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Search indexed NASA NTRS and DOE OSTI research on propulsion, heat transfer, battery materials and energy systems. Follow report and document links to the original sources.

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At least 415 records · Page 23
All sourcesNASA NTRSDOE OSTI
NASA NTRS2004

The Atmospheric Infrared Sounder- An Overview

The Atmospheric Infrared Sounder (AIRS) was launched in May 2002. Along with two companion microwave sensors, it forms the AIRS Sounding Suite. This system is the most advanced atmospheric sounding system to date, with measurement accuracies far surpassing those available on current weather satellites. The data products are calibrated radiances from all three sensors and a number of derived geophysical parameters, including vertical temperature and humidity profiles, surface temperature, cloud fraction, cIoud top pressure, and profiles of ozone. These products are generated under cloudy as well as clear conditions. An ongoing calibration validation effort has confirmed that the system is very accurate and stable, and many of the geophysical parameters have been validated. AIRS is in some cases more accurate than any other source and can therefore be difficult to validate, but this offers interesting new research opportunities. The applications for the AIRS products range from numerical weather prediction to atmospheric research - where the AIRS water vapor products near the surface and in the mid to upper troposphere will make it possible to characterize and model phenomena that are key for short-term atmospheric processes, such as weather patterns, to long-term processes, such as interannual cycles (e.g., El Nino) and climate change.

microwave↗
NASA NTRS2011

Getting the GeoSTAR Instrument Concept Ready for a Space Mission

The Geostationary Synthetic Thinned Array Radiometer - GeoSTAR - is a microwave sounder intended for geostationary satellites. First proposed for the EO-3 New Millennium mission in 1999, the technology has since been developed under the Instrument Incubator Program. Under IIP-03 a proof-of-concept demonstrator operating in the temperature sounding 50 GHz band was developed to show that the aperture synthesis concept results in a realizable, stable and accurate imaging-sounding radiometer. Some of the most challenging technology, such as miniature low-power 183- GHz receivers used for water vapor sounding, was developed under IIP-07. The first such receiver has recently been adapted for use in the High Altitude MMIC Sounding Radiometer (HAMSR), which was previously developed under IIP-98. This receiver represents a new state of the art and outperforms the previous benchmark by an order of magnitude in radiometric sensitivity. It was first used in the GRIP hurricane field campaign in 2010, where HAMSR became the first microwave sounder to fly on the Global Hawk UAV. Now, under IIP-10, we will develop flight-like subsystems and a brassboard testing system, which will facilitate rapid implementation of a space mission. GeoSTAR is the baseline payload for the Precipitation and All-weather Temperature and Humidity (PATH) mission - one of NASA's 15 "decadal-survey" missions. Although PATH is currently in the third tier of those missions, the IIP efforts have advanced the required technology to a point where a space mission can be initiated in a time frame commensurate with second-tier missions. An even earlier Venture mission is also being considered.

millimeter-wave↗
NASA NTRS1984

Vertical temperature sounding of the atmosphere

Attention is given to physical principles that affect the determination of atmospheric temperature profiles from observations of outgoing IR and microwave radiation. Simultaneous analysis of IR and microwave observations enhances observations in each spectral region. While IR soundings have higher sensitivity to lower tropospheric temperatures, ground temperatures, and sea surface temperatures, microwave observations are not only more suited to stratospheric sounding but are sensitive to snow and ice cover. They significantly aid correction of IR observations for cloud effects. Because effective cloud parameters and snow and ice cover can be inferred from the observations, 'temperature sounders' also yield data for a number of important climatic parameters.

Suskind, J.↗
NASA NTRS1981

Sonic simulation of the SPS power beam

A Satellite Power System Microwave Transmission Simulator is described. The simulator generates and transmits a beam audible sound energy which is mathematically similar to the microwave beam which would transmit energy to Earth from a Solar Power Satellite. This allows areas such as power beam formation to be studied in a laboratory environment.

