N. Korea satellite appears dead: scientist

Washington (AFP) Dec 17, 2012
A satellite launched with fanfare last week by a defiant North Korea appears to be dead as no signal can be detected, a US-based astrophysicist who monitors spaceflights said Monday.
The United States and its Asian allies have acknowledged that North Korea succeeded Wednesday in putting an object into orbit that the communist state said was observing the Earth and airing patriotic songs.
Jonathan McDowell of the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics said that the satellite was clearly in orbit but that no songs could be heard.
"To the best of our knowledge, the satellite isn't operating," he said.
"It's definitely up there and it's whizzing around, but it's just not feeling very well."
McDowell said it was unclear whether the satellite -- called the Kwangmyongsong-3 -- worked initially and that it remained possible that it was transmitting at a level too faint for detection.
But in another sign of trouble, McDowell said that the satellite was fluctuating in brightness. That means that the sun is shining at different angles and the satellite is not pointing down at the Earth as it should.

China launches Turkish EO satellite

Beijing (AFP) Dec 18, 2012
China early Wednesday "successfully" launched a Turkish earth observation satellite into orbit aboard a Chinese rocket, according to state media, hailed in Turkey as a "historic moment".
A statement from the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center in northwest China's Gobi Desert said the satellite was launched at 12:13 am (1613 GMT Tuesday) and was delivered into its predetermined orbit by a Long March 2D rocket, the official Xinhua news agency reported.
The satellite, jointly developed by Turkey's Space Technologies Research Institute and Turkish Aerospace Industries, will mainly be used for environmental protection, mineral resource exploration, urban planning and disaster monitoring and management, the statement said.
In Ankara, Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan watched the launch live from giant screens along with hundreds of Turks. "It is a historic moment for our nation," he said following the launch.
"In the past we did send satellites to space but Gokturk-2 has proven that we are now a country with a claim in this field. We are rising to position ourselves as one of the 25 countries which are capable of producing their own satellites."
He said Turkey, as the next step, would aim to become one of the few countries with its own launch pad.
China views satellite launches as part of its ambitious space programme. The country sent its first female astronaut, Liu Yang, into space earlier this year on the Shenzhou-9 in China's first manual space docking mission.
Last month China launched a European-made telecommunications satellite into orbit, according to Xinhua. In September a Chinese rocket launched a Venezuelan earth-observation satellite.
source: http://www.spacedaily.com

Raytheon wins DARPA contract to design new military imaging satellites

Tucson, AZ (SPX) Dec 14, 2012

For this contract, Raytheon has teamed with Sierra Nevada Corporation, University of Arizona and SRI International to assist with design work and eventually production. Next year, in phase two of the SeeMe program, the Raytheon team would build six satellites for ground testing.

Raytheon was awarded a $1.5 million Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) contract for phase one of the agency's Space Enabled Effects for Military Engagements (SeeMe) program.
During the next nine months, the company will complete the design for small satellites to enhance warfighter situational awareness in the battlespace.
The SeeMe program will provide useful on-demand imagery information directly to the warfighter in the field from a low-cost satellite constellation launched on a schedule that conforms to Department of Defense operational tempos.
"Leveraging our state-of-the-art missile assembly lines, we can mass produce these small, lightweight satellites quickly and affordably," said Tom Bussing, Raytheon Missile Systems' vice president of Advanced Missile Systems.
"As the world's only producer of exoatmospheric kill vehicles, we are already developing and building hardware to space standards."
For this contract, Raytheon has teamed with Sierra Nevada Corporation, University of Arizona and SRI International to assist with design work and eventually production. Next year, in phase two of the SeeMe program, the Raytheon team would build six satellites for ground testing.
"We are pleased to be working with DARPA to solve the challenge of providing warfighters with a tactical space sensor capability at a production rate price," said Bussing.
source:  http://www.spacewar.com

Shadows on ice: Proba-1 images Concordia south polar base

Paris (ESA) Dec 13, 2012

The base's distinctive double-cylinder habitats, home to skeleton crews during winter, are picked out by the area of greatest shadow. For a larger version of this image please go here.

ESA's Earth-observing microsatellite Proba-1 has glimpsed one of the loneliest places on Earth - Concordia research base in the heart of Antarctica. This image was acquired by the High-Resolution Camera, the smallest imager on ESA's smallest satellite. This black and white digital camera incorporates a miniaturised telescope to fit in Proba-1, whose overall volume is less than a cubic metre.
Long shadows cast by the low Sun pick out details of the base's layout in this 5 m-resolution image.
The Concordia station, built and operated by France's IPEV polar institute and Italy's PNRA Antarctic programme, is one of the few permanently crewed habitats in Antarctica. Located 3233 m above sea level in the high interior, its nearest neighbour is Russia's Vostok base, some 560 km away.
Its extreme location makes it interesting to ESA, which sponsors medical research on how isolation affects overwintering crews during months of cold darkness.
Life in Concordia is similar to living on another planet. No help can arrive during the winter months and venturing outside is dangerous - temperatures can drop to -80 degrees C.
The base's distinctive double-cylinder habitats, home to skeleton crews during winter, are picked out by the area of greatest shadow. Directly northeast are the summer camp buildings, with the base runway visible to the north.
To the east of the main habitats are an astronomy platform - Concordia boasts some of the clearest skies in the world - and glaciology survey areas where subsurface drilling extracts ice cores.
A faint dot further east is the entrance to an underground seismology shelter measuring ground tremors.

Cassini Spots Mini Nile River on Saturn Moon

Pasadena CA (JPL) Dec 13, 2012

This image from NASA's Cassini spacecraft shows a vast river system on Saturn's moon Titan. It is the first time images from space have revealed a river system so vast and in such high resolution anywhere other than Earth. Image Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/ASI. For a larger version of this image please go here.

Scientists with NASA's Cassini mission have spotted what appears to be a miniature, extraterrestrial likeness of Earth's Nile River: a river valley on Saturn's moon Titan that stretches more than 200 miles (400 kilometers) from its "headwaters" to a large sea. It is the first time images have revealed a river system this vast and in such high resolution anywhere other than Earth.
Scientists deduce that the river, which is in Titan's north polar region, is filled with liquid hydrocarbons because it appears dark along its entire length in the high-resolution radar image, indicating a smooth surface.
"Though there are some short, local meanders, the relative straightness of the river valley suggests it follows the trace of at least one fault, similar to other large rivers running into the southern margin of this same Titan sea," said Jani Radebaugh, a Cassini radar team associate at Brigham Young University, Provo, Utah.
"Such faults - fractures in Titan's bedrock - may not imply plate tectonics, like on Earth, but still lead to the opening of basins and perhaps to the formation of the giant seas themselves."
Titan is the only other world we know of that has stable liquid on its surface. While Earth's hydrologic cycle relies on water, Titan's equivalent cycle involves hydrocarbons such as ethane and methane.

A 50,000-Megapixel Camera Points and Shoots

Analysis by Jesse Emspak
Wed Jun 20, 2012 10:52 AM ET

A camera that can see five times better than a person with 20/20 vision is here. The resolution is 50 gigapixels, or 50,000 megapixels. Cameras used by professionals reach the 40-megapixel mark, and a typical point-and-shoot might have eight or 10. The amount of information the gigapixel camera captures in a frame is nearly as much as the amount of data stored on a PC's hard drive -- all for one picture.

The group that developed the camera was led by David Brady, professor of electrical engineering at Duke's Pratt School of Engineering, along with scientists from the University of Arizona, the University of California -- San Diego and Distant Focus Corp. The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) also supported the research. The military has an obvious interest in better image processing and in decades past, has spearheaded the development of sophisticated imaging tools. But a camera like this is also useful for fields as such as astronomy.
Unlike conventional digital cameras that have a single image sensor, the gigapixel camera has 98, all working in unison. A computer puts all the disparate images together to create a single picture. Blowing up the image reveals details that the naked eye wouldn't initially see.

