Satellite launched by India and Nasa will track changes to Earth's land and ice
The 1.3 billion dollar (£980 million) mission will help forecasters and first responders stay one step ahead of floods, landslides, volcanic eruptions and other disasters, according to scientists.
Rocketing to orbit from India, the satellite will survey virtually all of Earth's terrain multiple times. Its two radars — one from the US and the other from India — will operate day and night, peering through clouds, rain and foliage to collect troves of data in extraordinary detail.
Microwave signals beamed down to Earth from the dual radars will bounce back up to the satellite's super-sized antenna reflector perched at the end of a boom like a beach umbrella.
Scientists will compare the incoming and outgoing signals as the spacecraft passes over the same locations twice every 12 days, teasing out changes as small as a fraction of an inch.
It's 'a first-of-its-kind, jewel radar satellite that will change the way we study our home planet and better predict a natural disaster before it strikes,' Nasa's science mission chief Nicky Fox said ahead of liftoff.
Ms Fox led a small Nasa delegation to India for the launch.
It will take a week to extend the satellite's 30ft boom and open the 39ft-in-diameter drum-shaped reflector made of gold-plated wire mesh. Science operations should begin by the end of October.
Among the satellite's most pressing measurements: melting glaciers and polar ice sheets; shifting groundwater supplies; motion and stress of land surfaces prompting landslides and earthquakes; and forest and wetland disruptions boosting carbon dioxide and methane emissions.
Nasa is contributing 1.2 billion dollars (£900 million) to the three-year mission – it supplied the low-frequency radar and reflector.
The Indian Space Research Organisation's 91 million dollar (£68 million) share includes the higher-frequency radar and main satellite structure, as well as the launch from a barrier island in the Bay of Bengal. It is the biggest space collaboration between the two countries.
The satellite called Nisar — short for Nasa-Isro Synthetic Aperture Radar — will operate from a near-polar-circling orbit 464 miles high. It will join dozens of Earth observation missions already in operation by the US and India.
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Yahoo
34 minutes ago
- Yahoo
Mind-Blowing Discovery: Peacocks Have Lasers In Their Tails
Sharks with frickin' lasers are tired news. Peacocks, apparently, are where it's truly at. Famous for their dazzling iridescence, peacock feathers are known to contain nanostructures that scatter light in ways that make their plumage shimmer in hues of blue and green. Applying a special dye to multiple areas on a peacock's tail, researchers from Florida Polytechnic University and Youngstown State University in the US went on the hunt for structures that may emit a very different signature glow. In a mind-blowing first for the animal kingdom, they discovered the eyespots on the fowl's fabulous feathers have unique properties that align light waves by bouncing them back and forth, effectively turning them into yellow-green lasers. Related: The word laser itself is an acronym for Light Amplification by Stimulated Emission of Radiation. Shine a light on atoms in certain materials, such as certain dyes or crystals, and they'll collectively excite one another into releasing a flood of photons. This kind of light amplification isn't rare in nature, attracting the attention of researchers who are interested in developing biological lasers. To become a bona fide laser beam, however, the buildup of stimulated waves must be neatly aligned so their phases march in step. One way to achieve this is to reflect the waves back and forth in a confined space known as an optical cavity. The researchers found evidence of optical cavities in the form of resonating nanostructures in different parts of the eyespot, all faintly emitting two different wavelengths: green and yellow/orange. Exactly what kind of structure is responsible for aligning the amplified light at these colors isn't clear. But the fact they are found across the feather, all emitting the same precise wavelengths in a signature fashion, is a sign that something strange is at work. Identifying the physical properties of these resonators could lead to advances in laser technology, or provide biologists with a new tool for analyzing living materials. As for the peacocks, we can only guess why evolution built lasers into their stunningly iridescent plumage. Given how biologists are quickly coming to terms with the way animals fluoresce and shine in patterns and colors beyond our perception, it may be for displays that other peacocks are well adapted to see. Perhaps sharks with lasers aren't such a terrible idea after all. This research was published in Scientific Reports. Related News World's Longest Lightning Strike Crossed 515 Miles From Texas to Kansas Stunning New Video Reveals Deepest-Known Undersea Life Forms How a Giant Earthquake Triggered a Surprisingly Small Tsunami Solve the daily Crossword
