New Earth data to stream into campus

University researchers will have access to a new generation of global earth science data after a helicopter raises a new satellite tracking antenna to the top of the building housing the Space Science and Engineering Center this Saturday, Aug. 5.

To protect it from the elements, the antenna will be housed inside a 22-foot diameter radome. The helicopter will place the antenna-radome structure on top of a 40-foot tall tower that was airlifted to the roof last Nov. 27.

The structure will receive data from NASA’s Terra satellite, launched Dec. 18. Using a suite of advanced scientific instruments, scientists now are able to study the Earth in unprecedented detail. For example, UW–Madison’s SSEC researchers helped develop a key instrument aboard Terra, the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS), which acquires images of the entire surface of the Earth every two days. MODIS monitors the Earth’s land, ocean and atmosphere in many different channels, or wavelengths, that look at light in very different ways.

Scientists may combine channels or view them separately to see trends in regional and global weather. UW–Madison is developing and distributing software to research institutions around the world to help the global science community efficiently use the data.

SSEC’s Liam Gumley, program manager of the effort to create scientific products from MODIS data, says the new antenna will receive data when Terra is flying over the continental United States. Unlike the large dishes on top of the roof which receive global data from geostationary satellites that remain at the same equatorial location in the sky, Terra orbits the earth from pole to pole at about 800 miles in altitude.

“That makes it possible to cover the whole U.S. and much of central Canada from our Madison location,” Gumley says. “This antenna gives SSEC and UW–Madison the ability to receive this high-quality data in real-time as it is seen by MODIS on the spacecraft.”

The launch of Terra’s sister spacecraft, Aqua, in December will double the information flowing from to researchers, Gumley says. SSEC is one of four U.S. installations that will receive MODIS data.

SSEC researcher Christopher Moeller is pleased that information on cloud, atmospheric water vapor and aerosol distribution, land and ocean surface characteristics, and biological activity will be available in real time.

“Now we can evaluate the evolution and interaction of these complex Earth processes,” Moeller says. “This monitoring will lead to an improved understanding of the earth as a system, rather than as a series of seemingly isolated events.”

Paul Menzel, a NOAA chief scientist stationed at UW–Madison, is organizing international users of the MODIS data. “The new capabilities of MODIS offer exciting science opportunities for monitoring and understanding the interactions between land, ocean and atmosphere,” Menzel says.

Once MODIS data begins streaming into SSEC, researchers will monitor the data for new signatures of global change, in part by combining MODIS measurements with those of the other geostationary satellites. SSEC already is the NOAA national archive for the older satellites’ information. Data from MODIS will greatly expand and enhance SSEC’s archive, made available to scientists throughout the world.