Michael Gehm, assistant professor of electrical and computer engineering at the University of Arizona, who led the research there, noted in a press release that to boost the camera's resolution, the team had to go beyond simply making the optical elements more complex. This time, the researchers improved the electronics and built a system of parallel processors. The camera lens focuses the light to each of the image sensors and the computer takes care of building the final image.
Processing all the information is so complicated that 97 percent of the physical camera is comprised of the electronics and computer; only about three percent of the camera itself is deveoted to the optical elements. Details of the new camera were published in the journal Nature.
Photo: An image from the gigapixel camera, showing enlargements of certain sections. Credit: Duke University Imaging and Spectroscopy Program

source: http://news.discovery.com

Wildfires Light Up Western Australia

by Rani Gran for Goddard Space Flight Center Greenbelt MD (SPX) Dec 12, 2012

This nighttime image of Australia was cropped from the Suomi NPP "Black Marble" released by NASA and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration in December 2012. Credit: NASA Earth Observatory/NOAA NGDC. For a larger version of this image please go here.

Careful observers of the new "Black Marble" images of Earth at night released this week by NASA and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration have noticed bright areas in the western part of Australia that are largely uninhabited. Why is this area so lit up, many have asked?
Away from the cities, much of the night light observed by the NASA-NOAA Suomi NPP satellite in these images comes from wildfires.
In the bright areas of western Australia, there are no nearby cities or industrial sites but, scientists have confirmed, there were fires in the area when Suomi NPP made passes over the region. This has been confirmed by other data collected by the satellite.
The extent of the night lights in this area is also a function of composite imaging. These new images were assembled from data acquired over nine days in April 2012 and 13 days in October 2012.
This means fires and other lighting (such as ships) could have been detected on any one day and integrated into the composite picture, despite being temporary phenomena.
Because different areas burned at different times when the satellite passed over, the cumulative result in the composite view gives the appearance of a massive blaze. These fires are temporary features, in contrast to cities which are always there.
Other features appearing in uninhabited areas in these images could include fishing boats, gas flaring, lightning, oil drilling, or mining operations, which can show up as points of light. One example is natural gas drilling in the Bakken Formation in North Dakota.
source:  http://www.spacedaily.com

Environmental satellite produces first photo of Earth

Beijing (XNA) Dec 11, 2012

File image.

China's first synthetic-aperture radar (SAR) satellite for environmental monitoring has produced its first "clear, coherent and informative" image of Earth, authorities said Monday.
The satellite, which was launched on Nov. 19, on Sunday successfully produced an SAR image of the city of Zhengzhou, capital of central China's Henan province, said a statement from the State Administration of Science, Technology and Industry for National Defense.
The image was then sent to a station located at the Academy of Sciences' Center for Earth Observation and Digital Earth in Beijing, the statement said.
"Compared with optical imaging satellites, the SAR environmental monitoring satellite has greatly enhanced the efficiency and overall ability of the country's Earth observation satellites," it said.
The launch of the satellite marked the completion of a plan initiated by China in 2003 to create a group of environmental monitoring satellites, according to north China's Taiyuan Satellite Launch Center, where the satellite was launched.
The radar satellite joined two optical satellites launched in September 2008, forming a network that covers most of China's territory.
This satellites will help provide scientific evidence for assessing natural disasters, emergency aid and reconstruction, as well as enable China to monitor and forecast ecological changes, pollution and natural disasters around the clock, the center said.
source: http://www.spacedaily.com

Birds of a feather

The KH-9 HEXAGON on display at the National Museum of the Air Force in Dayton, Ohio. (credit: D. Day) by Dwayne Day Monday, December 10, 2012 Way back in 2004, I wrote an article about why there was no KH-9 HEXAGON reconnaissance satellite on display in the Smithsonian Institution’s Steven F. Udvar-Hazy Museum near Washington Dulles International Airport (see: “The invisible Big Bird: why there is no KH-9 spy satellite in the Smithsonian,” The Space Review, November 8, 2004). In the late 1990s the National Reconnaissance Office (NRO) was actively working on declassifying the HEXAGON and the other film return reconnaissance satellite program that operated from 1963 to 1984, the GAMBIT. The NRO even approached the Smithsonian Institution’s National Air and Space Museum about donating two large artifacts to the museum, a leftover GAMBIT-1 (or KH-7) reconnaissance satellite, and the HEXAGON ground engineering test vehicle, which included a working camera system. At the time the Air and Space Museum was planning on building what was then called the “Dulles Annex,” and had a tabletop plastic model of it, complete with little cut out figures of airplanes showing how they would be located in the large building. One such figure, in the shape of the Hubble Space Telescope, was labeled “KH-9.” Apparently the artifacts were victims of bad timing; the Udvar-Hazy Center was then preparing for the arrival of the space shuttle Discovery and the departure of the space shuttle Enterprise. But the declassification effort for these two top secret programs stalled around 1998 and did not resume until over a decade later. It was not until September 2011 when the programs were declassified. The HEXAGON and GAMBIT-1 were both displayed at Udvar-Hazy for one day: the bus-sized HEXAGON—popularly referred to as the Big Bird for its immense size—was displayed in a tent in front of the building, and the GAMBIT-1 inside, hidden from the general public by a curtain and visible only to attendees of an evening party celebrating the NRO’s fiftieth anniversary (see “Big Black throws a party,” The Space Review, September 19, 2011).

Elbit Systems to Provide Space Camera for the Italian OPTSAT 3000 Observation Satellite

Haifa, Israel (SPX) Dec 10, 2012

File image: OPTSAT 3000 observation satellite.

Elbit Systems reports that its wholly-owned subsidiary, Elbit Systems Electro-Optics Elop, was awarded a contract from Israel Aerospace Industries ("IAI") to provide a space camera for the Italian OPTSAT 3000 observation satellite.
The total project, comprising the Jupiter advanced camera and additional services, is valued at approximately $40 million and will be completed within three and a half years.
Adi Dar, Elop's General Manager, commented: "We are proud to have been selected to supply the space camera for the Italian satellite. Elop has been a world leader in the field of space cameras for many years, and our systems are supplied to a variety of space agencies and customers in the satellite market, providing high performance and reliability throughout the mission lifecycle. We trust that this contract will lead to additional contracts, both in Israel and abroad".
source:  http://www.spacemart.com

Seeing stars, finding nukes: Radio telescopes can spot clandestine nuclear tests

by by Pam Frost Gorder for OSU News San Francisco CA (SPX) Dec 10, 2012

File image: Very Large Array (VLA).

In the search for rogue nukes, researchers have discovered an unlikely tool: astronomical radio telescopes. Ohio State University researchers previously demonstrated another unlikely tool, when they showed that South Korean GPS stations detected telltale atmospheric disturbances from North Korea's 2009 nuclear test.
Both techniques were born out of the discovery that underground nuclear explosions leave their mark-on the outer reaches of Earth's atmosphere.
Now, working with astronomers at the U.S. Naval Research Laboratory (NRL), they have analyzed historical data from the Very Large Array (VLA), a constellation of 27 radio telescopes near Socorro, New Mexico-and discovered that the VLA recorded a very similar pattern of disturbances during the last two American underground nuclear tests, which took place in Nevada in 1992.
Dorota Grejner-Brzezinska, professor of geodetic and geoinformation engineering at Ohio State, said that the new findings help support the notion that GPS systems-and their technological successors, global navigation satellite systems (GNSS)-are viable tools for detecting clandestine nuclear tests around the globe. She added that now is a good time to begin developing the concept.
"With a global availability of permanently tracking GPS networks now extending to GNSS, tremendous amounts of information are becoming available, and the infrastructure is growing," she said. "We have a great opportunity to develop these ideas, and make a tool that will aid the global community."

