Spectrometer

A solar tracking Direct beam Irradiance Airborne Spectrometer (DIAS) is used for calculation of line of sight ozone and wavelength dependent aerosol optical depths.

The AIM-IT instrument (Meteor Tracker) was developed for rapid pointing and meteor tracking. Its purpose is to image bright meteors in high resolution, searching for jets and other plasma ejections. During the 2001 Leonids, the instrument carried a light collection lens with a fiber optic connection to a spectrograph.

The coastal zone is home to a high fraction of humanity and increasingly affected by natural and human-induced events from tsunamis to toxic tidal blooms. Current satellite data provide a broad overview of these events but do not have the necessary spectral, spatial and temporal, resolution to characterize and understand these events.

To address this gap, a compact, lightweight, airborne Portable Remote Imaging SpectroMeter (PRISM) compatible with a wide range of piloted and Uninhabited Aerial Vehicle (UAV) platforms are curently being developed at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory. Operating between the spectral range of 350 nm and 1050 nm, PRISM will offer high temporal resolution and below cloud flight altitudes to resolve spatial features as small as 30 cm. The sensor performance exceeds the state of the art in light throughput, spectral and spatial uniformity, and polarization insensitivity by factors of 2-10, while at the same time extending the spectral range into the ultraviolet. PRISM will also have a two-channel spot radiometer at short-wave infrared (SWIR) band (1240 nm and 1640 nm). It will be in co-alignment with the spectrometer in order to provide accurate atmospheric correction of the ocean color measurements.

The development of the PRISM instrument is supported by NASA Earth Science Division’s the Ocean Biology and Biogeochemistry, Earth Science Technology, and Airborne Sciences programs within NASA’s Earth Science Division.

The MASTER is similar to the MAS, with the thermal bands modified to more closely match the NASA EOS ASTER (Advanced Spaceborne Thermal Emission and Reflection Radiometer) satellite instrument, which was launched in 1998. It is intended primarily to study geologic and other Earth surface properties. Flying on both high and low altitude aircraft, the MASTER has been operational since early 1998.

Instrument Type: Multispectral Imager
Measurements: VNIR/SWIR/MWIR/LWIR Imagery

The MASTER is similar to the MAS, with the thermal bands modified to more closely match the NASA EOS ASTER (Advanced Spaceborne Thermal Emission and Reflection Radiometer) satellite instrument, which was launched in 1998. It is intended primarily to study geologic and other Earth surface properties. Flying on both high and low altitude aircraft, the MASTER has been operational since early 1998.

Instrument Type: Multispectral Imager
Measurements: VNIR/SWIR/MWIR/LWIR Imagery

The MODIS Airborne Simulator (MAS) is a multispectral scanner configured to approximate the Moderate-Resolution Imaging Spectrometer (MODIS), an instrument to be orbited on the NASA EOS-AM1 platform. MODIS is designed to measure terrestrial and atmospheric processes. The MAS was a joint project of Daedalus Enterprises, Berkeley Camera Engineering, and Ames Research Center. The MODIS Airborne Simulator records fifty spectral bands.

The MODIS Airborne Simulator (MAS) is a multispectral scanner configured to approximate the Moderate-Resolution Imaging Spectrometer (MODIS), an instrument to be orbited on the NASA EOS-AM1 platform. MODIS is designed to measure terrestrial and atmospheric processes. The MAS was a joint project of Daedalus Enterprises, Berkeley Camera Engineering, and Ames Research Center. The MODIS Airborne Simulator records fifty spectral bands.

The Hyperspectral Thermal Emissions Spectrometer (HyTES) instrument has 512 pixels across track with pixel sizes in the range of 5 to 50 m depending on aircraft flying height and 256 spectral channels between 7.5 and 12 µm. The HyTES design is built upon a Quantum Well Infrared Photodetector (QWIP) focal plane array (FPA) , a cryo-cooled Dyson Spectrometer and a high-efficiency, concave blazed grating, produced using E-beam lithography.

HyTES will be useful for a number of applications, including high-resolution surface temperature and emissivity measurements and volcano observations. HyTES measurements will also be used to help determine scientifically optimal band locations for the thermal infrared (TIR) instrument for the Decadal HyspIRI mission.