KEYWORDS: Short wave infrared radiation, Radiometry, Thermography, Signal processing, Infrared radiation, Calibration, Sensors, Space operations, Visible radiation, Near infrared
ASTER (Advanced Spaceborne Thermal Emission and Reflection Radiometer) System is operating more than 15 years since launched on board of NASA’s Terra spacecraft in December 1999. ASTER System is composed of 3 radiometers (VNIR (Visible and Near Infrared Radiometer), SWIR (Short-Wave Infrared Radiometer), and TIR (Thermal Infrared Radiometer)), CSP (Common Signal Processor) and MSP (Master Power Supply). This paper describes the ASTER System operating history and the achievement of ASTER System long term operation since the initial checkout operation, the normal operation, and the continuous operation. Through the 15 years operation, ASTER system had totally checked the all subsystems (MPS, VNIR, TIR, SWIR, and CSP) health and safety check using telemetry data trend evaluation, and executed the necessary action. The watch items are monitored as the life control items. The pointing mechanics for VNIR, SWIR and TIR, and the cooler for SWIR and TIR are all operating with any problem for over 15 years. In 2003, ASTER was successfully operated for the lunar calibration. As the future plan, ASTER team is proposing the 2nd lunar calibration before the end of mission.
The Advanced Spaceborne Thermal Emission and Reflection Radiometer (ASTER) is a high-resolution optical sensor system that can observe in a wide region from the visible and near-infrared, the short wavelength infrared to the thermal infrared with 14 spectral bands on board of NASA’s Terra spacecraft for Earth Observing System (EOS) “A mission to planet earth." ASTER achieved 5 years mission success on orbit operation normally which is the specified target after launched on December, 1999. And after through 10 years continuous orbit operation, ASTER has still operating the long life observation of extra success to be 15 years in total on December, 2014. As for ASTER instrument that is composed of 3 radiometers; the Visible and Near Infrared Radiometer (VNIR) with 3 bands, the Short Wavelength Infrared Radiometer (SWIR) with 6 bands, the Thermal Infrared Radiometer (TIR) with 5 bands, overall ASTER long life data taken by 15 years onboard operation has been reviewed from the point of view of the health and safety check by Telemetry (TLM) data trend, the function and performance evaluation by observation data trend, the onboard calibration and verification by periodic Calibration(CAL) data trend. As a result, the radiometric degradation of VNIR and TIR and the temperature rise of SWIR detector were identified as significant challenges. The countermeasure plan towards the end of mission was clarified and also the novel lessons learned was verified.
The ASTER Instrument is one of the five sensors on the NASA’s Terra satellite on orbit since December 1999. After 14 years on orbit, ASTER VNIR and TIR are still taking Earth images of good quality. The TIR radiometer has five bands from 8 to 12 μm with spatial resolution of 90 m. Each band has ten detectors. The detectors are cooled at 80 K precisely by using a Stirling cooler within 0.1 K. TIR is radiometrically calibrated by a single onboard blackbody. In the normal operation mode the blackbody is kept at 270 K, and once in 49 days the blackbody is heated up to 340 K for the gain calibration. The degradation at band 12 is largest and 48% and that at band 10 is smallest and 18%. One of the possible causes of the degradation is the contamination accretion by outgas of silicone SE9188 RTV used for TIR followed by the ultraviolet radiation. The absorption spectra of outgas of this silicon was measured at JAXA and the absorption spectra showed similar to the TIR degradation in the early days on orbit. ASTER science team is proposing the second lunar calibration at the end of terra mission for the estimation of the TIR optical characteristics. ASTER experienced first lunar calibration in April 2003 and many of the TIR bands were saturated. Due to the responsivity degradation the TIR dynamic range has extended to higher temperature. At least TIR four bands will not saturate in the next lunar calibration.
In this paper, we present a feasibility study for the potential of a high spatial resolution and wide swath thermal infrared (TIR) imaging radiometer for a small satellite using a large format uncooled infrared focal plane array (IR-FPA). The preliminary TIR imaging radiometer designs were performed. One is a panchromatic (mono-band) imaging radiometer (8-12μm) with a large format 2000 x 1000 pixels uncooled IR-FPA with a pixel pitch of 15 μm. The other is a multiband imaging radiometer (8.8μm, 10.8μm, 11.4μm). This radiometer is employed separate optics and detectors for each wave band. It is based on the use of a 640 x 480 pixels uncooled IR-FPA with a pixel pitch of 25 μm. The thermal time constant of an uncooled IR-FPA is approximately 10-16ms, and introduces a constraint to the satellite operation to achieve better signal-to-noise ratio, MTF and linearity performances. The study addressed both on-ground time-delayintegration binning and staring imaging solutions, although a staring imaging was preferred after trade-off. The staring imaging requires that the line of sight of the TIR imaging radiometer gazes at a target area during the acquisition time of the image, which can be obtained by rotating the satellite or a steering mirror around the pitch axis. The single band radiometer has been designed to yield a 30m ground sample distance over a 30km swath width from a satellite altitude of 500km. The radiometric performance, enhanced with staring imaging, is expected to yield a NETD less than 0.5K for a 300K ground scene. The multi-band radiometer has three spectral bands with spatial resolution of 50m and swath width of 24km. The radiometric performance is expected to yield a NETD less than 0.85K. We also showed some preliminary simulation results on volcano, desert/urban scenes, and wildfire.
