INPE - 2002

• The new cooperation agreement between Brazil and China is signed to develop CBERS-3 and CBERS-4.
• Inauguration of the Reverberating Acoustic Chamber for vibrant-acoustic tests on large equipment, at Integration and Test Laboratory premises.
• The Brazilian Humidity Sounder Instrument (HSB) is launched aboard NASA's Aqua satellite.
• First sprites record in Brazil.
• First Brazilian lightning incidence map based on data from surface and satellite.
• The supercomputer NEC SX-6 starts to work.
• INPE celebrates twenty years of activity in Antarctica.
• Installation of LISN (Low-Latitude Ionospheric Sensor Network) for simultaneous measurements of scintillation and ionospheric total electronic content using GPS signals. INPE and Boston College/USA with NSF (National Science Foundation) support were in the project.
• Installation of the first Latin American radar to study ionospheric bubbles. FCI radar (FAPESP-Clemson-INPE) is the result of a project supported by FAPESP (Research Support Foundation of São Paulo) and a partnership between INPE and Clemson University, USA.
• COPEX experiment for ionospheric bubbles studies and their seeders sources. It was collaboration between INPE, universities, and research centers in U. S. and Brazil.
• A new technique for growing thin films of diamond-like carbon (DLC) to use with solid lubricant in space and industrial applications is developed.

  Worldwide

On February 20^th (20/02/2002), it is registered a rare mathematician occurrence, a palindrome minute, at 20:02.