Earth and planetary observations
Earth science observations, weather monitoring and climate variability measurement are vital to everyday life on earth. We have become so accustomed to seeing the weather on our smart-phones that it is easy to forget the optical engineering expertise that lies behind this. We at ESA are not blasé about this and continue to develop and push the boundaries of optical technology to enable ever more accurate imaging and spectroscopic measurements of the Earth, it’s land, oceans and atmosphere. Cost effectiveness of the next generation of instruments is also an aspect we don’t neglect. One of the areas in which we are very active in pushing the technology, is the development of high performance, but miniaturized, optical systems to fly on nano- and cube-satellites.
Now that all the (original 9) major planets and increasingly dwarf-planets (e.g. Pluto and Ceres) have been explored, we are entering the era of more and more dedicated investigations of the individual planets by placing satellites into orbit around them to investigate specific aspects –ESA’s Exo-Mars Trace-Gas-Orbiter is a good example. It’s primary mission it is to measure and determine the source of Methane gas in Mars’ atmosphere. Optical instrumentation is critical for these types of missions.