Ott, J. H.↗
NASA NTRS1996

The ATLAS Series of Shuttle Missions

The ATLAS space shuttle missions were conducted in March 1992, April 1993, and November 1994. The ATLAS payload and companion instruments made measurements of solar irradiance and middle atmospheric temperatures and trace gas concentrations. The solar irradiance measurements included total and spectrally resolved solar irradiance. The atmospheric measurements included microwave, infrared, and ultraviolet limb sounding, nadir ultraviolet backscatter, and solar occultation techniques. This paper introduces a special section in this issue of Geophysical Research Letters.

Kaye, Jack A.↗
NASA NTRS1996

The ATLAS Series of Shuttle Missions

The ATLAS space shuttle missions were conducted in March 1992, April 1993, and November 1994. The ATLAS payload and companion instruments made measurements of solar irradiance and middle atmospheric temperatures and trace gas concentrations. The solar irradiance measurements included total and spectrally resolved solar irradiance. The atmospheric measurements included microwave, infrared, and ultraviolet limb sounding, nadir ultraviolet backscatter, and solar occultation techniques.

Kaye, Jack A.↗
NASA NTRS2012

Quantifying Interannual Variability of the UTLS Ozone Using Assimilation of Satellite Data

An accurate representation of spatial and temporal variability of the Upper Troposphere Lower Stratosphere (UTLS) ozone is essential for understanding both the tropospheric ozone budget and ozone s contribution to radiative forcing. The complex, dynamically driven structure of trace gas fields in the UTLS presents a challenge to data-based and modelling studies. Small features are not fully resolved in data from limb-sounding instruments such as the Microwave Limb Sounder on EOS-Aura (the EOS-MLS), but are captured in assimilation of those data as vertical structure is added from the assimilated meteorology. This will be demonstrated using a multi-year assimilation of EOS-MLS observations in the Goddard Earth Observing System, Version 5 (GEOS-5) data assimilation system. The results demonstrate the realism of the seasonal and year to year variability of laminar structures in the mid-latitudinal ozone field between years 2005-2007, for which independent validation data are available from the HIRDLS instrument. The analysis is done in the context of the underlying large scale dynamics. The lifetimes of most research instruments are too short for them to be used throughout the duration of long-term (at least 3 decades) reanalyses. For example, the EOS-MLS instrument has operated since mid-2004 until present. By contrast, Solar Backscatter Ultra Violet (SBUV) measurements provide continuous data since late 1978, but their vertical resolution is insufficient to represent the profile shape in the UTLS. Assimilation of these SBUV/2 observations in the GEOS-5 data assimilation system has hitherto not captured a realistic ozone structure in the UTLS, even though transport studies using GEOS-5 wind fields do show such structures. We show that careful construction of the background error covariance structure in GEOS-5 can lead to more realistic UTLS ozone fields when assimilating SBUV/2 observations. The reasoning behind this will be discussed, emphasizing the need to retain the sharp gradient of ozone concentrations across the tropopause. We analyze the UTLS ozone distributions in multi-year SBUV/2 assimilation experiments, comparing the results against the independent HIRDLSdataset and, for a longer period, with the MLS assimilation and discuss the consequences for tropospheric ozone and radiative forcing.

Wargan, K.↗
NASA NTRS2016

How to Interactively Operate the Global Hawk UAS NOAA/NASA ENSO Payload, from Your Armchair, Five Thousand Kilometers Away

