03/24/03 -- Kao Named to IEEE Editorial Post
NAS Division scientist David Kao has been named an associate editor of Transactions on Visualization and Computer Graphics (TVCG), a quarterly journal of the IEEE. The journal is designed to inform readers on the state of the art of the specialized field of scientific visualization.

During his two-year tenure, which began in February, Kao's duties will include soliciting manuscripts for the journal, distributing them to recognized experts for peer review, and evaluating and recommending them for publication. Kao has published extensively in the scientific visualization field and has served as co-chair or member of technical committees at several international conferences. He received his Ph.D. from Arizona State University in Computer Science.

David S. Ebert, newly appointed TVCG editor-in-chief, cited Kao's "reputation in the field" and recommendations from colleagues and current members of the TVCG Editorial Board as the basis for the appointment.

As a scientist in the NAS Division's Research Branch, Kao is working with government and university collaborators to develop several new visualization tools and techniques for analyzing Earth- and space science data. Some of the techniques will be applied, for example, to Earth Observing System (EOS) satellite image-derived data representing snapshots in time of the Earth's surface.

Kao has co-developed several visualization software packages, including the award-winning Unsteady Flow Analysis Toolkit (UFAT), a pioneering tool for visualizing very large time-dependent or "unsteady" flow datasets. UFAT reduces the analysis time of multi-gigabyte datasets from weeks to hours, and has been used to process and analyze simulation results of the Space Shuttle and artificial heart devices.

TVCG publishes papers that present important research results and state-of-the-art seminal papers related to visualization and computer graphics techniques, systems, software, hardware, and user interface issues.
For more information, see the Transactions on Visualization and Computer Graphics website.

02/25/03 -- Grid Workshop Signifies Progress
NASA’s Information Power Grid (IPG) community gathered February 4-5 to discuss recent accomplishments and goals for the IPG’s future. A common theme of many of presentations delivered at the workshop was data accessibility, or Data Grids.

Data Grids involve managing, replicating, sharing, and preserving data. The prevalence of this theme shows the evolving maturity of Grid computing, where emphasis has shifted from simply providing access to distributed resources, to making massive datasets available for scientific analysis via Grid resources. The idea is to make data and data analysis tools accessible from anywhere on Earth (and eventually in space) using a single, secure log-in feature from a Web interface.

The IPG tutorial and workshop, held in Palo Alto, Calif., began with an address from Walt Brooks, acting chief of the NAS Division. “Although the IPG is not available to NASA researchers as a totally functioning capability today, we’re on the right track to bring this enabling technology to full maturity. As the agency explores our solar system, picture what a grid-enabled NASA could do for future air- and spacecraft design, astrobiology, and a whole host of other scientific disciplines. The IPG can help NASA fulfill this need,” Brooks said.
Among workshop presenters were representatives of IPG collaborators from Argonne National Laboratory (ANL), in Illinois, and the Information Sciences Institute (ISI) at the University of Southern California. Considered by many to be the originators of Globus-based grid computing, ANL’s Ian Foster and ISI’s Carl Kessleman discussed their views on how grid development should evolve.

Foster outlined his organization’s role in the IPG effort: “We deliver grid technology to the IPG, making sure incoming technology is compatible with NASA’s grid infrastructure. One of our challenges is moving forward with technology while maintaining compatibility with IPG’s existing framework,” he said. Kessleman spoke about how his organization’ supports NASA’s IPG effort: “Our first priority is to understand requirements, and how they address NASA and IPG missions. Understanding these requirements helps us understand how grids are being used, and their future direction.”

Emphasizing the importance of maintaining relevance of the grid to NASA missions, NASA’s Computing, Networking, and Information Systems (CNIS) Project Manager Jerry Yan, said, “Our goal is to do research. We should constantly be looking to fill the technology gaps between where NASA is, and where NASA wants to go. We want to see automation and data readily accessible to scientists—that’s the resource we want to provide to NASA and the scientific community.” The CNIS Project is one of the IPG’s major funding sources.
In the coming year,

IPG team members and collaborators will work to transition the IPG to a higher level of maturity. Using their own applications, users will test drive the IPG’s new capabilities, centered on the availability of large datasets and more efficient Web-based services. “We need to develop a higher level grid middleware that includes standardized services to science portals, and applications for managing massive datasets,” says IPG Project Manager Bill Johnston. “We’re seeing an evolution toward a more service-oriented environment.”

Other IPG collaborators represented at the workshop included San Diego Supercomputing Center, the University of Wisconsin, and the University of Texas at Austin. Partners at NASA’s Glenn, Goddard, and Langley Research Centers, and the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, also participated.

The Information Power Grid is NASA’s version of a heterogeneous, distributed resource and data-sharing environment. The mission of NASA’s IPG is to develop grid technology and make the agency’s distributed computational capabilities, massive datasets, problem solving environments, and scientific tools available to NASA researchers. For more information about presentations delivered at the 2003 IPG Workshop, visit NASA's IPG website.

02/18/03 -- New 2003 Technical Reports Online
Researchers in the NAS Division have published three new technical reports, available online:

"Performance Evaluation of Remote Memory Access (RMA) Programming on Shared Memory Parallel Computers"

"NAS Parallel Benchmarks I/O Version 2.4"

"Implementation of Preconditioned Dual-Time Procedures in OVERFLOW"

For a complete list of reports (2002-1989), visit the NAS Technical Reports Archive.

01/27/03 -- NAS Researcher Scores Funding for Nanolaser Work
NAS Division researcher Cun-Zheng Ning, and Hou-Tee Ng of NASA Ames Research Center’s Nanotechnology Branch, were among the winners of the Ames Director’s Discretionary Fund (DDF) for fiscal year 2003. The grant provides the financial support needed to begin conducting proposed research on “Patterned Nanolaser Arrays as Building Blocks for Nano-Photonics Systems.” The proposed nano-photonic devices will consume considerably less power, perform better, and achieve revolutionary functional densities -- all necessary to withstand extreme conditions in space.

Nanolasers are the smallest lasers constructed to date, with a diameter of just tens of nanometers -- commonly equated with one-thousandth the width of a single human hair. “The nanolasers we are proposing to simulate and grow could shrink revolutionary information processing and communication capabilities into a nanoscale package for future NASA space missions,” says Ning.

Ning and Ng propose to combine computer simulation with experimental growth in order to get the best possible results. Drawing on their previous experience with modeling photonic devices (see “Tiny Lasers, Huge Potential"), the team is confident they can develop a model for patterned nanolaser array structures. Extensive computer simulations will be used to determine or design the size and location of each individual laser in the patterned laser array. To grow the actual nanotubes and nanowires, the team will use a vapor-liquid-water growth technique modeled after that of a researcher group from the University of California, Berkeley .

This proposed work is important to the future of nano-photonic devices because this could be the first time anyone has successfully grown patterned nano-laser arrays important for many applications. The way nanowires are currently grown results in quality issues: there is no way to control where they grow, so the end result is random distribution over a two-dimensional substrate. In addition, the nanotubes quickly undergo mechanical deformation -- not lasting long enough to be useful.

The Ames Director’s Discretionary Fund was established to fund innovative research ideas not currently funded by existing research activities. Funding is allocated to selected projects for up to two years. By the end of 2004, Ning and Ng hope to have completed a computer simulation code for nano-laser array design and prototype patterned nano-laser arrays.

For more information about this work, contact Cun-Zheng Ning at cning@mail.arc.nasa.gov.