A sense of place

Geography matters as much as ever, despite the digital revolution, says Patrick Lane

Oct 27th 2012 | from the print edition

THERE WAS SOMETHING odd about the black car at the junction of Sutter and Hyde Streets. It was an ordinary saloon. Its windows were clear, and it looked in good condition. And yet, as the lights changed and the car pulled away into the bright San Francisco morning, a question remained. Why was it sporting a luxuriant pink moustache at its front?
The moustache is the trade mark of Lyft, a ride-sharing service that began in the city this summer. Its drivers are private individuals who, in effect, rent out seats in their cars for a few dollars a time. Lyft’s cut is 20%. It works through a smartphone app. When you register as a customer, you supply your phone number and credit-card details. When you want a ride, you open the app and see a map with the locations of the nearest moustachioed motors. You tap to request a ride, and the app shows you your driver’s name, his rating by past passengers (out of five stars) and photos of him and his car. He will probably greet you with a friendly fist-bump. Afterwards you rate him and pay through the app. He rates you, too, so if you are poor company you may not get another Lyft.

NASA-NOAA Satellite Reveals New Views of Earth at Night

Greenbelt MD (SPX) Dec 07, 2012

This image of the continental United States at night is a composite assembled from data acquired by the Suomi NPP satellite in April and October 2012. The image was made possible by the satellite's "day-night band" of the Visible Infrared Imaging Radiometer Suite (VIIRS), which detects light in a range of wavelengths from green to near-infrared and uses filtering techniques to observe dim signals such as city lights, gas flares, auroras, wildfires and reflected moonlight. Credit: NASA Earth Observatory/NOAA NGDC

Scientists have unveiled an unprecedented new look at our planet at night. A global composite image, constructed using cloud-free night images from a new NASA and National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) satellite, shows the glow of natural and human-built phenomena across the planet in greater detail than ever before.
Many satellites are equipped to look at Earth during the day, when they can observe our planet fully illuminated by the sun. With a new sensor aboard the NASA-NOAA Suomi National Polar-orbiting Partnership (NPP) satellite launched last year, scientists now can observe Earth's atmosphere and surface during nighttime hours.
The new sensor, the day-night band of the Visible Infrared Imaging Radiometer Suite (VIIRS), is sensitive enough to detect the nocturnal glow produced by Earth's atmosphere and the light from a single ship in the sea. Satellites in the U.S. Defense Meteorological Satellite Program have been making observations with low-light sensors for 40 years. But the VIIRS day-night band can better detect and resolve Earth's night lights.
The new, higher resolution composite image of Earth at night was released at a news conference at the American Geophysical Union meeting in San Francisco. This and other VIIRS day-night band images are providing researchers with valuable data for a wide variety of previously unseen or poorly seen events.
"For all the reasons that we need to see Earth during the day, we also need to see Earth at night," said Steve Miller, a researcher at NOAA's Colorado State University Cooperative Institute for Research in the Atmosphere. "Unlike humans, the Earth never sleeps."

Skybox Imaging Completes Significant Testing Milestone Preceding its First Satellite and Product Launch

Mountain View CA (SPX) Dec 06, 2012

File image.

Skybox Imaging (has successfully completed the simulated space environmental test of its first high-resolution imaging microsatellite. During the 16-day test campaign conducted at NASA's Ames Research Center in Moffett Field, Calif., the satellite was placed in a thermal vacuum chamber that accurately simulated the thermal and environmental conditions of low Earth orbit. Skybox evaluated the spacecraft's performance in a variety of operational modes.
This included a "day-in-the-life" test where the Skybox operations team simulated flying the spacecraft for 20 orbits. The test data collected was used to accurately correlate the detailed spacecraft thermal and power models and verify that all subsystems performed as expected.
"Spacecraft thermal vacuum testing is the largest and most important phase in our integrated spacecraft test program," said Jonny Dyer, chief engineer at Skybox. "Successful completion of this milestone gives us greater confidence that our first spacecraft will perform well in the space thermal environment."
Skybox is now entering final testing phases of the spacecraft, including integrated system testing and launch base testing. The next key test is set to take place in early 2013, when the spacecraft will undergo vibration testing. This will be the last major milestone preceding the satellite's planned launch in the second quarter of 2013.
"Our team is the foundation of our success, and we are extremely proud of the completion of this milestone which brings us one crucial step forward in the lead-up to launch," said Tom Ingersoll, Skybox CEO. "This marks only the beginning of our endeavors as we advance toward the deployment of the constellation."
Skybox Imaging (Skybox) designs and builds microsatellites and cloud services that provide global customers easy access to reliable and frequent high-resolution images of the Earth via a scalable web-based platform.
By operating the world's first coordinated microsatellite constellation, Skybox aims to empower commercial and government customers to make more informed, data-driven decisions that will improve the profitability of companies and the welfare of societies around the world.

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source:http://www.spacedaily.com
Related Links Skybox Imaging

First-ever hyperspectral images of Earth's auroras

Washington DC (SPX) Dec 06, 2012

The aurora as seen as a color composite image from the NORUSCA II camera. Three bands were combined to make the image. Each band was assigned a different color - red, green, and blue - to enhance the features of the aurora for analysis. Credit: Optics Express.

Hoping to expand our understanding of auroras and other fleeting atmospheric events, a team of space-weather researchers designed and built NORUSCA II, a new camera with unprecedented capabilities that can simultaneously image multiple spectral bands, in essence different wavelengths or colors, of light.
The camera was tested at the Kjell Henriksen Observatory (KHO) in Svalbard, Norway, where it produced the first-ever hyperspectral images of auroras-commonly referred to as "the Northern (or Southern) Lights"-and may already have revealed a previously unknown atmospheric phenomenon.
Details on the camera and the results from its first images were published in the Optical Society's (OSA) open-access journal Optics Express.
Auroras, nature's celestial fireworks, are created when charged particles from the Sun penetrate Earth's magnetic field. These shimmering displays in the night sky reveal important information about the Earth-Sun system and the way our planet responds to powerful solar storms.
Current-generation cameras, however, are simply light buckets-meaning they collect all the light together into one image-and lack the ability to separately capture and analyze multiple slivers of the visible spectrum.
That means if researchers want to study auroras by looking at specific bands or a small portion of the spectrum they would have to use a series of filters to block out the unwanted wavelengths.
The new NORUSCA II hyperspectral camera achieves the same result without any moving parts, using its advanced optics to switch among all of its 41 separate optical bands in a matter of microseconds, orders of magnitude faster than an ordinary camera.

Sharing Data to Keep European Oceans Healthy

By Brendon Bosworth, posted on November 28th, 2012 in Earth Observation, Featured Article, Oceans

A school of fish. Image Credit: Matthew Hoelscher

In August, the world’s seas scored 60 out of a possible 100 on a global marine health index, which assessed the status of the world’s seas through an ecosystems approach. Marine pollution, overfishing and increased greenhouse gas emissions combine to pose a suit of threats to the planet’s saltwater systems. To help enhance the ability of scientists and stakeholders in the European Union to monitor the environmental health of the Mediterranean Sea, and support the implementation of a GEO Science and Technology Roadmap, the European Commission funded the EGIDA project (the Italian acronym stands for “coordinating Earth and environmental cross-disciplinary projects to promote GEOSS”).
Since a key area of focus for EGIDA researchers is the Mediterranean, the project has assisted in the development of online tools for sharing environmental data between scientists and decision-makers in the region.
One such tool is a webmapping application developed by David March Morlà, a consultant with Spanish research institute Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Científicas (CSIC), for the Gulf of Lions, a bay in the Mediterranean that lies between France and Spain. The application, which is still in its pilot stages, originated from a collaboration with the KnowSeas (knowledge-based sustainable management for Europe’s seas) project, a 4-year endeavor that ends in 2013 and brings together 32 partners from 16 countries with the intent of implementing an “ecosystems approach” to management of the Baltic, Black, Mediterranean and Northeast Atlantic seas.
Applying this ecosystems approach to marine management, KnowSeas incorporates geospatial, economic, and social science data, and a broad spectrum of practitioners, explains Tim O’Higgins, operational director for KnowSeas, based at the Scottish Association for Marine Science, the body responsible for coordinating the project.

