Jeff has been involved in aerospace journalism since the mid 1990s. Prior to joining Aviation Week, Jeff served as managing editor of Launchspace magazine and the International Space Industry Report. He has been the editor and chief of Aviation Week's Aerospace Daily & Defense Report since 2007 and has been a regular contributor to Aviation Week magazine. He received his B.A. from the College of William & Mary in Williamsburg, Va.
RUDDY GLOW: With the help of NASA’s Aqua satellite, researchers have performed the first global analysis of the health of ocean plants. Using Aqua’s Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS), scientists observed the fluorescent red light emitted by phytoplankton in the open ocean and assessed how efficiently the microscopic plants are converting sunlight and nutrients into food using photosynthesis.
GOES-R: The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) has picked Harris Corporation to develop the ground segment for the next-generation Geostationary Operational Environmental Satellite (GOES-R) system. Harris beat rival Raytheon for the $736 million award. Set to begin launching in 2015, the GOES-R weather satellites are expected to double the clarity of today’s satellite imagery and provide at least 20 times more atmospheric observations from space, according to NOAA.
THREE MORE: Expedition 20 Flight Engineers Roman Romanenko, Frank De Winne and Robert Thirsk launched to the International Space Station (ISS) in their Soyuz TMA-15 spacecraft from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan at 6:34 a.m. EDT May 27, kicking off a planned six months in space. They are scheduled to dock with the ISS on May 29, marking the beginning of six-person operations onboard the orbiting outpost as they join Russian cosmonaut Gennady Padalka, NASA astronaut Michael Barratt and Japanese astronaut Koichi Wakata.
