2019 AGU Hyperwall Presentations: Opening Night Talks and Data Visualization Winners

As the American Geophysical Union (AGU) marked its Centennial in 2019, the AGU’s Fall Meeting returned to San Francisco, CA, December 9-13, 2019, after a two-year hiatus due to renovations at the Moscone Center, the meeting’s traditional home. As they have done for more than a dozen years, NASA’s Science Support Office (SSO) staff organized and supported the NASA exhibit at the AGU Fall Meeting. With help from the NASA outreach community the exhibit space showcased the depth and breadth of NASA’s science activities.

The focal point of the exhibit experience continues to be the nine-screen Hyperwall. Sandra Cauffman [NASA Headquarters (HQ)—Acting Director of the Earth Science Division] provided opening remarks in front of the Hyperwall during the Centennial Opening Night Celebration and Ice Breaker held in the exhibit hall, Monday, December 9. She announced the release of NASA’s Earth at Night book, and shared important updates about NASA’s SMD and Earth Science Program. Alex Young [NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center (GSFC)—Associate Director of Science in the Heliophysics Science Division], Eleanor (Kellie) Stokes [GSFC/University of Maryland, College Park], Paula Bontempi [NASA HQ—Acting Deputy Director of the Earth Science Division], Kelsey Young [GSFC], and Nicola Fox [NASA HQ—Director of the Heliophysics Science Division] also gave Hyperwall talks on opening night, covering a variety of topics including heliophysics science from the Moon, Earth at night, Earth’s living ocean, the Artemis Program, and studying everything under the Sun, respectively.

The winners of the NASA-funded 2019 AGU Data Visualization and Storytelling Competition—a contest open to undergraduate and graduate students that focuses on innovation and creativity in presenting data to a larger audience in new, more easily accessible ways—were recognized at the NASA exhibit during the American Geophysical Union (AGU) Fall Meeting held in San Francisco, CA, December 2019. Thomas Zurbuchen [NASA HQ—Associate Administrator of SMD], Sandra Cauffman [NASA HQ—Acting Director of the Earth Science Division], and Paula Bontempi [NASA HQ—Acting Deputy Director of the Earth Science Division] joined representatives from AGU to introduce the winners of the competition. Having now completed its fourth year, the competition has been renamed the AGU Michael Freilich Student Visualization Competition Program, after past NASA Earth Science Director, Michael Freilich, who established the contest in partnership with the AGU. Freilich retired from NASA in February 2019. This is a collection of Hyperwall presentations given by the competition winners.