Indian space agency ISRO and its U.S. counterpart NASA are gearing up for a collaborative launch of a radar satellite later this year, named the NASA-ISRO Synthetic Aperture Radar mission (NISAR). This joint effort aims to capture crucial Earth data, measuring the health of wetlands, ground deformation caused by volcanoes, and the dynamics of land and sea ice.
NISAR will play a pivotal role in unraveling the intricate processes that lead to significant changes in ice sheets covering Antarctica and Greenland, as well as in mountain glaciers and sea ice globally.
NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory highlighted the significance of NISAR in providing the most comprehensive understanding to date of the motion and deformation of frozen surfaces in Earth’s ice- and snow-covered regions, collectively known as the cryosphere.
Glaciologist Alex Gardner from NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory emphasized the urgency of comprehending the ongoing changes, stating, “Our planet has the thermostat set on high, and Earth’s ice is responding by speeding up its motion and melting faster. We need to better understand the processes at play, and NISAR will provide measurements to do that.”
Scheduled for launch in 2024 by ISRO from southern India, NISAR is designed to observe nearly all of the planet’s land and ice surfaces twice every 12 days, offering an unprecedented frequency of data collection.
The satellite’s capabilities will be enhanced through the use of two radars: an L-band system with a 10-inch (25-centimeter) wavelength and an S-band system with a 4-inch (10-centimeter) wavelength.
NISAR’s orbit orientation will allow it to collect data from Antarctica’s far interior, close to the South Pole. Given that Antarctica’s ice sheets hold the planet’s largest reservoir of frozen fresh water, understanding the rate at which ice may be lost is crucial for accurate sea level rise projections, as per NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory.
The expanded coverage provided by NISAR will be particularly vital for studying the flow of ice from central Antarctica’s high elevations toward the sea. Additionally, the satellite’s measurements will enable scientists to closely examine the complex interactions at the intersection of ice and ocean.
(Inputs from ANI)