Dr. Kristina Collins KD8OXT, Dr. Nathaniel Frissell W2NAF, Angel Vasquez WP3R, and Tim Duffy K3LR
Honored By the Radio Club of America at Upcoming Symposium

The Radio Club of America (RCA) has recently announced that Dr. Kristina Collins KD8OXT will be receiving the Carole E. Perry Young Professional award at its upcoming annual banquet. Collins is currently an electrical engineering researcher at the Space Science Institute. She is also active in HamSCI, as the Chief Operations Scientist for the HamSCI Personal Space Weather Station (PSWS) project, organizing pilot experiments for distributed ionospheric sensing, including the HamSCI Eclipse Festivals of Frequency Measurement.  She is also managing the WWV/WWVH Scientific Modulation Working Group, to add scientifically valuable modulations to WWV and WWVH. See hamsci.org/wwv. 

HamSCI has been further honored as the club has announced that Dr. Nathaniel Frissell W2NAF and Angel Vasquez WP3R are being elevated to RCA Fellows. Longtime HamSCI supporter and HamSCI Personal Space Weather Station Host Tim Duffy K3LR will be receiving the Edgar F. Johnson Pioneer Citation at the same time. Dr. Collins, Dr. Frissell, and Diego Sanchez will also be presenting at the RCA Technical Symposium. Collins will be presenting “The Lion in the (Propagation) Path and Frissell and Sanchez will presenting “HamSCI and an Investigation of Large Scale Traveling Ionospheric Disturbances Using Amateur Radio Data”.

The RCA Technical Symposium and Awards Banquet will be held on Saturday, November 22, 2025, at the Hyatt Regency on Capitol Hill in Washington, DC.

The RCA was formed when a group of teenaged radio experimenters gathered on January 2, 1909 for the first meeting of the Junior Wireless Club. The meeting at the Ansonia Hotel in New York City was organized by E. Lilian Todd, a local inventor who was also the first female airplane designer who wanted to encourage “tinkering and experimentation”

RCA’s Mission: The promotion of cooperation among those interested in scientific investigation in the art of Radio Communication.

RCA’s Vision:  Wireless is the ubiquitous invisible thread that ties together social, business, government, and international communications.  Modern society cannot function without it.   Therefore advancements in wireless science and art must be encouraged in order to improve society for all.

ARDC (Amateur Radio Digital Communications) has announced their 2026 funding priorities along with the deadline for grant applications (1-Feb-2026).

As members of the HamSCI and amateur radio communities may already be aware, the mission of Amateur Radio Digital Communications (ARDC) is to support, promote, and enhance digital communication and broader communication science and technology, to promote Amateur Radio, scientific research, experimentation, education, development, open access, and innovation in information and communication technology.

Further, ARDC is a foundation that funds projects which advance Amateur Radio (AR), Digital Communications (DC), and related technologies. HamSCI's research efforts have greatly benefited from their giving, as a number of projects, activities and individuals have benefitted from ARDC grants in recent years.

This link describes ARDC's funding priorities, which were introduced earlier in 2025: ardc.net/apply/priority-areas-for-funding/

ARDC is especially interested in projects that align with these three areas:

• Research and Development: Open hardware and software systems that enable learning and experimentation (e.g. SDRs, open codec technologies, new modulation techniques).

• Space-Based Communications: Projects that create or expand access to satellite communications for amateur radio (AR) and digital communications (DC), engaging communities in wireless experimentation (e.g. GEO or HEO programs, repurposed commercial satellites, space-based tools for learning).

• Open Source Education: Scalable, open educational materials and hands-on projects that make AR and DC more accessible, especially for new learners and clubs (e.g. curricula, videos).

While ARDC welcomes proposals across the full range of Amateur Radio and Digital Communications, projects that align with these areas remain a priority in their grantmaking decisions.

The ARDC website fully describes their mission and values, the people behind the organization, priorities, scholarships and the grant application process.

HamSCI made its first ever appearance at the 2025 HamCon Colorado/ARRL Rocky Mountain Division Convention, held 24-26 October, in Grand Junction, Colorado.

HamSCI had a table in the vendor/club room, passing out materials including Meteor Scatter QSO Party (MSQP) flyers, MSQP business cards, three editions of HamSCI newsletters, and business cards inviting people to join HamSCI as citizen scientist volunteers.  HamSCI brought posters describing various projects, such as the Contesting/DX Dashboard, the Meteor Scatter QSO Party and the Ground Magnetometer.  The latter generated a lot of interest - perhaps appealing to the technical nature and natural science curiosity of many attendees.  Staffing was provided by three HamSCI members (AF8A, W0DAS, KF7ZN) and KF7ZN's wife, Gaylene.

