NASA and South Korea have forged a partnership to develop a study plan for air quality assessments as part of an effort to monitor air pollution with the use of aircraft, ground systems and satellites.

The research team will conduct the field study in May and June to test the quality of air in urban, rural and coastal areas of South Korea under the Korea U.S.-Air Quality program meant to build ground and space sensors and computer models for air quality evaluation, NASA said Thursday.

“KORUS-AQ is a step forward in an international effort to develop a global air quality observing system,” said James Crawford, a lead U.S. scientist on the project from NASA’s Langley Research Center.

“Both of our countries will be launching geostationary satellites that will join other satellites in a system that includes surface networks, air quality models, and targeted airborne sampling,” Crawford added.

NASA will fly the DC-8 flying laboratory to measure atmospheric data and the Hanseo King Air will fly overhead with remote-sensing instruments to make separate measurements in areas less accessible to DC-8.

Korean scientists will then gather ground and air observations with the King Air aircraft under an agreement NASA and South Korea’s National Institute of Environmental Research recently inked.

Researchers from the National Institute of Standards and Technology, Institute for Bioscience and Biotechnology Research and Johns Hopkins School of Medicine have tested a new method to detect Lyme disease at the earliest stage of infection.

The team performed the tests on serum samples derived from three patients with undetected Lyme disease at the first visit of a doctor and diagnosed all patients with small amounts of the target protein, NIST said Feb. 11.

“Our hypothesis was that Lyme bacteria shed vesicle-like particles or fragments derived from the cell wall of the bacteria circulating in the serum of individuals,” said Larik Turko, NIST research chemist.

“These particles would contain membrane proteins that can be detected to provide a unique indicator of infection.”

NIST said the collaborators determined Lyme infection on two patients simultaneously with the experimental method and standard blood tests, while the disease was detected on the other patient with the experimental method three weeks before they confirmed the infection using the standard tests.

The team published the results of its study in an issue of Analytical Chemistry.

The General Services Administration‘s 18F unit wants to expand its consulting and acquisition services in efforts to forge partnerships with federal agencies to support grants for state and local digital services programs.

Under the expanded practice, 18F plans to offer agile and modular design to federal agencies that provide grants to technology programs in the local and state levels, GSA said Tuesday.

Robin Carnahan, former Missouri state secretary, will lead the new state and local government practice at 18F.

“Federal agencies already provide millions of dollars each year to fund state and local government technology projects,” said Denise Turner Roth, GSA administrator.

“Now even more Americans will benefit from the world-class expertise at 18F, while partnering with federal agencies that provide grants to state and local programs allows GSA to help stretch those dollars even further.”

The new practice builds on 18F’s pilot project to help upgrade California’s child welfare system in 2015 in coordination with the Department of Health and Human Services and the California Department of Social Services.