Tufts-designed sonic anemometer set to circumnavigate the globe via balloon

May 20, 2025

Due to power problems in the main balloon, the NASA team decided to bring the system down early to prevent it from being lost in the ocean. The Tufts instrument performed successfully throughout the flight and provided data every 20 minutes via Iridium. 

May 6, 2025

Taking flight on Saturday from Wanaka, New Zealand, a NASA/Columbia Scientific Ballooning Facility balloon carrying a Tufts-designed and built sonic anemometer began its journey to circumnavigate the globe. Over the past year, Tufts has flown earlier prototypes of the hardware  from New Mexico and Antarctica respectively under the direction of Associate Professor Rob White of the Department of Mechanical Engineering. The most recent launch was the team’s most ambitious yet, involving a complete journey around the Earth.

The balloon will spend several weeks in the air. While the researchers have only limited, safety-related control over the balloon after it’s released, they will be able to track its movements thanks to a satellite network. Mechanical engineering undergraduate Elias Bilal, E26, built a tracking website and developed backend code to receive and display the live balloon data. The group will collaborate with atmospheric scientists to process the data they receive.

As it travels, the anemometer will collect high-resolution 3D relative wind data. Typically balloon measurement data only tracks the average motion of the balloon itself, which cannot measure fast turbulent wind structures, and gusts, as well as variation between the balloon itself and the gondola, which may be hanging 200 feet below the balloon at a different altitude. With faster update rates and high resolution, the technology has the potential to measure winds at various altitudes within the flight train to support platform stabilization and improve balloon navigation, as well as conduct atmospheric science.

The team’s primary goal at this stage is to refine the technology of stratospheric ultrasonic anemometers, but their work holds promise for a range of scientific applications. Beyond improving balloon navigation, measuring the fluctuating winds around the balloon may carry key insights into events such as earthquakes, eruptions, or deep ocean waves happening far away. Enhanced wind measurement technology could make balloons a more effective option for remote sensing. The balloons could use infrasound techniques to gather information about these events from afar and supplement ground based measurement systems, which primarily rely on seismic, rather than atmospheric, vibrations.

After the flight, the team will review the anemometer’s performance in the air to improve the technology before another launch in August. In the fall, they will travel to Denmark to further test their models in a Mars Simulation Wind Tunnel. By the end of the year, White plans to deliver their best ultrasonic anemometers to the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA). White has also previously worked with NASA on several projects, including helping develop a sonic anemometer for Mars, and spending a six-month sabbatical in the aerophysics branch at NASA Ames Research Center where he tested Tufts-built MEMS shear sensors and microphone arrays in aerodynamic wind tunnels at the fluid mechanics lab.

“I am very excited for these flights, the science data we will generate, and look forward to continuing to develop this technology for high altitude wind measurement, high altitude navigation, and planetary science,” shares White.

White joined Tufts in 2005 and runs the Microscale Sensors and Systems Lab, which works at the intersection of micro- and nano-scale devices, acoustics, sensors, and aerophysics. Current research focuses on acoustic MEMS in harsh environments including the Martian surface, planetary atmospheres, including Earth’s stratosphere, cryogenic fluids, and the deep ocean. He is also the founding director of the Tufts Micro- and Nano-Fabrication Facility, which makes micro- and nano- fabrication tools available to the Tufts community.

Track the balloon’s journey with NASA

Track the balloon’s journey and see live data feeds from White’s lab dashboard.

Research reported in this article is funded by NASA, “Sonic Anemometry on Stratospheric Balloons” (NASA-80NSSC23K0185)