This paper will describe the information technologies developed by NASA and NOAA for the February 2016 Sensing Hazards with Operational Unmanned Technology (SHOUT) El Niño Southern Oscillation (ENSO) Campaign. The air vehicle is a NASA Global Hawk UAS, with a primary payload of four instruments, two developed by NASA, two developed by NOAA. The aircraft is based at the NASA Armstrong Flight Research Center, Edwards Air Force Base, California. The payload components are remotely operated by scientists at various facilities, and the data collected downloaded over satellite links in real time for analysis and collaboration. NOAA: Advanced Vertical Atmospheric Profiling System (AVAPS), developed by NCAR, which deploys dozens of dropsondes at altitudes up to 65,000 ft to collect high vertical resolution measurements of the temperature, pressure, relative humidity, and wind speed and direction. NASA: High-Altitude Imaging Wind and Rain Airborne Profiler (HIWRAP), a radar designed to examine the factors of storm intensity: formation, structure and intensification. NOAA: O3 Photometer (UAS-O3), designed specifically for autonomous, precise, and accurate O3 measurements in the upper troposphere and lower stratosphere (UT/LS). NASA JPL: High Altitude MMIC Sounding Radiometer (HAMSR), an atmospheric microwave temperature and humidity sounder instrument that looks at the microwave spectrum.

Southern Oscilliation↗
NASA NTRS1984

NOAA/NASA Joint Simulation of AMTS and HIRS

Sounding simulation test was designed to compare the relative accuracies of atmospheric temperature profiles retrieved from HIRS2, the current operational infrared temperature sounder, and AMTS, a proposed advanced high spectral resolution infrared sounder. Retrievals generated by GLAS, using their physical retrieval algorithm, and NESDIS, using their operational statistical regression algorithm, for both instruments under clear and cloudy conditions were compared. In the cloudy portion of the test, MSU data, corresponding to the microwave component of the current operational sounding system, was used in conjunction with both instruments to aid in cloud seeding.

Susskind, J.↗
NASA NTRS2011

High-Altitude MMIC Sounding Radiometer - From the IIP to the Global Hawk

The HAMSR instrument is a 25 channel cross-track microwave sounder developed by the Jet Propulsion Laboratory under the IIP-98 program. The instrument was recently upgraded under the NASA AITT program in 2008 to deploy on the Global Hawk UAV. The instrument now has state-of-the-art radiometric performance and the capability to process and display both brightness temperature imagery and derived products in real time. The improved performance of the instrument is demonstrated through retrievals of temperature and water vapor.

microwave sounder↗
NASA NTRS2008

Microwave Radiometers from 0.6 to 22 GHz for Juno, a Polar Orbiter around Jupiter

A compact instrument called the MWR (microwave radiometer) is under development at JPL for Juno, the next NASA new frontiers mission, scheduled to launch in 2011. It's purpose is to measure the thermal emission from Jupiter's atmosphere at six selected frequencies from 0.6 to 22 GHz, operating in direct detection mode, in order to quantify the distributions and abundances of water and ammonia in Jupiter's atmosphere. The goal is to understand the previously unobserved dynamics of the sub-cloud atmosphere, and to discriminate among models for planetary formation in our solar system. as part of a deep space mission aboard a solar-powered spacecraft, MWR is designed to be compact, lightweight, and low power. The receivers and control electronics are protected by a radiation-shielding enclosure on the Juno spacecraft that also provides for a benign and stable operating temperature environment. All antennas and RF transmission lines outside the vault must withstand low temperatures and the harsh radiation environment surrounding Jupiter. This paper describes the concept of the MWR instrument and presents results of one breadboard receiver channel.

Jupiter↗
NASA NTRS1977

The impact of satellite soundings upon the NMC analysis and forecast system

The importance of satellite-derived soundings on National Meteorological Center weather analysis and forecast was studied by comparing summertime DST (Aug. 18-Sept. 4, 1975) forecasts generated by analyses with and without both the operational VTPR soundings from NOAA-4 and the experimental soundings derived from the infrared and microwave instruments aboard Nimbus-6. Objective and subjective procedures, including evaluation of standard skill scores and judgment by skilled synopticians, was used to evaluate the importance of satellite data. The investigation shows that satellite data do not aid numerical weather prediction in the Northern Hemisphere.

Tracton, M. S.↗