Landsat satellite image of land in Saudi Arabia, with green circular irrigated farm fields.

Artificial Intelligence for Science

The Office of the Chief Science Data Officer (OCSDO) within NASA's Science Mission Directorate (SMD) researches how AI can help people use NASA's science data more effectively. Current projects include AI foundation models, which are trained on vast amounts of data and can be adapted to specific science studies with minimal resources, and large language models for enhancing different steps of research and data lifecycles.

ai for science data Strategy

5

AI foundation models

1

Large language model

AI for Science Focus Areas

  1. 01

    Prediction and Forecasting

    Develop data driven predictive modeling and simulation to allow scientists to forecast phenomena such as weather, space weather, and cosmic events.

  2. 02

    Open Science

    Streamline scientific workflows by improving data search, discovery, analysis, and visualization, thus enhancing research efficiency and promoting open science practices.

  3. 03

    Collaboration Across Sciences

    Facilitate broader scientific collaboration by integrating and analyzing data from diverse sources and missions, and overcome siloed mission science to move towards systems science.

  4. 04

    Infrastructure

    Establish and maintain a secure, scalable AI infrastructure to support model development and deployment within NASA's operational systems.

AI for Science Stories

Learn about the latest AI research for making the most of science data.

All AI at NASA Stories
A light blue circular graphic identifier, which contains stars, a satellite, and a DNA strand. A jagged graph line cutting through the middle of the circle represents NASA science data. Everything lies on a dark blue background.

OCSDO Releases Year in Review 2024 Newsletter

The Office of the Chief Science Data Officer (OCSDO) shared its annual accomplishments in promoting NASA science data discovery and innovation.

Read Year in Review
A false-color image of the East Peak fire burning in southern Colorado near Trinidad, captured by the Operational Land Imager on the Landsat 8 satellite. Dark green forests and light green grasslands cover most of the image, but a red patch in the middle represents a burn scar, and some orange spots around it represent actively burning areas.

Expanded AI Model with Global Data Enhances Earth Science Applications 

NASA and collaborators openly released an expanded version of an AI foundation model that can track land use, monitor disasters, and predict crop yields. 

Read Article
An image of Earth from space showing the swirling clouds of a hurricane forming over the ocean with a robotic arm extending from the International Space Station.

NASA AI, Open Science Advance Natural Disaster Research and Recovery

NASA's artificial intelligence weather models and open data practices help researchers monitor hurricanes and other disasters.

Read Article
Members of the NASA Impact and IBM Research teams accept their certificate after winning the NASA Marshall Group Achievement Award.

Geospatial AI Foundation Model Team Receives NASA Marshall Group Achievement Award

A team of researchers from NASA and IBM received recognition for their work on an open-source AI geospatial foundation model for Earth scientists.

Read Article

Artificial Intelligence Science Data Projects

  • Prithvi Geospatial Foundation Model

    Pre-trained on Harmonized Landsat and Sentinel-2 (HLS) satellite data, the Prithvi Geospatial Foundation Model helps Earth science researchers conduct AI-powered studies such as flood mapping, fire-scar identification, and crop classification. The model is released openly on the Hugging Face platform.

    Access the Model

  • Prithvi Weather and Climate Foundation Model

    The Prithvi Weather-Climate Foundation Model enables Earth science projects like hurricane tracking, severe weather risk mapping, and renewable energy forecasting. It is pre-trained on Modern-Era Retrospective analysis for Research and Applications, Version 2 (MERRA2) satellite data. The model is released openly on the Hugging Face platform.

    Access the Model

  • INDUS Large Language Models

    Named for the southern sky constellation, INDUS (stylized in all caps) is a suite of large language models tailored for astrophysics, biological and physical sciences, Earth science, heliophysics, and planetary science. The model is released openly on the Hugging Face platform.

    Access the Model

Ethical AI

Ethics in AI for Science

NASA's Science Mission Directorate collaborated with the American Geophysical Union (AGU) to create a playbook for the safe, open, inclusive use of AI in science.

Learn More
A close-in, face-on view of a spiral galaxy. It has two large arms that curve outward from the round, bright, central region to nearly the corners of the image. Channels of dark reddish dust that blocks light line the arms while bright pink, glowing points denote where stars are forming. Beyond its prominent spiral arms, the galaxy’s oval disk is generally cloudy in form and speckled with stars. A black background is visible behind it.
AI has helped NASA find new star clusters and exoplanets, predict solar flares, and imagine new ways to protect human health in space.
ESA/Hubble & NASA, F. Belfiore, J. Lee and the PHANGS-HST Team

AI for Science Reports, Documents, and Papers

NASA SMD AI Workshop 2024 Report

Dec 19, 2024

pdf (380.83 KB)

NASA SMD AI Workshop 2023 Report

Oct 3, 2023

pdf (1.01 MB)

NASA SMD AI Workshop 2021 Report

Apr 24, 2023

pdf (9.27 MB)

nasa science mission directorate

Office of the Chief Science Data Officer

The Office of the Chief Science Data Officer (OCSDO) within NASA's Science Mission Directorate (SMD) facilitates AI for science data through its Data Science and Innovation program.

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A light blue circular graphic identifier, which contains stars, a satellite, and a DNA strand. A jagged graph line cutting through the middle of the circle represents NASA science data. Everything lies on a dark blue background.

OCSDO Data Science and Innovation Contact

  • Portrait of Matt McClure, who stands in front of a light background wearing a plaid shirt and black suit jacket.

    Matt McClure

    Data Science and Innovation Lead, OCSDO

Explore More AI at NASA

NASA uses artificial intelligence for a wide variety of applications to plan missions, analyze science data, and explore our universe.

Learn More
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Keep Exploring

Discover More Topics From NASA

Open Science at NASA

Mars Perseverance Rover

Climate Change

Science crew members retrieve a canister from melt ponds on the Arctic Ocean.

Solar Storms and Flares

A close-up portion of the Sun appears in shades of yellow, brown, and white. A bright white burst of light, a solar flare, appears in the upper right.