NASA's Tropical Rainfall Measuring Mission Turns 15

by Ellen Gray for Goddard Space Flight Center Greenbelt MD (SPX) Nov 29, 2012

This 3-D image of Hurricane Sandy's rainfall was created using TRMM Precipitation Radar data. It shows the storm as it appeared on Oct. 28, 2012. Red areas indicate rainfall of 2 inches (50 mm) per hour. Credit: NASA/SSAI, Hal Pierce.

When it rains it pours, goes the saying, and for the last 15 years, the data on tropical rainfall have poured in. NASA's Tropical Rainfall Measuring Mission (TRMM) was launched on Nov. 27, 1997, and for the last decade and a half has enabled precipitation science that has had far-reaching applications across the globe.
Rain is one of the most important natural processes on Earth, and nowhere does it rain more than across the tropics. Orbiting at an angle to the equator that covers 35 degrees north to 35 degrees south of the equator, TRMM carries five instruments that collectively measure the intensity of rainfall, characteristics of the water vapor and clouds, and lightning associated with the rain events.
One of the instruments, the Precipitation Radar, built by NASA's mission partner the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA), is the first precipitation radar flown in space. It returns images of storms that for the first time have revealed close-up, three-dimensional views of how rainbands in tropical cyclones develop, potentially indicating how strong the storms might become.
The TRMM Precipitation Radar penetrates clouds to see raindrops and precipitation-sized ice such as hail. The radar's ability to make precise measurements of both the altitude and the intensity of precipitation gives scientists clues about the energy that fuels thunderstorms, hurricanes and other kinds of severe weather.

NASA's TRMM Satellite Confirms 2010 Landslides

by Lisa-Natalie Anjozian for Goddard Space Flight Center Greenbelt MD (SPX) Nov 29, 2012

Around midnight on Aug. 8, 2010, a violent surge of loosened earth roared down mountain slopes and slammed into quietly sleeping neighborhoods in Zhouqu County in Gansu, China. The catastrophic mudslides - the deadliest in decades according to state media - buried some areas under as much as 23 feet (7 meters) of suffocating sludge. 1,765 people died. Property damages totaled an estimated $759 million. Cutting from right to left, this detailed image, from DigitalGlobe's WorldView-2 satellite, shows the largest slide in the lower part of the city on Aug. 10, 2010. Credit: Image from WorldView-2 2010 by DigitalGlobe. For a larger version of this image please go here.

A NASA study using TRMM satellite data revealed that the year 2010 was a particularly bad year for landslides around the world. A recent NASA study published in the October issue of the Journal of Hydrometeorology compared satellite rain data from NASA's Tropical Rainfall Measurement Mission (TRMM) to landslides in central eastern China, Central America and the Himalayan Arc, three regions with diverse climates and topography where rainfall-triggered landslides are frequent and destructive hazards to the local populations.
The work, led by Dalia Kirschbaum, a research physical scientist in the Hydrological Sciences Laboratory at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md., is part of an ongoing effort to catalog worldwide rainfall-triggered landslides-one of the world's lesser known but often catastrophic natural hazards. Locating them is a step in an effort to be able, one day, to predict and warn.
Currently, Kirschbaum explains, no consistent regional or global scale warning system exists for landslide disasters. To create one, scientists need to understand more than the individual factors that may contribute to local landslides - the intensity and total amount of rainfall over hours to days, slope angle, soil type and saturation, among others.
"For other hazards like hurricanes, there's a clearly defined season," says Kirschbaum. "From satellite data and observations we know that hurricane season in the Atlantic spans from June 1 to Nov. 30. But we don't have that type of record for landslides around the world, and we want to know when and where to expect them in different regions."
Scientists also need a systematic way to assess landslide hazards for a region, and one way to do that, says Kirschbaum, is to look at the distribution and intensity of rain from satellite data and see how that correlates with where and how often landslides are being reported.

GOES-R Satellite Program Undergoes Successful Review

by Rob Gutro for Goddard Space Flight Center Greenbelt MD (SPX) Nov 29, 2012

Artist's concept of the GOES-R satellite in geostationary orbit around the Earth. Credit: NOAA.

The GOES-R Series Program, which is leading the effort to replace and upgrade NOAA's existing fleet of geostationary satellites that track severe weather across the United States, received a favorable appraisal conducted by an external team of aerospace experts of its preparations to launch the new series, beginning in late 2015.
"Severe weather was again a major story in America this year," said Mary Kicza, assistant administrator of NOAA's Satellite and Information Service. "Passing this Mission Critical Design Review gives us confidence that the GOES-R Program's development is progressing well and will be ready to carry the latest technology to help improve NOAA's weather forecasts."
At all times, NOAA operates two Geostationary Operational Environmental Satellites (GOES) from a fixed position, 22,300 miles above the Earth. Additionally, NOAA keeps one GOES in orbital storage mode, ready to step in if one of the active satellites experiences trouble.
NOAA's geostationary satellites constantly monitor all weather conditions, from tornadoes, floods and snowstorms, to wildfires and developing tropical storms. Instruments on GOES also monitor solar activity.

Tracking Pollution from Outer Space

Tel Aviv, Israel (SPX) Nov 29, 2012

To accurately analyze the level of pollution over each megacity, the researchers used data gathered by three aerosol-monitoring satellites, called MODIS-Terra, MODIS-Aqua, and MISR, which NASA launched from 2000 through 2002. The combined data these satellites provide constitute an accurate survey of aerosol concentrations a few hundred meters above Earth.

The thickest layers of global smog - caused by traffic, industry, and natural minerals, among other factors - are found over the world's megacities. But getting an accurate measurement of pollution is no easy task.
On-the-ground monitoring stations do not always provide the most accurate picture - monitoring stations depend heavily on local positioning and some cities put stations in urban centers, while others build on the edge of a city.
Now Prof. Pinhas Alpert of Tel Aviv University's Department of Geophysics and Planetary Sciences and head of the Porter School of Environmental Studies, with graduate student Olga Shvainshteinand and Dr. Pavel Kishcha, is turning to three of NASA's high-tech satellites for a comprehensive view of pollutants in the atmosphere.
Using eight years' worth of data collected by the satellites, the researchers tracked pollution trends for 189 megacities - metropolitan hotspots where the population exceeds 2 million. 58 of these megacities, including New York City, Tokyo, and Mumbai, have populations that exceed 5 million.
Their method, published in the American Journal of Climate Change, is the first to provide standardized global testing of pollution levels. Beyond uncovering reliable data about pollution trends, Prof. Alpert believes that this monitoring method will also hold countries accountable for their emissions and encourage more environmentally friendly practices.

Arianespace Lofts Pleiades 1B Using Soyuz Medium-lift launcher

Kourou, French Guiana (ESA) Dec 02, 2012

The Pleiades 1A and 1B satellites launched by Arianespace create an optical observation system with great agility, a quick-response ground segment and daily revisit capability - offering a new generation of "real-world" satellite Earth imagery at a resolution of 70 cm.

