Earth Observing Systems XXIX

Post-deadline submissions will be considered for the poster session, or oral session if space is available

Despite the continuing challenges of a global pandemic in recent years, the Earth Observing Systems XXVIII conference was successfully held in August 2023 in an in-person format; and the Earth observing missions continued to be launched, are awaiting launch or are in development. For example, missions recently launched include but are not limited to the NASA/NOAA Joint Polar Satellite System-2 (JPSS-2) on November 10, 2022, the ESA/EUMETSAT Meteosat Third Generation – Imager 1 (MTG-I1) on December 13, 2022, the NASA/CNES/Canadian Space Agency (CSA)/UK Space Agency Surface Water and Ocean Topography (SWOT) mission on December 16, 2022, the NASA Tropospheric Emissions: Monitoring of Pollution (TEMPO) on April 7, 2023, the China Meteorological Administration (CMA) Fengyun 3G (FY-3G) satellite on April 16, 2023 and 3F (FY-3F) satellite on August 4, 2023. Earth remote sensing missions projected for launch in late 2023-2025 timeframe include: the ESA/EUMETSAT Meteosat Third Generation Sounder (MTG-S1) satellite (2024 launch) and Sentinel-3C (2024 launch), the ESA BIOMASS satellite (2024 launch) and the FLuorescence EXplorer (FLEX) satellite (2025 launch), the CMA Fengyun 3H (FY-3H) satellite (2025 launch) and 4C (FY-4C) satellite (2025 launch), the JAXA Global Observing SATellite for Greenhouse gases and Water cycle (GOSAT-GW) (2024 launch) and Advanced Land Observing Satellite-4 (ALOS-4) (2024 launch), the ESA/JAXA Earth Cloud, Aerosol, and Radiation Explorer (EarthCARE) mission (2024 launch), the NOAA GOES-U satellite (2024 launch), the NASA Plankton, Aerosol, Cloud, Ocean Ecosystem (PACE) satellite (2024 launch), the CLARREO Pathfinder (CPF) instrument (2024 launch), the Total and Spectral Solar Irradiance Sensor-2 (TSIS-2) (2025 launch), and the NASA/Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) NISAR (2024 launch).

On an international scale, these missions have or will join the impressive number of Earth observing satellite systems currently operating on-orbit with active and passive instruments producing remote sensing data—from the ultraviolet through the radar/microwave wavelength region. This proliferation of satellite instruments requires calibration and validation of the quality of the data they produce through a combination of careful pre-launch testing, on-orbit monitoring, and on-orbit inter-instrument comparisons of measurements made by other on-orbit assets and by airborne, balloon-borne, and ground-based remote sensing instrumentation.

Advances in electro-optic technologies and data acquisition and analysis techniques by commercial, academic, and governmental research institutions have promoted the successful on-orbit operation of hyperspectral Earth remote sensing instruments and enabled the development of lower-cost, miniature satellite sensors with specific areas of performance equal to or better than those of traditional systems.

Lastly, space agencies continue to formulate and/or refine their long-term mission plans. For example, the 2017-2027 U.S. National Research Council’s Decadal Survey on Earth Science and Applications from Space continues to serve as the guide for the science and application objectives of future US space-based observations of Earth in terms of instruments and missions. NASA continues its development of its Earth Venture missions. ESA and EUMETSAT continue instrument formulation and launch planning for their future Earth Explorers, follow-on Copernicus Sentinel Missions, Meteosat Third Generation (MTG), and Polar System-Second Generation (EPS-SG) programs.

In summary, the Earth Observing Systems XXIX conference welcomes the submission of papers over a wide range of remote sensing topics. Papers are solicited in the following general areas:

• Earth-observing mission studies including new system requirements and plans
• commercial system designs
• electro-optical sensor designs and sensitivity studies
• ultraviolet through thermal infrared, microwave, radar, and lidar remote sensing systems
• hyperspectral remote sensing instruments and methodologies
• instrument sub-system and system level pre-launch and on-orbit calibration and characterization
• vicarious calibration techniques and results
• satellite instrument airborne simulators
• techniques for enhancing data processing, reprocessing, archival, dissemination, and utilization
• conversion from research to operational systems
• on-orbit instrument inter-comparison techniques and results
• enabling technologies (optics, antennas, electronics, calibration techniques, detectors, and models)
• sensor calibration traceability, uncertainty, and pre-launch to on-orbit performance assessments
• lunar radiometry and photometry
• remote sensing data acquisition and analysis.