Flower elliptical-orbit constellation exploiting millimetre-wave radiometry and radio occultation for meteo-climatological applications
This paper reports on the potential of combining elliptical-orbit Flower constellations with millimeter-wave radiometry and radio-occultation, a mission concept briefly named FloRad2. The advantages of flower constellation with respect to conventional orbits are discussed, including the flexibility...
| Main Authors: | , |
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| Format: | Article |
| Language: | English |
| Published: |
Copernicus Publications
2010-07-01
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| Series: | Advances in Geosciences |
| Online Access: | http://www.adv-geosci.net/25/167/2010/adgeo-25-167-2010.pdf |
| Summary: | This paper reports on the potential of combining
elliptical-orbit Flower constellations with millimeter-wave radiometry and
radio-occultation, a mission concept briefly named FloRad2. The advantages
of flower constellation with respect to conventional orbits are discussed,
including the flexibility ensuring increasing coverage with separate
launches. Millimeter-wave radiometry and radio-occultation receivers provide
the advantage to design fairly compact payloads that comply well with
current technology of mini-satellites. Millimeter-wave radiometry and
radio-occultation techniques are somewhat complementary and an optimal
combination of these observations results in atmospheric products with
enhanced vertical and horizontal resolutions. Thus, the combination of
small, light payloads employing millimeter-wave radiometry and
radio-occultation with Flower elliptical-orbit constellations may result in
an optimal compromise between retrieval performances and system complexity
that is ideal for continued long-term missions with meteorological and
climatological applications. |
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| ISSN: | 1680-7340 1680-7359 |