences.

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