We customize and deploy infrastructure and instruments to remote, under-sampled locations worldwide. FIDO field deployments collect data vital to developing a predictive understanding of complex biological, earth, and environmental systems including dynamic, physical, and biogeochemical processes required to systematically develop Earth System Models that integrate across the atmosphere, land masses, oceans, sea ice and subsurface.
For three decades, FIDO has customized and managed flexible laboratories with state-of-the-art instrument suites designed to operate in any environment—from Arctic cold to tropical heat—and for ship-borne and land-based measurement. The FIDO fixed and mobile research sites spanning every continent provide the world’s largest infrastructure to obtain global Earth system observations for atmospheric process models.
FIDO supports the U.S. Department of Energy’s (DOE) Atmospheric Radiation Measurement (ARM) scientific user facility and Los Alamos science initiatives. We also help the DOE NNSA Office of Defense Nonproliferation halt nuclear weapons proliferation and reduce the threat of nuclear and radiological terrorism globally.
CAPABILITIES INCLUDE
- Campaign management from conception to closure.
- Turnkey operations expertise.
- Customized mobile research facilities with extreme geographical and logistical constraints.
- Data collection of novel, high-value observations from under-sampled regions.
- Supporting nuclear treaty verification.
- Expertise utilizing cutting-edge instruments to detect climate signatures.
- International logistics expertise and project management.
- Global collaboration and partnership development.
PRIMARY EXPERTISE
- Designing mobile laboratories customized to operate in severe environments including portable shelters, instrument suites, communications equipment and data systems.
- Building partnerships with domestic and foreign universities, research organizations, government agencies and industry.
- Managing mobile and fixed research facilities to collect, process, and distribute continuous climate- and atmospheric-process measurements from high-value locations.
- Utilizing cutting-edge data collection methods by coordinating university mentors, principle investigators and on-site technicians to manage optimal instrument operations.
- Selecting optimal sites for field campaigns in remote and under-sampled regions.
- Capturing high-value information: more than one petabyte of data sets distributed freely worldwide within 24-48 hours of collection and processing.
FIELD CAMPAIGN PROCESS
With the unique objectives of each field campaign in mind, FIDO facilitates the campaign lifecycle based on the following six phases:
Identifying opportunities for global cooperation and partnerships, relationship building and proposal management.
Infrastructure development and implementation, local contract hiring, OSHA compliance, engineering and design, contracts and procurement and foreign country regulatory compliance.
Global site selection, budget estimation, risk analysis, contingency planning, local resources identification and international project liaison work.
Instrument integration and commissioning, technical implementation and state-side mentor support coordination.
Management and technical support, equipment inventory control, operation software tools development, services and supplies management and equipment maintenance coordination.
Comprehensive management, rapid and efficient deployment solutions, logistic management, data availability and reliability assurance.
RECENT MAJOR PROJECTS
Manage ARM’s Eastern North Atlantic fixed facility: providing rare, long-term data sets about the response of marine clouds to greenhouse gases and aerosols—a major source of uncertainty in global and regional climate models.
Manage ARM’s Mobile Facility One and Mobile Facility Two. Recent campaigns:
- Multidisciplinary Drifting Observatory for the Study of Arctic Climate (MOSAIC), Marine Deployment, 2019-20: Intensive icebreaker-based observatory frozen in and drifting with Arctic sea ice for full annual cycle taking atmosphere, ocean, and biosphere measurements in crucial climate regime. Major international collaboration. World's longest, largest Arctic research expedition.
- Cold-Air Outbreaks in the Marine Boundary Layer Experiment (COMBLE), Norway, 2020: Collected comprehensive dataset measuring the dynamics and properties of clouds and precipitation in the high-latitude marine boundary over open water in the Arctic.
- TRacking Aerosol Convection interactions ExpeRiment (TRACER) Houston, Texas, 2021- 2022: Scientists using the first ARM Mobile Facility (AMF1), the second-generation C-Band Scanning ARM Precipitation Radar (CSAPR2), and a small satellite (ancillary) site with radiosonde and aerosol measurements to learn more about cloud and aerosol interactions in the deep convection over a coastal metropolis.
Current and Upcoming Campaigns
- Surface Atmosphere Integrated Field Laboratory (SAIL), Crested Butte, Colorado, 2021-23: Quantify and characterize the atmospheric processes that are relevant to mountainous hydrology in midlatitude continental interior locations. World-leading atmosphere-through-bedrock observations to inform mountainous hydrological research. Co-located AMF2 with existing surface and subsurface measurements as part of the Watershed Function Scientific Focus Area (SFA) in the East River Watershed.
Image: SAIL campaign - Eastern Pacific Cloud Aerosol Precipitation Experiment (EPCAPE) La Jolla, California, 2023-2024: The large dynamic range of aerosol particle concentrations combined with the multi-hour to multi-day persistence of stratocumulus cloud layers in polluted coastal region makes the site ideal for investigating the seasonal changes in cloud and aerosol properties as well as the quantitative relationships between cloud and aerosol properties.
Image: EPCAPE pier image - Cloud And Precipitation Experiment at Kennaook (CAPE-K), Tasmania, 2024-2025: The remote Southern Ocean is an area of great interest to atmospheric scientists because of its influence on global atmospheric and oceanic circulation. Detailed measurements of clouds and precipitation in the marine boundary layer are lacking. With less influence from aerosols produced by human activities than most areas on Earth, the region provides a view into preindustrial conditions.