Engadget
2 hours ago
- Engadget
NASA's latest mission to the ISS features a bacterial experiment
Scientists are sending several strains of disease-causing bacteria to the International Space Station as part of the Crew-11 mission. This experiment isn't the plot to some cheesy horror film, but a scientific investigation from the Sheba Medical Center in Israel and the US-based company Space Tango with the goal of better understanding how bacteria spread and behave under extreme conditions. The experiment includes E. coli, along with bacteria that cause diseases like typhoid fever and the infection commonly known as Salmonella. After reaching the ISS, the experiment will see the different bacterial species grow before being returned to Earth to be tested against counterparts that were grown simultaneously in an identical lab under normal conditions. The experiment's results will help scientists understand how bacteria respond to zero gravity and could help astronauts, who are more prone to infections during missions due to stress, exposure to radiation and changes in gravity. However, the research could prove useful beyond space missions. With the onset of superbugs that show antibiotic resistance, the experiment could reveal ways to combat more robust bacterial strains. "This experiment will allow us, for the first time, to systematically and molecularly map how the genetic expression profile of several pathogenic bacteria changes in space," Ohad Gal-Mor, head of the Infectious Diseases Research Laboratory at Sheba, said in a press release. The medical center previously conducted a test with bacteria in simulated space conditions, which showed a reduced ability to develop antibiotic resistance, but the latest experiment is the first one to take place at the ISS. It's not the first time scientists have studied bacteria's behavior in microgravity conditions, since researchers from the University of Houston tested how E. coli would grow in a simulated space environment back in 2017. More recently, NASA launched an experiment tasking astronauts to swab the interiors of the ISS and test them for evidence of antibiotic-resistant bacteria.
Yahoo
3 hours ago
- Yahoo
SpaceX, NASA scrub Crew-11 astronaut launch due to weather (video)
When you buy through links on our articles, Future and its syndication partners may earn a commission. CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. — SpaceX scrubbed today's (July 31) launch attempt of the Crew-11 astronaut mission for NASA. Launch officials called the scrub just over a minute before liftoff, due to a bank of cumulus clouds that appeared over in the skies over NASA's Kennedy Space Center here. "Unfortunately, the weather is just not playing alongside with today's excitement on the launch for NASA SpaceX's Crew-11," NASA commentator Derrol Nail said during today's launch coverage. "We could literally see the clouds kind of going over top of our heads, getting close to the pad, and the standoff area is a 10-mile radius around the pad for these dark clouds, cumulous clouds, and that is a safety factor," Nail added. "That is because you don't want to send a rocket through a tall cloud like that — that could generate some energy from the rocket passing through it." SpaceX will try again on Friday (Aug. 1) at 11:43 a.m. EDT (1543 GMT). There's another chance on Saturday (Aug. 2) at 11:21 a.m. EDT (1521 GMT). When it launches, Crew-11 will see a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket take off from Launch Complex 39A at KSC. Atop the rocket is the company's Crew Dragon Endeavour spacecraft making its sixth flight, a reuse record for Crew Dragon vehicles. The four crewmembers of Crew-11 are NASA astronauts Zena Cardman and Mike Fincke, Kimiya Yui of the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) and Oleg Platonov of Russia's space agency Roscosmos. When it launches, Crew-11 will embark on a roughly 40-hour flight to catch up with the International Space Station, orbiting at a speed of about 17,500 mph (28,000 kph) some 248 miles (400 kilometers) above the surface of Earth. As its name implies, Crew-11 will be the eleventh operational astronaut mission SpaceX has flown for NASA, through the agency's Commercial Crew Program, which sees NASA send astronauts to and from the ISS on private spacecraft. Solve the daily Crossword
