The Engineering Research Center for Collaborative Adaptive Sensing of the Atmosphere (CASA) is a National Science Foundation Engineering Center. The Center brings together a multidisciplinary group of engineers, computer scientists, meteorologists, sociologists, graduate and undergraduate students, as well as industry and government partners to conduct fundamental research, develop enabling technology, and deploy prototype engineering systems based on a new paradigm: Distributed Collaborative Adaptive Sensing (DCAS) networks.
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CASA is investigating a concept in which networks of small, low-cost radars could be deployed on rooftops, communication towers, and other infrastructure elements to address coverage gaps in today’s radar infrastructure. The CASA Engineering Research Center is a partnership among nearly 20 institutions, configured into academic, government, and industrial arms. This configuration enables the participants of the center to: develop the concepts behind small radar networks; translate these concepts into new technologies; and commercialize and implement the best concepts in practice. Many of the center’s key concepts have been demonstrated in research trials, and development and commercialization of various technologies is underway.
CASA is a collaboration among four academic partners: the University of Massachusetts Amherst (lead institution), the University of Oklahoma, Colorado State University, and the University of Puerto Rico. Other collaborating academic institutions are: the University of Delaware, the University of Virginia and McGill University.
CASA operates a network of four low-power, short-range, X- band, dual-polarized Doppler weather radars in southwestern Oklahoma. The system, known as Integrative Project 1 or IP1 for short, was installed in January 2006 and began operation April 1 of 2006. IP1 is the first CASA test bed to demonstrate DCAS and the value of low-level sensing, and a number of research opportunities will be made available by the system. Current plans are to expand the IP1 from 4 nodes to as many as 9 nodes within the next few years.