Steve Love is a scientist at the Space and Remote Sensing team at Los Alamos National Laboratory. This work was done through a gift from NASA’s Earth Science Technology Office’s In-Space Validation of Earth Science Technology (Investing), and by the U.S. Department of Energy through its Laboratory Directed research and development program in Los Alamos. This article was donated to Space.com Soundtracks: Op-Ed & Insights.
The Earth’s atmosphere contains most of the nitrogen and oxygen, but fused gases, from natural sources and human activities, play an important role in the environment, air and human health. These gases contain more than 50 billion tons of global warming gases the earth is released into the atmosphere every year, along with carbon dioxide, methane, nitrous oxide and others.
Many other gases, such as nitrogen dioxide, are also important, giving urban smog its darker color. amau; Tropospheric ozone, which contributes to the poor health of smog; and sulfur dioxide, the source it is acidic. This is mainly used by man -made – power plants and cars based on fossil fuels – but volcanoes and agriculture are other sources.
Earth’s atmosphere: Information about the shields of our planet
An important part of effective pollution prevention plans is to understand the causes of these polluting gases and to understand their chemical effect on the air as they move through the air. A long -term goal sought in this area was to see the sources from the sky. Although there are others the satellites It can look at these gases on a regional scale, no one has the definitive decision to see more important details, such as pollutant chemicals in cities, or emissions. Emission of sulfur dioxide from rising volcanoes.
In addition, satellite instruments can measure large, heavy and power -hungry gases, requiring large satellite forces to develop and launch. This makes the use of a high-performance monitor, which can detect trace-gas using traditional technology which is very cost effective.
New technology development at Los Alamos National Park can provide a solution to that problem. The NanoSat Atmospheric Chemistry Hyperspectral Observation System, or NACHOS, is the first. cubesat-based hyperspectral imaging system that can compete with traditional large-satellite instruments in chemical imaging applications. Hyperspectral image is the same concept as color image, except that where each pixel has three red, green, and blue paths to represent human perception, each pixel has hundreds of colors. long waves, looking at the light with great detail in order to see the. The unique spectral index of each gas is interesting.
The system uses spherical lenses that are easy to make, have a high glass window (allow a lot of light for high visibility) and can be mounted on a satellite as large as the ball. berena. Its high precision allows researchers to detect gases not at the surface, but at the environmental scale, and can detect emissions from single plants from its previous low orbit. of 300 miles (480 kilometers) above.
Select: 10 alarming signs of climate change seen by satellites from the sky
It can be used in a variety of scientific studies, including looking at tropospheric ozone (one of the most harmful to the health of urban smog), detecting formaldehyde from wildfires and Identification and distinction between dispersing and airborne aerosols is an important factor in understanding air change.
In addition to focusing on pollution, these powerful images can improve public safety. High -resolution images can detect low levels of volcanic degassing and help provide insight into the current state of volcanic degassing. dear pit it can explode.
The first NACHOS cubesat was released in Feb. 19 on the Northrop-Grumman NG-17 Cygnus resupply vehicle, currently standing on the The space station. In preliminary tests, starting later this year after Cygnus launches and puts NACHOS into its final orbit, the research team will be looking at chemical releases from mission locations, according to Four quarters and San Juan headquarters in New. Mexico, the Los Angeles Basin, Mexico City and Popocatépetl, the volcano that rises close to the top of the city. The data collected from this project will help better understand pollution in these areas, improve the prediction of air quality and provide valuable scientific data to professionals.
Although hyperspectral imaging is a powerful technique, it produces a lot of data that can take hours to get down to the visual field. Therefore, an important goal of these tests was to evaluate NACHOS ’independent image editing ability, which would greatly shorten the time required to downlink. NACHOS uses newly built -in, more efficient computational algorithms that can quickly extract gas signals from large hyperspectral data, with only minutes to work on a small cubesat computer.
When combined in a combination of other cubesats, these cameras can provide a view of the sky with high spatial resolution and constant attention to important points. The second NACHOS cubesat is set to begin this summer. Possibly, these stars could use an inter -satellite surveillance and cueing system, where one satellite detects an unpredictable event, and then signals to other satellites with different powers that See the reason. Further detailed data, in which the two cubesats are combined by the ground -based properties of the hyperspectral generator NACHOS are developed together to produce detailed 3D maps of the pollutant gas plumes. These precious satellites and their ability to provide real -time data could change the way researchers approach space observation – and help fight climate change. in the process.
Follow us on Twitter @Spacedotcom or at Facebook.
