Solar storm

The Next Big Solar Storm Could Fry the Grid

Oct. 11, 2023

The first primitive ancestor of future AI-based solar-weather alert systems is live. [SWx TREC's] DstLive system, which debuted on the web in December 2022, uses machine learning to take data about the state of Earth’s magnetic field and the solar wind and translate both into a single measure for the entire planet, known as DST.

Space weather graphic

New center will lay groundwork for better space weather forecasts

Sept. 25, 2023

NASA announced that it had selected four Space Weather Centers of Excellence , including the Space Weather Operational Readiness Development (SWORD) center at CU Boulder. As its name suggests, the nearly $10 million center will offer some powerful protection for the planet: SWORD research will seek to help scientists develop...

SWORD logo square

NASA Selects Space Weather Centers for Excellence

Aug. 16, 2023

The Space Weather Technology, Research & Education Center is leading a NASA Space Weather Center of Excellence, an integrated multi-agency initiative to advance the science and technology of space weather. NASA has selected three Space Weather Centers of Excellence (SWxC) and is partnering with the Department of Commerce (DoC) on...

A polar tongue of ionization during a geomagnetic storm stretching from lower latitudes up over Canada, Greenland, and northern Europe and Asia.*

CU Boulder researcher earns NASA grant to study how space weather affects Earth

Aug. 1, 2023

Yang Wang is leading a unique study harnessing satellite data to study how solar activity affects a poorly understood region of Earth’s upper atmosphere. Wang, a visiting faculty member in the Ann and H. J. Smead Department of Aerospace Engineering Sciences working in the Space Weather Technology, Research, and Education...

NSF logo

SWx TREC PhD student awarded NSF Graduate Research Fellowship

March 24, 2021

The National Science Foundation (NSF) has announced the 2021 winners of the NSF Graduate Research Fellowship Program (GRFP). Swx TREC PhD student Anton Buynovskiy was among those to receive the prestigious award which recognizes and supports individuals early in their graduate training in Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM) fields...

Solar flare

SWx TREC executive director wins NASA grant for machine learning

Dec. 9, 2020

Dr. Thomas Berger, SWx TREC executive director, has landed a NASA grant to research space weather with machine learning. Berger is leading a team that has received a two-year, $496,000 grant to design a better forecasting system for solar magnetic eruptions on the sun. More information on this grant can...

Lenticular clouds over Sand Dunes National Park

SWx TREC Co-Investigator Cora Randall wins Phase I NASA DRIVE Center Grant

Aug. 12, 2020

SWx TREC co-investigator Cora Randall is the principal investigator for one of two new CU science centers to be funded by NASA. The program is part of NASA’s Diversity, Realize, Integrate, Venture, Educate (DRIVE) Science Center initiative. Randall's project, Wave-induced Atmospheric Variability (WAVE), studies gravity waves, which can affect Earth's...