B612 Foundation Announces $2.3M in Leadership Gifts

B612 Foundation Announces $2.3M in Leadership Gifts

Press release from: B612 Foundation
Posted: Sunday, May 29, 2022

The B612 Foundation announced a new $1 million matching challenge grant from Tito’s Handmade Vodka and separated $1.3 million in gifts to further their efforts to build the Asteroid Discovery Analysis and Mapping (ADAM) cloud-based astrodynamics platform. The B612 Foundation and its core program, the Asteroid Institute, are committed to expanding humanity’s understanding of our solar system, including the discovery of asteroids and their orbits.

“We are humbled and inspired by the generosity of our funding partners. Their support over the years and into the future, along with Tito’s matching challenge, helps us scale our engineering team and expand our scientific, technical and educational partnerships,” said Danica Remy B612 Foundation, President and Chief Executive. “The Foundation has a three-year funding goal to raise an additional $4 million to advance the Asteroid Discovery Analysis and Mapping (ADAM) platform. These funds will enable ADAM to analyze historical and future data from Vera Rubin Observatory and its Legacy Survey of Space and Time (LSST), which will enable the discoveries and orbits of new asteroids.”

“The work of the Asteroid Institute and the continued development of the ADAM platform have been a testament to the support from us and many others who share our vision. We are proud to invest in the future expansion of the Asteroid Institute’s science and technology team,” said Broadcom’s US technology director, philanthropist and former CEO. Scott McGregor†

To unlock Tito’s Handmade Vodka Matching Challenge grant, B612 needs to raise an additional $1 million from backers. The Austin, Texas-based vodka company will match all donations made, up to $1 million, with a fundraising goal to receive those gifts by December 31, 2022. Tito’s encourages others to get involved and help achieve the campaign goal. These gifts will advance B612 and its Asteroid Institute. Go to Titus . to learn more about how a vodka company gets involved in asteroid discovery CHEERS site to learn more about Tito’s CHEERS program and other emerging research and science they support.

“It has been an honor for us at Google Cloud to partner with the Asteroid Institute and collaborate on future cloud-based astronomy breakthroughs,” said Massimo Mascaro, Distinguished Technical Director, Applied AI, Google Cloud. “New computational techniques are changing the way we use data and collect insights, enabling us to build new scientific discovery tools and we are excited to see what this will enable in the future.”

“Our family has been involved with B612 for over ten years. We are inspired by the transformative power of adding massive computations to telescopic data, bringing the potential for exponentially greater asteroid discoveries,” said philanthropist and business leader Laurie Girand† “This is just the beginning of completing a map of our solar system.”

Scott Manley, Internet Rocket Scientist, says: “B612 has always targeted Earth’s invisible neighbors in the solar system. The capabilities of the ADAM platform will demonstrate that ADAM can not only process the data stream from new telescopes, but also harvest discoveries from existing images that can yield new results thanks to advanced computational astronomy techniques. ADAM shows how managing, manipulating and merging new and old images will help us understand the importance of asteroids for our future.”

“B612 has led the way by educating global citizens about the dangers of asteroid impacts, and initiating national and international programs to assess the threat and find solutions. Now, those mighty new research tools are pouring tsunamis of data across the solar system. With this work from the Asteroid Institute, they are entering a new phase and developing smart ways to search everything and find the glittering rocks that could pose danger or opportunity,” said dr. David Brinscientist, speaker, technical consultant and world-renowned author.

B612s Founding Circle and Asteroid Circle members, along with anonymous major donors and thousands of individual donors from 46 countries, provide financial support to the Asteroid Institute’s astrodynamics as a service platform ADAM, which is used to discover asteroids and analyze their orbits. Google Cloud has enabled the current development and future work of the ADAM platform with generous Cloud credits and technical support. Tito’s Handmade Vodka has secured major funding, including today’s announcement of a $1 million matching grant challenge. A collaboration with The Explorer’s Club and voyages of discovery global platform helps fund and promote the research.

About B612 Foundation and Asteroid Institute

Asteroid Institute brings together scientists, researchers and engineers to develop tools and technologies to understand, map and navigate our solar system. The Asteroid Institute, a program of the B612 Foundation, uses advances in computer science, instrumentation and astronomy to find and track asteroids. Since 2002, the Foundation has supported research and technologies to enable the economic development of space and advance our understanding of the evolution of our solar system, in addition to supporting educational programs, including Asteroid Day. Founding Circle and Asteroid Circle members and individual donors from 46 countries provide financial support for the work. For more information visit B612foundation.org or follow on social: Twitter† facebook† YouTube and Instagram†

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Media contact
Danica Remy, chairperson
650-644-4539

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