Engineering:CloudSat

From HandWiki
CloudSat
CloudSat spacecraft model.png
Artist's Concept of CloudSat
Mission typeAtmospheric research
OperatorNASA
COSPAR ID2006-016B
SATCAT no.29107
WebsiteCloudSat home page
Mission durationPlanned: 22 months
Elapsed: 18 years, 2 months, 17 days
Spacecraft properties
BusBCP-2000
ManufacturerBall Aerospace
Launch mass700 kg (1,543 lb)
Dimensions2.54 × 2.03 × 2.29 m (8.3 × 6.7 × 7.5 ft)
(H × L × W)
Start of mission
Launch dateApril 28, 2006, 10:02:16 (2006-04-28UTC10:02:16) UTC
RocketDelta II 7420-10C
Launch siteVandenberg Air Force Base SLC-2W
End of mission
DisposalPassivation
DeactivatedDecember 20, 2023, 11:10:30 UTC
Last contactApril 2024 (2024-05) (planned)
Orbital parameters
Reference systemGeocentric
RegimeLEO
Semi-major axis7,080.59 km (4,399.67 mi)
Eccentricity0.0000824
Perigee altitude709 km (441 mi)
Apogee altitude710 km (440 mi)
Inclination98.23 degrees
Period98.83 minutes
RAAN330.82 degrees
Argument of perigee91.62 degrees
Mean anomaly14.57 degrees
Mean motion14.57
Epoch25 January 2015, 03:10:38 UTC[1]
Revolution no.46,515
 

CloudSat is an inactive NASA Earth observation satellite, which was launched on a Delta II rocket on April 28, 2006, and is awaiting disposal. It used radar to measure the altitude and properties of clouds, adding to information on the relationship between clouds and climate in order to help resolve questions about global warming.[2]

It operated in daytime-only operations from 2011 to 2023 due to battery malfunction, requiring sunlight to power the radar. On December 20, 2023, the Cloud Profiling Radar was deactivated for the final time, ending the data collection portion of the mission.

The mission was selected under NASA's Earth System Science Pathfinder program in 1999. Ball Aerospace & Technologies Corp. in Boulder, Colorado, designed and built the spacecraft.

CloudSat's primary mission was scheduled to continue for 22 months to allow more than one seasonal cycle to be observed.

Instrument

The Delta II rocket with CloudSat and CALIPSO on Launch Pad SLC-2W, VAFB.
CloudSat at Vandenberg Air Force Base.
Animation of CloudSat's orbit. Earth is not shown

The main instrument on CloudSat was the Cloud Profiling Radar (CPR), a 94-GHz nadir-looking radar that measures the power backscattered by clouds as a function of distance from the radar. The radar instrument was developed at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) in Pasadena, California, with hardware contributions from the Canadian Space Agency. The overall design of the CPR was simple, well understood, and had a strong heritage from the many cloud radars already in operation in ground-based and airborne applications. Most of the design parameters and subsystem configurations were nearly identical to those for the Airborne Cloud Radar, which has been flying on the NASA DC-8 aircraft since 1998.

The CPR capitalized on existing radar expertise and experience at JPL. Other radars already flown successfully or developed by JPL include the Seasat SAR, the Shuttle Imaging Radars (SIR-A, SIR-B, SIR-C), the Shuttle Radar Topography Mission (SRTM), Magellan Venus Radar Mapper, Cassini Radar (mapping Saturn's moon Titan), NSCAT, and SeaWinds.

Based on radar lifetime data, NASA expected the radar to operate for at least three years with a 99% probability.

CloudSat is managed by the Jet Propulsion Laboratory. Colorado State University provides scientific leadership and science data processing and distribution. The cost of this project was approximately $200 million.[3]

Impact on radio astronomy

Power levels of the CloudSat radar were such that the receiver electronics deployed on a typical radio telescope could be burned out if the telescope was pointing at the zenith during an overflight. Moreover, the typical receiver would probably saturate during an overflight (or near overflight) no matter where the radio telescope were pointed, and similarly strong signal levels would have been received if a telescope pointed at or near CloudSat whenever the satellite was above the horizon (which could be of order one hour per day at a typical location). The narrow-band, Doppler-shifted radar signal would probably have been detectable in even fairly short integrations no matter where a radio telescope were pointed, whenever CloudSat was above the horizon.[4][5][6]

See also

References

  1. ↑ "CLOUDSAT Satellite details 2006-016A NORAD 29107". N2YO. 25 January 2015. http://www.n2yo.com/satellite/?s=29107. 
  2. ↑ Stephens, Graeme L.; Vane, Deborah G.; Boain, Ronald J.; Mace, Gerald G.; Sassen, Kenneth; Wang, Zhien; Illingworth, Anthony J.; O'connor, Ewan J. et al. (2002). "THE CLOUDSAT MISSION AND THE A-TRAIN: A New Dimension of Space-Based Observations of Clouds and Precipitation". Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society 83 (12): 1771–1790. doi:10.1175/BAMS-83-12-1771. ISSN 0003-0007.  open access
  3. ↑ "CloudSat Press Kit". NASA/JPL. http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/press_kits/cloudsat-calipso-launch.pdf. 
  4. ↑ "Radio Astronomy and CloudSat". Scientific Committee on Frequency Allocations for Radio Astronomy and Space Science. http://www.iucaf.org/CloudSat/. 
  5. ↑ "CLOUDSAT - consequences for Radio Astronomy". Institut de Radioastronomie Millimétrique. https://www.iram.fr/IRAMFR/ARN/aug05/node5.html. 
  6. ↑ Liszt, Harvey (2020-01-08). "Radio Astronomy in a New Era of Satellite Radiocommunication". AAS 235. p. 27m08s. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QM1eh7nq24I#27m08s. 

External links



Retrieved from "https://handwiki.org/wiki/index.php?title=Engineering:CloudSat&oldid=3234628"