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Ed Yeates ReportingNASA is focusing a whole fleet of satellites to track alien invaders from space. In fact, the system, dubbed the "Invasive Species Forecasting System," is sort of the Space Agency's own version of Homeland Security.
Those satellites up there have a keen eye for something that's already invading Utah and many other western states, and it's not on two legs.
As its first target, the Invasive Species Forecasting System is zeroing not on little green men, but a big green moving mass called Tamarisk. On river banks and waterways, it's taking over, sucking up all the water with deep tap roots, pushing out native plants.
We talked to NASA scientist Jeff Morisette via satellite.
Jeff Morisette, NASA Scientist: "It also takes up salt from the soil, and that, by transferring salt to leaves, makes a crust on the soil which is okay for tamarisk, but inhospitable to other plants. And so it really comes in and takes over."
Taking over it is! Satellites will forecast the spread of this homebound alien as its seasonal pods - 500-thousand per plant - drift on the wind.
Jeff Morisette: "By mapping the habitat where it can grow, we can look at areas where it's not yet a problem. But we can predict it would be if introduced there, and sort of guard against that invasion."
It's not just Tamarisk. The network, sweeping the globe, will look for other invaders as well. Its cameras are getting more precise with each passing day.
Jeff Morisette: "We can bring in different satellite assets that can get down to the size of an infield - the size of a baseball infield - or even smaller, one meter, about the width of a car."
It can track places, no matter how obscure, where West Nile carrying mosquitoes breed. It will also keep an eye on the pattern and migration of other insects which come and go, depending on selected seasons.
Jeff Morisette: "Where it was at time 'A' and time 'B', and predict where it might go in time 'C'."
This is NASA's new forecasting weapon to catch invaders in the act, as Morisette says, to map the moving pulse of the planet.