We were fortunate to have the WWV ARC (Ft. Collins, CO) table right next to us, staffed by Dave Swartz, W0DAS.  Of course, NIST time and frequency standard station WWV is key to many of our research efforts, and Dave has been instrumental in  providing/installing HamSCI research equipment and coordinating efforts with the technical staff at WWV.  Some attendees went home with unique bumper stickers (“I Set My Clocks to WWV”), that are sure to attract interest from local hams and time/frequency enthusiasts. 

HamCon is a forum-oriented event, rather than the flea market/commercial vendor focus of most regional ham radio gatherings.  This year’s HamCon was true to form, with well over 50 hour-long forums on Friday and Saturday.  HamSCI members filled multiple time slots with topics including the HamSCI Personal Space Weather Station (Gary Mikitin, AF8A), WWV’s First Century (Dave Swartz, W0DAS), The Early Days of Ham Radio & DX’ing (Ron Wilcox, KF7ZN) and The Ionosphere (Ron Wilcox).  Other HamSCI members including Bill Mader, K8TE and Doug Leber, N0MM were also on the presentation schedule.

HamSCI hopes to have many stations participate in the upcoming (12-13 December, 2025) Meteor Scatter QSO Party.  As with any astronomic activity (especially one that peaks over just a 1 to 2 day period) it helps to be prepared.  HamSCI suggests that future MSQP participants practice making QSOs and/or receiving pings from the meteoroids entering the Earth's atmosphere.  Three upcoming showers/practice opportunities are listed the table below.

Aside from participants gaining confidence in their antenna, receiver and software, the data collected prior to the MSQP will have scientific value.  HamSCI fully welcomes and encourages those making meter scatter (MS) QSOs, or those who choose to operate receive-only during these events, to submit their data, in the form of WAV files, to HamSCI's data repository at zenodo.org. Complete instructions are available at the MSQP GitHub Site.

Note:  There is no need for a separate submission form, as there won't be any scoring of entries for dates other than the official MSQP period (12-13 December, 2025).  Questions are welcome at the HamSCI mailbox.

Lastly, don't forget about the resources available to MS ops, rookie to expert:  

• The Ping Jockey Central website is a real-time messaging tool, where friendly MS ops share tips regarding what they are working, when and where.  Simply reading the live comments can point you in the right direction, on the right bands, whenever meteor showers are active.
• The weekly HamSCIence telecon offers an open net-type roundtable where questions are welcome (details are on the HamSCI Get Involved page) (the second Thursdays of each month are generally reserved for presentations, roundtables may not be possible on those days).
• HamSCI's 'How-to' MSQP page

Meteor Showers for Remainder of 2025

The following meteor showers from the American Meteor Society website may be useful for testing your equipment and data collection and upload procedures for the HamSCI Meteor Scatter QSO Party prior to the Geminids (also listed). The zenithal hourly rates (ZHRs) are small but may provide useful rates. Testing using sporadic meteors especially during the diurnal peak around sunrise each morning is also appropriate but the population index, r, for showers indicates a slightly higher probability of larger meteoroids which may be useful for testing. 

Further Information (Thanks to Rob, NN4NT, for all of the information on this page)

The full list of large meteor showers (Class I) as well as the smaller Class II shower list are available at https://www.amsmeteors.org/meteor-showers/2020-meteor-shower-list/ 

A nice graphic of the Comet Halley material responsible for the Orionids and Eta Acquarids is available at https://www.amsmeteors.org/meteor-showers/meteor-shower-calendar/ You may want to click “View Other Showers and Learn More” to see animations for other showers. 

You may check the current activity levels as measured by the Canadian Meteor Orbit Radar near London, Ontario at https://fireballs.ndc.nasa.gov/ Click on “Radar” on the menu at left. 

HamSCI was well represented at the 2025 Northeast HamXposition, held 21-24 August, in Marlborough (Boston), Massachusetts. Our booth attracted many visitors armed with questions and a strong fascination for what we do. The booth featured working GRAPE receivers of various 'flavors' (GRAPE 1, GRAPE 1 DRF and GRAPE 2), a live display of the new SDR PSWS installation at K3LR plus an array of posters highlighting both past and active experiments.  Overall awareness of our HamSCI efforts appears to be getting better and better!

Dr. Nathaniel Frissell W2NAF was the keynote speaker at the HamX banquet and provided a comprehensive overview of the origins of the group, our past and current experiments such as the SEQP and MSQP and a look into the future.