The SWIR(Short Wave-length Infrared Radiometer) is one of the optical sensors in ASTER(Advanced Space-borne
Thermal Emission and Reflection Radiometer). ASTER is installed in the EOS(Earth Observing System) TERRA
spacecraft of NASA. TERRA was launched on December18, 1999, and is employed still on the orbit for 14 years in
January, 2014, The detector of SWIR is cooled at temperature 77K by cryocooler with the optimum sensitivity. SWIR
had continued to take the numerous image data for more than five years of the mission period on orbit, and the
cryocooler is still operating normally. However, a gradual rise in temperature of the detector has been seen after launch.
Silicone compound have been used in order to achieve heat transfer between the detector and the cryocooler. On
investigation, we have found that thermal conductivity of the silicone compound has been gradually reduced. We
evaluated the low temperature properties (such as thermal conductivity, strength etc.) of the silicone compound. In
addition, we analyzed the temperature conditions and the thermal stress values of cryostat in the orbit. As a result, the
silicone compound solidified at low temperature shows a behavior similar to adhesive. Depending on the thermal stress
generated at a low temperature, there is a possibility that destruction such as peeling occurs.
KEYWORDS: Sensors, Short wave infrared radiation, Signal to noise ratio, Calibration, Absorption, Optical filters, Filtering (signal processing), Linear filtering, Temperature metrology, Spectral calibration
HISUI (Hyperspectral Imager SUIte) is the next Japanese earth observation sensor, which consists of hyperspectral and
multispectral sensors. The hyperspectral sensor is an imaging spectrometer with the VNIR (400-970nm) and the SWIR
(900-2500nm) spectral channels. Spatial resolution is 30 m with swath width of 30km. The spectral resolution will be
better than 10nm in the VNIR and 12.5nm in the SWIR. The multispectral sensor has four VNIR spectral bands with
spatial resolution of 5m and swath width of 90km. HISUI will be installed in ALOS-3 that is an earth observing satellite
by JAXA. It will be launched in FY 2015. This paper is concerned with the effect of temperature on onboard calibration
reference material (NIST SRM2065) for spectral response functions (SRFs) retrieval of the hyperspectral sensor. Since
the location and intensity of absorption features are sensitive to material temperature, the estimated center wavelength and bandwidth of the SRFs may include the uncertainty. Therefore, it is necessary to estimate the deviation of the wavelength and the bandwidth broadening of the SRFs when the material temperature changes. In this paper we describe the evaluation of uncertainty of the SRF’s parameters retrieval and show some simulation’s results.
HISUI (Hyper-spectral Imager SUIte), which is the next Japanese earth observation project, has been developed under
the contract with Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry(METI) and New Energy and Industrial Technology
Development Organization(NEDO). HISUI is composed of hyper-spectral sensor and multi-spectral sensor. The hyperspectral
sensor is an imaging spectrometer with two separate spectral channels: one for the VNIR range from 400 to 970
nm and the other for the SWIR range from 900 to 2500 nm. Ground sampling distance is 30 m with spatial swath width
of 30 km. The spectral sampling will be better than 10 nm in the VNIR and 12.5 nm in the SWIR. The multi-spectral
sensor has four VNIR spectral bands with spatial resolution of 5m and swath width of 90 km. HISUI will be installed in
ALOS-3 that is an earth observing satellite in the project formation phase by JAXA in FY 2015. This paper is concerned
with the retrieval of spectral response functions (SRF) for the hyper-spectral sensor. The center wavelength and
bandwidth of spectral response functions of hyper-spectral sensor may shift and broaden due to the distortion in the
spectrometer, the optics and the detector assembly. Therefore it is necessary to measure or estimate the deviation of the
wavelength and the bandwidth broadening of the SRFs. In this paper, we describe the methods of retrieval of the SRF's
parameters (Gaussian functions assumed) by means of onboard calibration sources and we show some simulation's
results and the usefulness of this method.