The maturity of Arianespace's Soyuz launch system at French Guiana - and its confirmed role as a full-fledged member of the company's launcher family - were demonstrated once again by tonight's successful orbiting of the Pleiades 1B satellite from the Spaceport.
During a flight lasting 55 minutes, the Soyuz vehicle deployed its 970-kg. passenger into a targeted circular orbit of 695 km., inclined 98.2 deg., marking the medium-lift vehicle's fourth mission from French Guiana since its introduction at this near-equatorial launch site in October 2011.
Pleiades 1B is a very-high-resolution dual-use satellite designed to provide optical imaging coverage for French and European defense ministries, institutions and civil users. It joins the twin Pleiades 1A spacecraft that was launched in December 2011 on Arianespace's second Soyuz mission from the Spaceport.
Arianespace Chairman and CEO Jean-Yves Le Gall noted tonight's launch was the ninth at French Guiana in 2012 for the company's launcher family; following the lightweight Vega's maiden flight in February; medium-lift missions with Soyuz in October and today; along with heavy-lift Ariane 5 flights in March, May, July, August, September and November.
Le Gall thanked all involved in these successes, including the teams who work at the Spaceport for such an "impressive" year - during which a total of 23 primary and secondary payloads were placed into orbit from French Guiana.

EDRS space network ready to go ahead

Paris (ESA) Nov 25, 2012

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The design of Europe's data relay satellite system - EDRS - has been completed and approved. This marks the moment when it moves ahead with a green light from its first customer, the Global Monitoring for Environment and Security initiative from the European Union (GMES).
EDRS will provide a telecommunications network that is fast, reliable and seamless, making real-time information from satellites available on demand. EDRS will be the first commercially operated data relay system to deliver services to the Earth observation community.
It is being built through a Public-Private Partnership (PPP) between ESA and Astrium Services, using payloads carried by two satellites in geostationary orbit, hovering 36 000 km above the Equator, where their speed matches Earth's rotation.
Data transmitted from satellites in lower orbits to either of these EDRS payloads can then be relayed to the ground.

TerraSAR-X image of the month - the Santorini volcano expands

Berlin, Germany (SPX) Nov 25, 2012

British researchers have used images acquired by the German Aerospace Center (Deutsches Zentrum fόr Luft- und Raumfahrt; DLR) TerraSAR-X satellite to create a map showing changes in the Santorini archipelago. The cause of the deformation is the Santorini volcano located beneath the archipelago. In some places, the Kameni Islands inside the flooded caldera have risen by eight to 14 centimetres. The breadth of the caldera as a whole has increased by about 14 centimetres since early 2011. In the analysis of the radar data, the red and yellow shading shows the areas where the ground has risen the most. The main island of Thira is unaffected by the deformation, thus appearing blue. image credit DLR

Glasses are rattling on the shelves and the ground is rumbling - since January 2011 the earth under the Santorini volcano has been stirring.
Most of the time, it is barely noticeable, but every now and then the inhabitants notice small tremors jolting the volcanic archipelago. Nearly circular, and seemingly carved from stone, the submerged caldera is located in the Aegean Sea.
"It was clear to the local people that something was happening with the volcano - but it wasn't until we saw, among other things, the images from the TerraSAR-X radar satellite that we realised that molten rock was pooling beneath the volcano," says British scientist Juliet Biggs from the University of Bristol.
Images acquired by the German Aerospace Center's (Deutsches Zentrum fur Luft- und Raumfahrt; DLR) satellite show the entire archipelago not just rising, but also expanding.
It has been 3600 years since a powerful explosion formed the large caldera. Since then, a new vent has been gradually forming in the middle of this basin, where today the Kameni islands protrude from the water. The volcano last erupted in 1950 and then fell dormant again, so the scientists from Oxford and Bristol were all the more surprised when the inhabitants started reporting tremors.
"Tour guides, who often visit the volcano with tourists on a daily basis, told me there was an increase in the quantity of strong smelling gas being released by the summit," explains PhD student Michelle Parks. "The colour of the sea had changed as well."
Expanding magma chamber Funded by the UK National Environment Research Council, radar specialist Juliet Biggs, Parks and volcanologist David Pyle began to study the Santorini volcano closely.
Using GPS receivers, they determined precise locations with millimetric accuracy on a daily basis. The TerraSAR-X radar satellite also observed the archipelago from orbit, at an altitude of 514 kilometres, recording its uplift and expansion from one orbit to the next. The results showed that the Kameni islands had risen eight to 14 centimetres in many places.

Instrument Delivered for NASA's Upcoming Mars Mission

Greenbelt MD (SPX) Nov 18, 2012

A $670 million NASA mission to Mars led by the University of Colorado Boulder is on track for a November 2013 launch. Illustration courtesy NASA

A remote sensing instrument that will peer into the ultraviolet to offer clues to how Mars might have lost its atmosphere has arrived at Lockheed Martin for integration into NASA's Mars Atmosphere and Volatile EvolutioN (MAVEN) spacecraft.
"The Remote Sensing package team built a system that meets all technical requirements and delivered it on schedule and on budget," said David Mitchell, MAVEN project manager from NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md.
"I look forward to the instrument's next level of integration onto the spacecraft and ultimately the science it will provide."
The Remote Sensing package consists of an Imaging UltraViolet Spectrograph (IUVS) and its control electronics box, the Remote Sensing Data Processing Unit (RSDPU).
The Remote Sensing package was conceived, designed and built by the University of Colorado's Laboratory for Atmospheric and Space Physics (CU/LASP) at Boulder, under contract to NASA Goddard.
The Imaging UltraViolet Spectrograph collects the light and spreads it out into spectra and records the spectra using imaging detectors. IUVS is the eyes of the instrument.

Spacecraft Monitoring Martian Dust Storm

Pasadena CA (JPL) Nov 25, 2012

This nearly global mosaic of observations made by the Mars Color Imager on NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter on Nov. 18, 2012, shows a dust storm in Mars' southern hemisphere. Small white arrows outline the area where dust from the storm is apparent in the atmosphere. Image Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/MSSS

A Martian dust storm that NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter has been tracking since last week has also produced atmospheric changes detectable by rovers on Mars.
Using the orbiter's Mars Color Imager, Bruce Cantor of Malin Space Science Systems, San Diego, began observing the storm on Nov. 10, and subsequently reported it to the team operating NASA's Mars Exploration Rover Opportunity.
The storm came no closer than about 837 miles (1,347 kilometers) from Opportunity, resulting in only a slight drop in atmospheric clarity over that rover, which does not have a weather station.
Halfway around the planet from Opportunity, the NASA Mars rover Curiosity's weather station has detected atmospheric changes related to the storm. Sensors on the Rover Environmental Monitoring Station (REMS), which was provided for Curiosity by Spain, have measured decreased air pressure and a slight rise in overnight low temperature.
"This is now a regional dust storm. It has covered a fairly extensive region with its dust haze, and it is in a part of the planet where some regional storms in the past have grown into global dust hazes," said Rich Zurek, chief Mars scientist at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif.
"For the first time since the Viking missions of the 1970s, we are studying a regional dust storm both from orbit and with a weather station on the surface."

