IEEE Haiti Engineering Educational and Professional Development Rebuilding Fund
By Pedro Ray, posted on January 29th, 2010 in Articles, Disasters, Earth Observation
A multinational aircrew from the Heavy Airlift Wing out of Papa Air Base, Hungary, loads a C-17 Globemaster III with aid supplies and equipment coming out of Orebro, Sweden, for its second mission to Port-au-Prince, Haiti. The first load of materials was delivered Jan. 18, 2010, to Port-au-Prince’s main airport. The air relief is being delivered in response to a massive earthquake that struck Haiti Jan. 12, 2010. This is the first humanitarian assistance operation flown by the Heavy Airlift Wing since it stood up in July 2009. The wing is a multinational force made up of airmen from 12 nations. (U.S. Air Force photo/ Staff Sgt. Michael T. McCool
The tragedy in Haiti is still only in the first stage of triage with valiant efforts being made to alleviate the immediate suffering and provide the basics for sustaining human life. However, challenges just as daunting lay ahead for reconstruction. One of these will be the re-establishing of engineering and technology education and professional activities in Haiti.
As a global transnational organization with nearly 400,000 members and as a leader in advancing technology for humanity, IEEE is uniquely positioned to help address these challenges. To this end, IEEE has established the IEEE Haiti Engineering Educational and Professional Development Rebuilding Fund. Individuals may contribute online or donate by check to the IEEE Foundation and mail to the IEEE Development Office, 445 Hoes Lane, Piscataway, NJ 08854. Donations from OUs (societies, sections, conferences, etc.) will be made using existing governance processes. IEEE will match the first US$50,000 in donations.
Because Haiti is in IEEE Region 9, disbursements of funds will be coordinated through that Region. The IEEE Board of Directors just last November developed a policy that allows IEEE and its Organizational Units to contribute to third-party nonprofit organizations that provide disaster relief. The disbursements may be in the form of grants to academic institutions, charitable organizations, or used for such things as equipment, services, scholarships and classroom and laboratory materials. They also may be used to support programs developed for retraining or other professional activities to help engineering and technology professionals in Haiti.
IEEE continues to encourage donations to other organizations for the immediate relief effort and to help bring some semblance of stability to the lives of the people of Haiti. But we are hopeful that the generosity of our members – and others associated with IEEE — will also add to the long-term development of Haiti through this IEEE fund.
For more information or questions regarding the IEEE Haiti Engineering Educational and Professional Development Rebuilding Fund, please direct your inquiries to the IEEE Contact Center.
Sincerely,
Pedro Ray
2010 IEEE President and Chief Executive Officer
NASA Daily Image
Remnant of a Supernova
Vital clues about the devastating ends to the lives of massive stars can be found by studying the aftermath of their explosions. In its more than twelve years of science operations, NASA's Chandra X-ray Observatory has studied many of these supernova remnants sprinkled across the galaxy. The latest example of this important investigation is Chandra's new image of the supernova remnant known as G350.1-0.3. This stellar debris field is located some 14,700 light years from the Earth toward the center of the Milky Way. Evidence from Chandra and from ESA's XMM-Newton telescope suggest that a compact object within G350.1+0.3 may be the dense core of the star that exploded. The position of this likely neutron star, seen by the arrow pointing to "neutron star" in the inset image, is well away from the center of the X-ray emission. If the supernova explosion occurred near the center of the X-ray emission then the neutron star must have received a powerful kick in the supernova explosion. Data suggest this supernova remnant, as it appears in the image, is 600 and 1,200 years old. If the estimated location of the explosion is correct, this means the neutron star has been moving at a speed of at least 3 million miles per hour since the explosion. Another intriguing aspect of G350.1-0.3 is its unusual shape. Many supernova remnants are nearly circular, but G350.1-0.3 is strikingly asymmetrical as seen in the Chandra data in this image (gold). Infrared data from NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope (light blue) also trace the morphology found by Chandra. Astronomers think that this bizarre shape is due to stellar debris field expanding into a nearby cloud of cold molecular gas. The age of 600-1,200 years puts the explosion that created G350.1-0.3 in the same time frame as other famous supernovas that formed the Crab and SN 1006 supernova remnants. However, it is unlikely that anyone on Earth would have seen the explosion because of the obscuring gas and dust that lies along our line of sight to the remnant. These results appeared in the April 10, 2011 issue of The Astrophysical Journal. Image Credits: X-ray: NASA/CXC/SAO/I. Lovchinsky et al; IR: NASA/JPL-Caltech