KEYWORDS: Sensors, Short wave infrared radiation, Spectrographs, Signal to noise ratio, Radiometry, Signal processing, Spectral calibration, Signal detection, Telescopes, Spectral resolution
The hyper-multi spectral mission named HISUI (Hyper-spectral Imager SUIte) is the next Japanese earth observation
project that will be on board ALOS-3 satellite. This project is the follow up mission of the Advanced Spaceborne
Thermal Emission and reflection Radiometer (ASTER). HISUI is composed of hyperspectral radiometer with higher
spectral resolution and multi-spectral radiometer with higher spatial resolution. The functional evaluation model is under
development to confirm the spectral and radiometric performance prior to the flight model manufacture phase. This
model contains the VNIR and SWIR spectrograph, the VNIR and SWIR detector assemblies with a mechanical cooler
for SWIR, signal processing circuit and on-board calibration source.
The Japanese hyper-spectral sensor provides data products covering continuous spectral bands in the wavelength range
from 400 nm to 2500 nm. It is characterized by a SNR of > 450 in the VNIR and>300 in the SWIR range at a ground
resolution of 30 m x30 m. This report is concerned with the onboard wavelength calibration methods for the Japanese
hyper-spectral sensor. As a result of trade study, the combination of a transmission type glass filter containing rare earth
oxides, a Mylar polyester film and a quartz tungsten-halogen-lamp was selected. This method covers the wavelength
range from 400 nm to 2450 nm. For the purpose of wavelength shift estimation, the method employing the mean square
deviation as merit-function was found to be stable and precise. The accuracy of the absorption peak wavelength
determination will be expected less than 2% (=0.2 nm) for the VNIR spectral resolution and 5% (=0.625 nm) for the
SWIR spectral resolution.
A solid state airborne lidar for profiling cloud and aerosol scattering has been demonstrated. The transmitter of the lidar is a laser diode pumped Q-switched Nd:YLF laser. The wavelength of the laser is 1,053 nm, output energy from a transmitter optics is 16.5 mJ and repetition rate is 50pps. Eye safety is obtained through beam expansion, whose divergence is 2.6mrad. The diameter of the telescope made of beryllium is 200mm, the field of view is 0.3mrad. The receiver employs a photon counting solid state Geiger mode avalanche photodiode. The vertical resolution is 75m. The received signals were integrated 300 times to the horizontal direction to improve the signal to noise ratio. The measurements for airmolecule, aerosol and cloud were performed using the lidar in November, 1997. The airplane made a round trip from Nagoya airport to Kashima nada via Tsukuba in Japan. The altitude of the airplane was 6,150 m. The measurements indicate that the lidar is capable of detecting and profiling cloud and aerosol scattering through the atmosphere.
In the Mission Demonstration Satellite Lidar (MDS-lidar) Project, the National Space Development Agency of Japan (NASDA) has started development of a satellite-borne lidar system for experiments in space, which is called Experimental Lidar-In-Space Equipment (ELISE). Its main purposes are to demonstrate technical feasibility of a space-borne lidar and its key components, and also to get scientific data on clouds/aerosols distribution for better understanding of the earth climate system. Presentation will be made on the ELISE development plan, scientific goals and their implementation plan.
Since Nd-doped fiber amplifiers could be used as power amplifiers for high data rate optical inter-orbit communications, we have fabricated and studied a square shaped double clad Nd-doped fiber for the 1.06 micrometers amplifier characteristics. The output signal power is not saturated up to 1 watt level using the single frequency broad linewidth signal source. It is, however, saturated at a few hundred milliwatts by a stimulated Brillouin scattering effect using narrow linewidth non-modulated linewidth signal source. The maximum output power of 1.17 Watts is obtained with extraction efficiency of 37 percent from absorbed pump power. The net gain is estimated more than 25dB.
For future spaceborne water vapor DIAL systems, we started a laser design study in 1994. New laser materials such as Cr:LiSAF are very attractive, but at present there are no high power diode lasers for direct pumping those materials. Therefore we determined to develop a high power diode-pumped Nd:YLF laser and Ti:sapphire laser for water vapor DIAL. The output energy of Nd:YLF laser is expected to be 550 mJ at 1053 nm and 400 mJ at 527 nm with a maximum repetition rate of 150 Hz. A Ti:sapphire laser will be pumped by the SHG of the Nd:YLF laser. Tuning of the Ti:sapphire laser to a strong absorption line (ON1), a weak absorption line (ON2) of water vapor and an off line (OFF) is made by an injection seeder which consists of two single longitudinal mode laser diode modules. Two on-line laser diodes are locked to water vapor absorption lines using an absorption cell or a photo-acoustic cell. These three laser lines (ON1, OFF and ON2) are transmitted into the atmosphere with a triple pulse technique for measurements of water vapor profiles from the ground up to 10 km. The laser spectral width of the on line is expected to be 0.5 pm with a stability of 0.05 pm. The output energy of each laser line is to be more than 100 mJ. This laser system will be developed within three years, and then incorporated as an airborne water DIAL.
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