The Last Pictures

Since 1963, more than eight hundred spacecraft have been launched into geosynchronous orbit, forming a man-made ring of satellites around the Earth. These satellites are destined to become one of the longest-lasting artifacts of human civilization, quietly floating through space long after every trace of humanity has disappeared from the planet.

image credit: http://creativetime.org/projects/the-last-pictures/the-pictures/

Trevor Paglen’s The Last Pictures is a project that marks one of these spacecraft with a visual record of our contemporary historical moment. Paglen spent five years interviewing scientists, artists, anthropologists, and philosophers to consider what such a cultural mark should be. Working with materials scientists at Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Paglen developed an artifact designed to last billions of years—an ultra-archival disc, micro-etched with one hundred photographs and encased in a gold-plated shell. In Fall 2012, the communications satellite EchoStar XVI will launch into geostationary orbit with the disc mounted to its anti-earth deck. While the satellite’s broadcast images are as fleeting as the light-speed radio waves they travel on, The Last Pictures will remain in outer space slowly circling the Earth until the Earth itself is no more.

source:  http://creativetime.org/projects/the-last-pictures/

A Global System for Monitoring Ecosystem Service Change

credit: http://www.jstor.org

Earth’s life-support systems are in flux, yet no centralized system to monitor and report these changes exists. Recognizing this, 77 nations agreed to establish the Group on Earth Observations (GEO). The GEO Biodiversity Observation Network (GEO BON) integrates existing data streams into one platform in order to provide a more complete picture of Earth’s biological and social systems. We present a conceptual framework envisioned by the GEO BON Ecosystem Services Working Group, designed to integrate national statistics, numerical models, remote sensing, and in situ measurements to regularly track changes in ecosystem services across the globe. This information will serve diverse applications, including stimulating new research and providing the basis for assessments. Although many ecosystem services are not currently measured, others are ripe for reporting. We propose a framework that will continue to grow and inspire more complete observation and assessments of our planet’s life-support systems.

source and article full text: http://www.jstor.org/stable/full/10.1525/bio.2012.62.11.7

Satellite photo shows odd cloud phenomenon

Greenbelt, Md. (UPI) Nov 20, 2012

disclaimer: image is for illustration purposes only

NASA says its Terra Earth observation satellite has captured a striking image of an atmospheric phenomenon knows as "cloud streets" over Canada's Hudson Bay.
Cloud streets are long parallel bands of cumulus clouds that form when cold air blows over warmer waters, while a warmer air layer -- or temperature inversion -- rests over the top of both, the space agency said.
As the comparatively warm water gives up heat and moisture to the cold air above, columns of heated air called thermals naturally rise through the atmosphere until they reach the inversion layer which acts as a lid.
The rising thermals hit this "lid," roll over and loop back on themselves to create "streets" of parallel cylinders of rolling air.
This creates flat-bottomed, fluffy-topped cumulus clouds that line up parallel to the prevailing wind, NASA said.
If the land or water surface underneath is uniform, as in Canada's huge Hudson Bay, cloud streets can stretch for hundreds of miles, the agency said.
The Terra satellite obtained the image on Nov. 13.

source: http://www.terradaily.com

New Radar Technologies for the Aerosol/Cloud/Ecosystems Mission

By Wanda Archy, posted on November 16th, 2012 in Atmospheric Chemistry, Earth Observation, Featured Article

NASA’s future Aerosol/Cloud/Ecosystems (ACE) Mission will address fundamental science questions concerning the role of aerosols on cloud development and ecosystems. Recommended by the National Research Council’s (NRC) Earth Science Decadal Survey, ACE targets a broad class of hydrometeor types. The mission’s instruments will measure cloud droplets, ice crystals, rain and snow, which are subject to change in the presence of aerosols. These changes also impact the Earth’s ecosystems and the ocean’s storage of carbon dioxide. The ACE measurements aim to improve the understanding of aerosol, cloud and ecosystem interactions. Also, ACE measurements will have spin-off benefits, including aiding in air-quality forecasting.

Aerosol pollution in Northern India and Bangladesh. Source: Wiki Commons.

ACE seeks to study cloud and aerosol height, organic material in surface ocean layers, and aerosol and cloud type properties. Overall, the mission will provide improved climate modeling and better predictability of climate change variability, measure ocean productivity and health, and create air-quality models and forecasts. Results of the mission will help decrease uncertainty in climate predictions. ACE will focus primarily on two phenomena: aerosol-cloud interactions and carbon uptake in oceans.
The ACE mission calls for the use of two radars, ACERad, which represent a significant advancement compared to earlier atmospheric radar technologies. The radars will operate at 94 gigahertz in W-band and 35 gigahertz in Ka-band, and unlike previous missions, have Doppler and polarimetric capabilities. The dual-frequency Doppler measurements will provide valuable information about how particle sizes change with height. Dual-polarization will provide information about the water particle state and shape.
The Ka-band radar will scan to provide images for a more comprehensive picture of precipitating systems. The use of these two radars will create stronger vertical profiles for measurement of cloud droplet size, glacier height, and cloud height.

China launches third environment monitoring satellite

Taiyuan, China (XNA) Nov 20, 2012

Long March-2C carrier rocket carrying an environment-monitoring satellite Huanjing-1C blasts off from the launch pad at the Taiyuan Satellite Launch Center in Taiyuan, capital of north China's Shanxi Province, Nov. 19, 2012. The Huanjing-1C satellite and the other two satellites Huanjing-1A and Huanjing-1B, which were sent to the outer space in 2008, will be used to monitor the environment and help reduce natural disasters. (Xinhua/Liu Chan)

China on Monday sent the third satellite in its "Environment I" family into the sky, sharpening its abilities in environmental monitoring and disaster forecasting.
The launch marks the completion of a plan initiated by China in 2003 to create a small environmental monitoring satellite constellation, according to north China's Taiyuan Satellite Launch Center.
The radar satellite will join the other two operating optical satellites "Environment I" satellites, which were launched in Sept. 2008, to form a network covering most of China's territory.
This "2+1" formula will help provide scientific evidence for assessing natural disaster situations, emergency aid and reconstruction as well as enable China to monitor and forecast ecological changes, pollution and natural disasters around the clock, the center said.
The satellite was carried by a Long March 2C rocket.
The rocket also carried two additional satellites designed to run tests and carry out in-orbit experiments for new-type aerospace equipment, materials, methods and miniature satellite platforms.
 
Source: www.spacedaily.com -  Xinhua News Agency

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Related Links China National Space Administration

How many Russian Earth observation satellites will be in orbit by 2015?

by Olga Zakutnyaya Moscow (Voice of Russia) Nov 20, 2012

The Resurs-P is meant to replace the Resurs-DK, a previous generation spacecraft, which was launched into space in 2006. Image courtesy "The Voice of Russia"

The launch of the Resurs-P spacecraft was postponed till the first quarter of 2013. This remote sensing satellite was to replace the Resurs-DK Number 1 spacecraft launched in 2006, which has already gone beyond its warranty period. Roskosmos plans to restore the group of remote sensing satellites by 2015-17, but apparently new spacecraft launch dates continue to be postponed.
The press-service of the Federal Space Agency informs that the launch of the Resurs-P remote sensing satellite will be postponed from the end of this year to the first quarter of 2013. According to the report, this decision is the result of additional tests of high-precision star sensors' photodetectors based on new technology. It was thus decided to improve the devices.
The Resurs-P spacecraft ("P" is an abbreviation of "prospective") is created at the Progress State Research and Production Space Centre (TsSKB-Progress) in Samara. It is designed for observing the Earth in the visible range of the spectrum. It is planned to place the spacecraft on a near-circular sun-synchronous orbit at an average altitude of about 475 km.
In panchromatic range (that is, when observed in all the range of the visible spectrum at once) its resolution will be approximately 1 m; in hyper-spectral mode (when a lot of images are formed in fairly narrow spectral ranges, for the Resource-P it is no less than 96 images) it will be about 3 m. The term of the spacecraft's service in orbit is 5 years.

Spatial Energy Becomes First Astrium Services OilGas Global Reseller

Boulder CO (SPX) Nov 20, 2012

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Spatial Energy has signed a strategic reseller agreement with Astrium Services in Chantilly, Va. This agreement establishes Spatial Energy as the first global reseller of Astrium products and services to the worldwide oil and gas industry.
"Astrium Services is the only geo-information data provider today with a full spectrum of satellites acquiring multi-resolution optical and radar imagery from which a variety of products and services are derived, including elevation data, global oil seeps, and geologic studies," said Bud Pope, Spatial Energy President.
"A key advantage of Astrium Services is the large capacity of high resolution imaging open to the commercial market, resulting in faster acquisitions and deliveries."
With the full range of Astrium Services' products and services catalog added to the Spatial Energy content offerings and available through its Spatial on Demand cloud-based service, the Colorado firm is better positioned to provide oil and gas customers with detailed geospatial information throughout their entire exploration and production workflows, while benefiting from favored pricing and global oil/gas licensing.

