MITRE’S University Innovation Exchange For Space

The Commonwealth of Virginia has several key needs addressed with space-based remote sensing data. The Commonwealth has many experts in remote sensing observations, data analysis, and data archival and dissemination, working in independent groups on a range of research topics. The thesis of the UIX project is that information from data sources can be more efficiently exploited to support real-time decision making by problem stakeholders. The UIX Space Team envisions the use of space, airborne, terrestrial, maritime sensors, and a variety of data sources (e.g., weather, traffic reports) to support these problems. Our goal is to obtain necessary data from information sources associated with a given problem (‘problem-centric’) and integrate this data into a single process for data mining and exploitation.

MITRE is collaborating with four Virginia universities (George Mason University, Old Dominion University, University of Virginia, and Virginia Tech) and the Virginia Space Grant Consortium to make impactful contributions to the Commonwealth. Taking advantage of existing capabilities and investments, the project is leveraging current activities such as Virginia Research Investment Committee-Funded Virginia Small Sat Data Consortium, the Virginia Open Data Cube (VODC), and the work of other state and federal entities, to provide efficient access to data to address problems in the Commonwealth.

MITRE’s University Innovation Exchange (UIX) for Space brings these groups together to analyze Virginia’s remote sensing needs and the resources available in five problem areas:

• Solar power generation efficiency – Stability and efficiency of the electric grid, the most important aspects for the energy infrastructure.
• Transportation efficiency – Congestion on Virginia roadways, which costs billions of dollars and causes needless loss of life, as well as affects Virginians’ quality of life.
• Flooding prediction and response – Impacts of flooding, sea-level rise, and land subsidence all affect the near and far-term economic growth and development of Virginia coastal regions.
• Water body monitoring – A large portion of rivers are unmonitored and unassessed. Virginia’s water pollution problem requires extensive monitoring to understand how to prevent environmental damage.
• Wildfire prevention and response – Assessing wildfire risk in the wilderness urban interface is a major challenge and area of concern for wildfire danger—with the potential for massive loss of personal property and infrastructure.

Click here to view the UIX report. This whitepaper documents our first phase of work. During this phase, the UIX Space Team identified and documented the information needed to address these problems, to determine if existing information sources are sufficient to provide that data and, if not, determine what is required and design a plan to obtain and populate the relevant data into the VODC, as means of integrating information for subsequent action.

VSGC Contact: Mary Sandy, Director of the Virginia Space Grant Consortium, msandy@odu.edu.