HamSCI volunteers accompanying Frissell to Marlborough were Bill Blackwell AB1XB, Bob Reif W1XP, Stan Pozerski KD1LE, Mindy Hull KM1NDY and Ed  Efchak WX2R.

The full list of HamSCI speakers and their talks:

A Successful Field Exercise

HamSCI just completed its first ever multi-day field exercise, where two components of the Personal Space Weather Station (PSWS) were successfully installed at the world-class ham station K3LR in West Middlesex, PA.  Students, professors, research associates and community volunteers were hosted for four days by station owner Tim Duffy, K3LR.

The field exercise had three goals:  a) installation of a PSWS ground magnetometer and a WSPR Daemon/RX888 wide band SDR and an active antenna; b) exposure to ham radio and practical applications of the applied physics which make HF communication possible; c) a chance for all attendees, including invited members of the ham community from western PA and eastern Ohio, to enjoy Tim’s special brand of hospitality, including an afternoon operating the K3LR station.

Timeline of Events

Much of the installation work and computer setup was done on Monday evening and Tuesday morning, including assembly of a DX Engineering active vertical receive antenna, insertion of an 8-foot ground rod/antenna mounting point, digging a hole for, and then burying the HamSCI/TAPR designed ground magnetometer (built prior to arrival at Scranton), followed by laying cables between the equipment and the building housing the equipment.

It was “show time” on Tuesday afternoon, when the RX888 spectrum display was fired up.  That effort included a Zoom session with HamSCI “spectrum consultant” Rob Robinette, AI6VN.  Rob declared the 1-30 MHz spectrum at K3LR, as displayed on the WSPR Daemon/RX888’s waterfall display, to be very clean, with a good opportunity to be one of the top spotters, worldwide, of WSPR signals.  This came as little surprise to K3LR, as Tim has spent nearly 40 years perfecting his station, studying the surrounding topography (which, he explained, can greatly influence HF signal paths) and doggedly pursuing and removing every RF noise source in the immediate area.    More distant sources, impossible to disable (i.e. commercial AM broadcasters) are well known to Tim, and sure enough, they and their mixing products were observed on the HamSCI equipment.  Some tuning and tweaking of the RX888 bandwidth, along with a judicious choice of input filters, left the RX888 happily receiving WSPR and FT8 spots numbering in the hundreds per hour.

Wednesday morning was a two-hour tour of the K3LR antenna farm, with detailed explanations of what, why and how nearly every system functioned.  It took two hours because K3LR has 14 towers, 50+ antenna systems (including band-dedicated receiving systems) all designed to eke out every last 0.1 dB of signal when working stations in Europe, Asia and the rest of the globe.  The adjective ‘impressive’ doesn’t do it all justice. Consider that two of the towers, each over 200 feet tall, are on aviation maps, painted and lighted to comply with FAA regulations.

Beyond the Work

The week wasn’t all work and no play.  Tim and a CWRU alum supplied all the afternoon and evening meals, set up under a large tent, next to the ‘DX Barn’ where some of the male participants overnighted. (The females had a nearby house to themselves). Local caterer Guy Gibbs cooked up piles of chicken, corn on the cob, hamburgers, salads, veggie dishes and all the fixings.  Tim and co-host Amy, N8AMY, topped that all with servings of locally made apple pie on Thursday evening.  Tim’s friends from the local area, schools and colleges joined the HamSCI bunch to swap operating stories and to discuss HamSCI’s research efforts, mixed with the nerdy banter always heard at ham radio-centric events.   

Tim’s hospitality extended to his award-winning ham station, where he invited all in for a tour and operating session.  The most recently licensed hams in the group were given seats on four different bands, and paired up with experienced ops in case of questions - and to keep things legal - FCC rules, you know ;-) Over 400 QSOs (contacts) were made on 10, 15, 20 and 40 meters, domestic and DX QSOs with New Zealand, Australia, England, to name a few.  Often the stations we worked told us “you are the only signal on the band” and “thanks for the past contest QSOs”.  Tim has millions of contacts in his log, going back to 1972, from one of the best known callsigns in the world.  Tim credits the success of his station to uncompromising engineering, meticulous maintenance, and a crew of operators dedicated to being the best at what they do.  (One particular operating highlight was the brand-new ham we met on 10 meters - it was his very first ham radio contact - and he emailed Tim right afterwards to thank him).

There were other events, almost too numerous to mention.  A Monday evening dinner at the local country club, Wednesday evening presentations on HamSCI research topics, N8AMY’s special hot dogs and onions, magnetometer calibration and alignment, breakfasts at the local diner.  Perhaps we can reconvene at Tim’s place next year, bringing along another generation of new hams, ready for deep immersion into the wonders of ham radio.