Astrium's GRAIN service shows US corn yields are lower than expected

Geneva, Switzerland (SPX) Nov 15, 2012

File image.

Astrium estimates 2012 U.S. corn yield at 116.0 bushels per acre which is at the lower end of current industry expectations. This forecast announced during Global Grain Geneva 2012, the world's premier agricultural industry congress, is based on Astrium Services' GRAIN (Global Risk Agricultural Intelligence), a unique technology combining satellite imagery processing, agronomic and meteorological models developed over several years.
The GRAIN service predicted this very low trend since June 2012, while early signs of US drought were only just emerging. Astrium Services is developing the next generation tools for decision making in the agricultural industry to provide accurate and reliable crop analysis capabilities consistent worldwide at both local and regional levels.
The robustness of the parameters is principally due to its unique deterministic plant modeling approach supported by the strength and reliability of the Astrium Services' satellite constellation. GRAIN provides homogeneous, stable and consistent crop supply information compared to current statistical methods and field surveys.

Satrec Initiative Announces Agreement with Korea Aerospace Research Institute

Seoul, Korea (SPX) Nov 18, 2012

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Satrec Initiative, a leading solution provider for Earth observation missions, announced an agreement with Korea Aerospace Research Institute (KARI) for "Worldwide Marketing and Sales Representative of KOMPSAT-2, 3 and 5 Image data". KARI assigned Satrec Initiative as the 'worldwide exclusive representative' for KOMPSAT imagery sales.
"Satrec Initiative is pleased that KARI has selected us as the representative for KOMPSAT imagery sales. The KOMPSAT imagery will serve worldwide customers as an alternate source of earth observation data," said Sungdong Park, President and CEO of Satrec Initiative. "Also, we expect the growth of Korean remote sensing industry through commercialization of KOMPSAT imagery by domestic company."
KARI is the Korean institute dedicated to aerospace research, and is in charge of Korean Space Program. KARI has developed, and operated its optical remote sensing satellites such as KOMPSAT- 1, KOMPSAT-2 and KOMPSAT-3, and will launch the first Korean SAR satellite, KOMPSAT-5, shortly.

GOCE's second mission improving gravity map

Paris (ESA) Nov 18, 2012

The first 'geoid' based on GOCE's gravity measurements was unveiled in June 2010. It is the surface of an ideal global ocean in the absence of tides and currents, shaped only by gravity.

ESA's GOCE gravity satellite has already delivered the most accurate gravity map of Earth, but its orbit is now being lowered in order to obtain even better results.
The Gravity field and steady-state Ocean Circulation Explorer (GOCE) has been orbiting Earth since March 2009, reaching its ambitious objective to map our planet's gravity with unrivalled precision.
Although the planned mission has been completed, the fuel consumption was much lower than anticipated because of the low solar activity over the last two years. This has enabled ESA to extend GOCE's life, improving the quality of the gravity model.
To be able to measure the strength of Earth's gravity, the satellite was flying in an extraordinarily low orbit about 255 km high - about 500 km lower than most Earth observation satellites.
Based on a clear preference from the GOCE user community, ESA's Earth Scientific Advisory Committee recommended lowering the orbit to 235 km starting in August.
Lowering the orbit increases the accuracy and resolution of GOCE's measurements, improving our view of smaller ocean dynamics such as eddy currents.
The control team began the manoeuvres in August, lowering GOCE by about 300 m per day.
After coming down by 8.6 km, the satellite's performance and new environment were assessed. Now, GOCE is again being lowered while continuing its gravity mapping. Finally, it is expected to reach 235 km in February.

What lies beneath? New survey technique offers detailed picture of our changing landscape

Nottingham UK (SPX) Nov 18, 2012

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A new surveying technique developed at The University of Nottingham is giving geologists their first detailed picture of how ground movement associated with historical mining is changing the face of our landscape.
The new development by engineers at the University has revealed a more complete map of subsidence and uplift caused by the settlement of old mines in the East Midlands and other areas of the country and has shown that small movements in the landscape are bound by natural fault lines and mining blocks.
It appears to support concerns that movement associated with historical mining is continuing far longer than previously anticipated.
The research has been led by Dr Andrew Sowter in the University's Department of Civil Engineering. He said: "This method allows us to measure patterns of slow millimetre-scale movement across large regions of the landscape and, in the UK, almost everywhere we look is dominated by our industrial past. Large tracts of our land, including parts of our cities, towns and infrastructure as well as agricultural and woodland areas, are steadily creeping upwards over mines that were closed decades ago."
The new development builds on existing technology that allows engineers to use satellite radar technology to measure points on the landscape over a length of time to assess whether they are moving up (uplifting) or sinking down (subsiding).
A complete picture Previously, this has relied on using fixed, unchanging objects like buildings that can be accurately re-measured and compared against previous measurements time after time. However, the technique has not been practical for use in the rural landscape meaning that geologists could only get half the picture.
Now, Dr Sowter has developed a technique called the Intermittent Small Baseline Subset (ISBAS) method which adapts the same technology and extends it to rural areas by taking stacks of these radar images and identifying those more transient points in the rural landscape against which changes over time are able to be measured.

1,000+ Satellites to be Launched in the Decade Ahead; Over One-Third Commercial

Washington DC (SPX) Nov 09, 2012

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Euroconsult's newly released research report, Satellites to be Built and Launched by 2021: World Market Survey, anticipates that 1,075 satellites will be built for launch worldwide over the next 10 years (2012-2021). Revenues from the manufacture and launch of these 1,000+ satellites will be worth $198 billion, up 36% from that generated by the 800 satellites launched in the past ten years.
In 2011, the industry entered a growth phase with 100 satellites launched that year, an activity unknown since the late 1990s when the first generation of the two commercial constellations for global mobile personal communications were deployed into low Earth (LEO) orbit.
In the next six years, an average of 120 satellites should be orbited each year, then the launch tempo will decelerate at the end of the period as government and commercial satellite constellations complete their deployment.
Governments continue to dominate the space industry Governments worldwide are responsible for almost two-thirds of the 1,000+ satellites to be launched and for the same proportion of the $198 billion expected in revenues.
With 260 satellites to be launched in the decade ahead, Earth observation is the largest satellite application for governments that operate electro-optical and radar satellite systems through national agencies, multilateral cooperation and public/private partnerships.
Satellite demand of civilian government agencies will be much stronger than that of military agencies since military space remains concentrated in a limited number of countries for dedicated applications such as imagery intelligence.
Despite the continuous emergence of new space countries globally, the six established space powers continue to dominate 85% of future government satellite demand.
According to Rachel Villain, Director for Space at Euroconsult and Editor of the research report, "Governments in established space countries continue to drive innovation for satellite systems with benefice for their local industries even if systems' replacements are more carefully assessed in the countries where cost limits become stricter."
Emerging space countries should represent a market of 110 satellites of different size and capabilities to be developed by local suppliers with the support of foreign companies.

Taking the 'pulse' of volcanoes using satellite images

Miami FL (SPX) Nov 08, 2012

This image shows averaged 2006-2009 ground velocity map of the west Sunda volcanic region from the Japanese Space Agency's ALOS satellite. Positive velocity (red colors) represents movement towards the satellite (e.g. uplift) and negative velocity (blue colors) movement away from the satellite (e.g. subsidence). Locations of volcanoes are marked by black triangles, historically active volcanoes by red triangles. Insets show six inflating volcanoes. Credit: Estelle Chaussard, University of Miami.

