Climate science in orbit

Earthshine

During the new Moon phase in each month of his Huginn mission, Andreas floated in the Cupola to capture images of the Moon as Earth reflected sunlight on the lunar surface, as part of the Earthshine experiment.

While Andreas took many images from the International Space Station, people on Earth supported the experiment as well: “Andreas took over 4500 images over seven new Moon phases and we received more than 1500 images from people from Australia and Vietnam to the Canary Islands in Spain and the USA and many more, who wanted to help out with our experiment,” says Peter Thejll, senior scientist at Danish Meteorological Institute.

Peter is excited that so many people wanted to take part in citizen science with Earthshine. “Our resident bachelor student, Mathilde Schou from Technical University Denmark, is analysing the images at the moment and we look forward seeing the results,” he adds.  

ANITA-2

The Space Station is a closed environment where astronauts live and work. Making sure the air they breathe is safe is vital for the crew: this is ANITA-2’s job, monitoring the air quality of the International Space Station. The small experiment runs autonomously in the background, allowing astronauts to work knowing ANITA-2 has their back. While Andreas was on the Space Station, he also used the analyser to take air samples of incoming cargo vehicles, like the Dragon. 

ASIM

Looking at the edge of Earth, the Atmosphere-Space Interactions Monitor (ASIM) is located on the outside of Columbus. ASIM has X-ray and gamma ray detectors that look for dark lightning also known as Terrestrial Gamma-ray Flashes (TGFs), as well as a Modular Multi-Imaging Assembly (MMIA) that captures images of rare lightning phenomena. ASIM is operated from the ground and has continued its operation during Andreas’s mission, collecting data to understand Earth’s upper atmosphere and bringing more knowledge about our climate.

In April 2024, ASIM was moved back to its original position of pointing nadir i.e. straight down towards Earth, after making way for another experiment. In the two years it spent pointing at the edge of Earth, it continued performing science, looking out for TGFs.

Thor-Davis

The study of rare lightning phenomena in and above thunderstorms caught the eye of Andreas, as well as the lens of the Davis-camera. Andreas managed to capture many thunderstorms and even a red sprite, which you can see a video of below.

Project scientist of the Thor-Davis experiment, Olivier Chanrion, senior researcher at the Technical University of Denmark was delighted by Andreas’s work. “The experiment went well, with more than 60 storms captured by Andreas. This was more than we expected, and we proved that the Davis camera works” says Olivier.

Aquamembrane

Clean water is vital, both on the Space Station and on Earth. Andreas also tested the Aquamembrane technology during his first space mission in 2015.

This time, Andreas passed around 1.5 litres of wastewater through the membrane, the size of a suitcase, that mimics nature’s way of purifying water. The sample water was returned to Earth in late 2023. The company behind the membrane, Aquaporin, is now working on analysing the samples: ” We are very happy and grateful for Andreas’s work. The system worked flawlessly, and he conducted the tests we wanted without issues” says Jörg Vogel, VP of Open Innovation at Aquaporin. “We are now working on identifying contaminants from the wastewater and our membrane’s ability to reject them in microgravity. We have a high confidence that the transport of water through our Aquaporin Inside®-membrane is no affected by microgravity as the speed and amount of water through the membrane is similar in space and on Earth.” he adds.
The company expects the results to help progress their water recovery system that is expected to be ready within the next two years.