SPARTA: BC/ISR Selected for 5-Year Space Weather Center of Excellence by NASA

We are excited to announce that BC's Institute for Scientific Research (ISR) has been selected by NASA to host a new Space Weather Center of Excellence (SWxC). The new SWxC, “SPARTA” (Space Weather Research and Technology Applications), will be measuring and forecasting ionospheric disturbances, especially scintillation events, and their impacts on communications, navigation, and timing systems such as GPS, in part using machine learning techniques. A major goal of the SWxC is to improve global forecasts of scintillation in order to provide better alerts and prevent disruptions to communication and navigation applications. Led by the PI Keith Groves, the SPARTA team includes members at institutes across the country and around the globe, with experts from academia, government, and industry.  For additional details, please see the BC News article.