A new study by scientists at the University of Miami (UM) Rosenstiel School of Marine and Atmospheric Science uses Interferometric Synthetic Aperture Radar (InSAR) data to investigate deformation prior to the eruption of active volcanoes in Indonesia's west Sunda arc. Led by geophysicist Estelle Chaussard and UM Professor Falk Amelung, the study uncovered evidence that several volcanoes did in fact 'inflate' prior to eruptions due to the rise of magma.
The fact that such deformation could be detected by satellite is a major step forward in volcanology; it is the first unambiguous evidence that remotely detected ground deformation could help to forecast eruptions at volcanoes.
"Surveying entire volcanic regions using satellite data is of primary importance to the detection of ground deformation prior to the onset of eruptions. If volcanic inflation is observed, it can help us to predict where the next eruption may occur.
Moreover, in regions like Indonesia, where volcanoes are prevalent and pose a threat to millions of people, and where ground-based monitoring is sparse, remote sensing via satellite could become a major forecasting tool," said Chaussard.
Analyzing more than 800 InSAR images from the Japanese Space Exploration Agency's ALOS satellite, the team surveyed 79 volcanoes in Indonesia between 2006 and 2009.
They detected deformation at six volcanic centers, three of which erupted after the observation period, confirming that inflation is a common precursor of volcanic eruptions at west Sunda volcanoes.

Storms, Ozone, Vegetation and More: NASA-NOAA Suomi NPP Satellite Returns First Year of Data

by Laura Betz for Goddard Space Flight Center Greenbelt MD (SPX) Nov 08, 2012

These two images are season-long composites of ocean chlorophyll concentrations derived from visible radiometric measurements made by the VIIRS instrument on Suomi NPP. The date ranges of the two composites are included in the individual images. These false-colored images make the data stand out. The purple and blue colors represent lower chlorophyll concentrations. The oranges and reds represent higher chlorophyll concentrations. These differences in color indicate areas with lesser or greater phytoplankton biomass. Credit: NASA/Suomi NPP/Norman Kuring. View northern hemisphere larger here. View southern hemisphere larger here.

On Oct. 28, 2011, the Suomi National Polar-orbiting Partnership (NPP) satellite successfully blasted into orbit in a spectacular night launch from Vandenberg Air Force Base, Calif. Now, Suomi NPP has orbited the Earth more than 5,000 times and begun returning images and data that provide critical weather and climate measurements of the complex Earth system.
"The Suomi NPP flight and ground teams have spent the first year making sure the spacecraft, instruments and data products are working well. As the instruments and data products have successfully checked out, the data go out to users," says James Gleason, Suomi NPP project scientist at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md.
"These data help us improve our computer models that predict future environmental conditions," Gleason adds. "Better predictions let us make better decisions, whether it is as simple as taking an umbrella to work today or as complex as responding to a changing climate."
Suomi NPP observes Earth's surface twice every day, once in daylight and once at night. The spacecraft flies 512 miles (824 kilometers) above the surface in a polar orbit, circling the planet about 14 times a day. Suomi NPP sends its data once an orbit to the ground station in Svalbard, Norway, and continuously to local direct broadcast users.
Named for satellite meteorology pioneer Verner Suomi, the Suomi NPP mission is managed by NASA with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) providing operational support and NOAA's Joint Polar Satellite System (JPSS) managing the satellite's ground system.
"Suomi NPP provides NOAA with the highest quality satellite data for critical operational products and services, such as weather forecasts, climate and ecosystem assessments," says Mitch Goldberg, NOAA's JPSS program scientist. NPP is the precursor satellite for the upcoming series of JPSS Earth-observing satellites.
What makes Suomi NPP such a powerful tool is the wide range of important observations it makes with its five instruments. These instruments send back data that allow scientists to see the entire globe from space and further understand oceans, clouds, ozone, snow, ice, vegetation and atmosphere.

NASA's SPoRT Team Tracks Hurricane Sandy

Huntsville AL (SPX) Nov 06, 2012

The SPoRT team provided images to the National Weather Service to help forecast Hurricane Sandy. (NASA)

As Hurricane Sandy wreaked havoc on the east coast, weather experts at the Short-term Prediction Research and Transition, or SPoRT Center at NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville were busy developing information to help forecasters better predict the massive storm.
The SPoRT Center uses Earth Observing System measurements and other satellite data to generate products useful in the analysis of weather events. SPoRT provides these products and data sets to partners within the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), NOAA's National Weather Service, and private sector organizations like The Weather Channel.
In 2002, NASA established SPoRT, at the Marshall Space Flight Center to facilitate the use of real-time Earth Observing System measurements for short-term weather forecasting. Near real-time satellite imagery is useful for monitoring current conditions and events likely to occur in the next few hours.
SPoRT provides a variety of satellite imagery and unique products from NASA and NOAA satellites such as Terra, Aqua, and the recently launched Suomi National Polar-Orbiting Partnership (Suomi NPP).
These products can be useful for identifying hazards such as severe thunderstorms and tropical cyclones, fog, and snow cover, or help to monitor disasters such as floods and wildfires.
SPoRT researchers also incorporate satellite observations of the land surface and profiles of atmospheric temperature and moisture within high resolution weather forecasting models with a goal of improving short-term weather predictions over the next few days.

Ball Aerospace/B612 Foundation Sign Contract for Sentinel Mission

Boulder CO (SPX) Nov 06, 2012

Sentinel will launch into a Venus-like orbit around the sun, which significantly improves the efficiency of asteroid discovery during its 6.5-year mission. (PRNewsFoto/Ball Aerospace and Technologies Corp.)

Ball Aerospace and Technologies Corp. and the non-profit B612 Foundation have signed a contract for Ball to create prototype infrared imaging sensors for the Sentinel Mission, a deep space mission to protect Earth by providing early warning of threatening asteroids. Ball's detector design characterization initiates the first phase of developing Sentinel's 20-inch diameter, space-based infrared telescope.
Sentinel is led by B612, a group of highly regarded scientists and explorers whose goal is to build, launch, and operate the first privately funded deep space mission. The mission will create a comprehensive and dynamic map of the inner solar system to catalog 90 percent of the asteroids larger than 140 meters in Earth's region of the solar system.
The map will detail the paths of asteroids during the next 100 years to provide decades of notice of threatening asteroids on a collision course with Earth.
Ball's advanced detector technology is responsible for many of the most spectacular space images ever taken, including those returned by the Kepler mission, the Spitzer and Hubble Space Telescopes, the Deep Impact mission and the HiRISE camera aboard the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter.
These missions developed flight proven deep space systems that will be used to minimize the technical and programmatic risks on the Sentinel mission. Ball's state-of-the-art Detector Technology Center which opened in 2006 will play a critical role in producing the Sentinel camera.
"Sentinel is unique because it relies on proven systems that will now be leveraged for a privately-funded mission," said Cary Ludtke, vice president and general manager of Ball's Civil and Operational Space strategic business unit.
"Ball was our first and only choice as the major contractor for Sentinel," said Ed Lu, Chairman, B612 Foundation. "The company is a pioneer in space observatories with a track record of excellence spanning more than 55 years. We are thrilled to have them as our partner."

USGS and Google Partner on Emergency Alerts

Released: 11/2/2012 11:00:00 AM

Emergency notifications for earthquakes, severe weather and other public safety matters are now available through Google Public Alerts. The system provides access to information during crises through the online tools you use every day. The Google Crisis Response team wants to make it easy for people to find critical information during emergencies and is doing so by partnering with authoritative sources to include public alert data into Google products. Earthquake data from the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) have been incorporated into the system, as well as weather data from the U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) National Weather Service. "From having been on the front line of several crises, I know personally that the internet can get populated with misinformation that confuses the public and can interfere with response efforts," said USGS Director Marcia McNutt. “I am very grateful for this partnership with Google to point people to authoritative sources of critical information when they need it most.” Users can go to the Google Public Alerts website and search for key terms to find relevant information: What's happening? Where and when will an event strike? How severe will it be?