Research & Development World

  • R&D World Home
  • Topics
    • Aerospace
    • Automotive
    • Biotech
    • Careers
    • Chemistry
    • Environment
    • Energy
    • Life Science
    • Material Science
    • R&D Management
    • Physics
  • Technology
    • 3D Printing
    • A.I./Robotics
    • Software
    • Battery Technology
    • Controlled Environments
      • Cleanrooms
      • Graphene
      • Lasers
      • Regulations/Standards
      • Sensors
    • Imaging
    • Nanotechnology
    • Scientific Computing
      • Big Data
      • HPC/Supercomputing
      • Informatics
      • Security
    • Semiconductors
  • R&D Market Pulse
  • R&D 100
    • Call for Nominations: The 2025 R&D 100 Awards
    • R&D 100 Awards Event
    • R&D 100 Submissions
    • Winner Archive
    • Explore the 2024 R&D 100 award winners and finalists
  • Resources
    • Research Reports
    • Digital Issues
    • R&D Index
    • Subscribe
    • Video
    • Webinars
  • Global Funding Forecast
  • Top Labs
  • Advertise
  • SUBSCRIBE

R&D 100 winner of the day: Global Synthetic Weather Radar

By Heather Hall | June 22, 2022

This image shows an overview of the Global Synthetic Weather Radar algorithm. Multiple (nonradar) inputs, such as lightning data, satellite imagery, and numerical weather model outputs, are fused using a supervised machine learning methodology trained against weather radar to create global weather radar-like images of areas outside the range of ground-based weather radars. Users can select whether to view the storm height or the precipitation intensity as represented by different metrics.

The Global Synthetic Weather Radar (GSWR) technology, from MIT Lincoln Laboratory and the U.S. Air Force, uses machine learning–based algorithms to provide radar-like weather imagery and radar-forward forecasts in global regions where actual weather radars are not deployed or available. The GSWR capability builds on a previous limited-domain version, the Offshore Precipitation Capability (OPC). The OPC was developed for the Federal Aviation Administration to provide weather information for flight planning and air traffic control purposes for offshore regions off the U.S. east coast, and that technology won an R&D 100 Award in 2016. GSWR required novel machine learning methods to incorporate new satellite, lightning, numerical weather model and radar truth data sources and to substantially scale up the capability from the continental United States domain to the global domain. This technology will provide valuable weather information to the U.S. Air Force to support mission planning for their worldwide operations, and it was deployed to their cloud computing environment in 2020. There are many civilian applications including aviation, water resources, and recreation that could also be enabled through wider GSWR deployment.

Related Articles Read More >

2024’s R&D 100 Researcher of the Year on the drive that inspired him to create digital twins of 141 million buildings
R&D 100 Awards
The 2025 R&D 100 Awards are now open for nominations
R&D 100 Awards
Call for Nominations: The 2025 R&D 100 Awards
R&D 100 winner of the day: Berelex Green eco-friendly, antiviral, antifungal, and antibacterial paint
rd newsletter
EXPAND YOUR KNOWLEDGE AND STAY CONNECTED
Get the latest info on technologies, trends, and strategies in Research & Development.
RD 25 Power Index

R&D World Digital Issues

Fall 2024 issue

Browse the most current issue of R&D World and back issues in an easy to use high quality format. Clip, share and download with the leading R&D magazine today.

Research & Development World
  • Subscribe to R&D World Magazine
  • Enews Sign Up
  • Contact Us
  • About Us
  • Drug Discovery & Development
  • Pharmaceutical Processing
  • Global Funding Forecast

Copyright © 2025 WTWH Media LLC. All Rights Reserved. The material on this site may not be reproduced, distributed, transmitted, cached or otherwise used, except with the prior written permission of WTWH Media
Privacy Policy | Advertising | About Us

Search R&D World

  • R&D World Home
  • Topics
    • Aerospace
    • Automotive
    • Biotech
    • Careers
    • Chemistry
    • Environment
    • Energy
    • Life Science
    • Material Science
    • R&D Management
    • Physics
  • Technology
    • 3D Printing
    • A.I./Robotics
    • Software
    • Battery Technology
    • Controlled Environments
      • Cleanrooms
      • Graphene
      • Lasers
      • Regulations/Standards
      • Sensors
    • Imaging
    • Nanotechnology
    • Scientific Computing
      • Big Data
      • HPC/Supercomputing
      • Informatics
      • Security
    • Semiconductors
  • R&D Market Pulse
  • R&D 100
    • Call for Nominations: The 2025 R&D 100 Awards
    • R&D 100 Awards Event
    • R&D 100 Submissions
    • Winner Archive
    • Explore the 2024 R&D 100 award winners and finalists
  • Resources
    • Research Reports
    • Digital Issues
    • R&D Index
    • Subscribe
    • Video
    • Webinars
  • Global Funding Forecast
  • Top Labs
  • Advertise
  • SUBSCRIBE