The possibilities of polar meteorology,environmental remote sensing,communications and space weather applications from Artificial Lagrange Orbit |
| |
Authors: | Matthew A. Lazzara Alex Coletti Benjamin L. Diedrich |
| |
Affiliation: | 1. Antarctic Meteorological Research Center, Space Science and Engineering Center, University of Wisconsin-Madison, 1225 West Dayton Street, Madison, WI 53706, USA;2. SM Research Corporation, Washington, DC 20706, USA;3. NOAA Satellite and Information Service, Office of Systems Development, Advanced Satellite Planning and Technology, Silver Spring, MD 20910, USA |
| |
Abstract: | The ability to observe meteorological events in the polar regions of the Earth from satellite celebrated an anniversary, with the launch of TIROS-I in a pseudo-polar orbit on 1 April 1960. Yet, after 50 years, polar orbiting satellites are still the best view of the polar regions of the Earth. The luxuries of geostationary satellite orbit including rapid scan operations, feature tracking, and atmospheric motion vectors (or cloud drift winds), are enjoyed only by the middle and tropical latitudes or perhaps only cover the deep polar regions in the case of satellite derived winds from polar orbit. The prospect of a solar sailing satellite system in an Artificial Lagrange Orbit (ALO, also known as “pole sitters”) offers the opportunity for polar environmental remote sensing, communications, forecasting and space weather monitoring. While there are other orbital possibilities to achieve this goal, an ALO satellite system offers one of the best analogs to the geostationary satellite system for routine polar latitude observations. |
| |
Keywords: | Artificial Lagrange Orbit Solar sail Remote sensing Space weather Polar meteorology Satellite composite |
本文献已被 ScienceDirect 等数据库收录! |
|