A Hearty Thank You 

In summary, a hearty thanks to all who participated, a most enjoyable four days, and we can’t say enough about the support and enthusiasm from station designer/builder/operator Tim Duffy K3LR, and the company he runs, DX Engineering.  DXE is a longtime supporter of HamSCI, and we thank them for providing supplies and expertise, helping make the field work highly successful.  We are looking forward to gigabytes of data being generated from West Middlesex, PA!

Photos courtesy of Nathaniel Frissell W2NAF (University of Scranton, HamSCI Lead), Gary Mikitin AF8A (author), Harry Bloomberg W3YJ (University of Pittsburgh)

Dr. Nathaniel Frissell, W2NAF, can be seen discussing the field work event on the Q5 Worldwide Ham Radio YouTube podcast, recorded in August, 2025.

Tim Duffy, K3LR, is inviting the HamSCI community, including local schools and colleges, to a BBQ Picnic and HamSCI Meet & Greet on Wednesday, August 6th (1200 local time) at Tim's QTH in West Middlesex, PA.  (RSVP required)

The BBQ picnic is part of a multi-day field work event for HamSCI, where HamSCI students, researchers, and ham radio community volunteers will be installing, configuring and validating a Personal Space Weather Station (hamsci.org/psws) at K3LR.  Expected are teams from the U of Scranton, Case Western Reserve and NJIT.  Most of the work should be done by noon or so on Wednesday, so that’s a good time to share a meal while meeting others interested in radio wave propagation, space weather, ionospheric physics, contesting, DXing - and how ham radio plays a major role in HamSCI’s research activities.  Plus, it is an opportunity to tour K3LR, one of the best equipped amateur radio stations in the world. RSVP details are below.   

If Tim's name and callsign sound familiar...

• K3LR is known around the world as a top-tier contesting station, hosting dozens of events throughout the years, winning countless domestic and DX contest awards
•  Tim is CEO of DXEngineering, a premier supplier of amateur radio equipment, and a long time supporter of HamSCI

Particularly welcome are local college and high school students, including:

• Carnegie Mellon
• Grove City College
• Penn State 
• University of Pittsburgh
• Harborcreek High School 
• Case Western Reserve
• University of Scranton
• New Jersey Institute of Technology

31 July 2025: Registration has closed...thanks to all who signed up and who will be attending!

Gary Mikitin, AF8A
HamSCI Amateur Radio Community Coordinator

A large HamSCI-led team recently made a field trip to Jenny Jump State Forest (NJ), surveying the United Astronomy Clubs of New Jersey (UACNJ) site.  It is located on a rustic, park-like property, where the UACNJ hosts scientific instruments from many US-based institutions, including the New Jersey Institute of Technology (NJIT) and HamSCI. The trip’s primary goals:

1) Assess maintenance needs of the existing Personal Space Weather Station (PSWS) equipment

2) Develop a plan for upgrading to the current generation of PSWS (DASI Track 2)

The findings were mostly positive:  The HF receive antennas (a DXEngineering active vertical and a DXE receive loop) are generally in good condition, though animals have done some damage to cabling.  The Reverse Beacon Network (RBN) receiver is currently off-line, in need of attention.

As for the PSWS/DASI2 upgrade, plans were made for summer ‘work parties’ to replace computers, install an RX888-based HamSCI HF Receiver, re-site the HamSCI ground magnetometer, and install a new VLF receiver/signal processor.  Additionally, the RBN Rx will be brought back on-line and cables repaired as needed.  Much of the work will be done by members of the amateur radio clubs from NJIT (K2MFF) and the University of Scranton (W3USR).

The trio of PSWS instruments (GRAPE Rx, VLF Rx and magnetometer) represents the next generation of PSWS.  It will be one of approximately 30 such systems to be deployed in 2025/2026.   Collectively, the systems will form a space weather data collection network, the first of its kind to simultaneously monitor HF (shortwave), VLF (~8 kHz) and the Earth’s magnetic field.  Using data collected by the Network, HamSCI researchers hope to gain a better understanding of the local, regional, and global scale processes that influence the ionosphere.  This may lead to improved propagation predictions, new tools to predict radio wave behavior during solar storms, and, perhaps, new insights regarding solar cycles and other heliophysical phenomena.

All efforts at this site, from planning to equipment construction, configuration and installation is a collaboration between the University of Scranton and NJIT.  Conveniently, the site is located exactly halfway between the two schools.  Beyond station implementation, the schools partner on data collection, data analysis and research efforts. 

Photos courtesy of Ann Marie Rogalcheck-Frissell and Nathaniel Frissell