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UP: Fachverband Umweltphysik

UP 3: Methoden - Fernerkundung, Messverfahren und Datenauswertung

UP 3.6: Talk

Tuesday, February 26, 2013, 16:45–17:00, HS 5

GRACE Follow-On Laser Ranging Interferometer — •Vitali Müller, Benjamin Sheard, Daniel Schütze, Gunnar Stede, Oliver Gerberding, Christoph Mahrdt, Gerhard Heinzel, and Karsten Danzmann — Max-Planck-Institut für Gravitationsphysik, Albert-Einstein-Institut, Universität Hannover, Callinstr. 38, 30167 Hannover

The joint NASA/DLR satellite pair GRACE (Gravity Recovery and Climate Experiment) has been measuring temporal and spatial variations of the geopotential since 2002. These maps of Earth's gravity field are recovered from inter-satellite distance variations and they change due to the re-distribution of Earth's mass by various geophysical effects including tides, mantle conversion or melting glaciers. Therefore, the data has a wide field of applications in geoscience.

Since the mission lifetime is drawing to an end, a GRACE follow-on mission is being developed for launch in 2017. In addition to the conventional microwave ranging system a inter-satellite laser link will be established to perform interferometric distance measurements with a precision of 80 nm/sqrt(Hz) at 100 mHz. An overview of the follow-on mission will be given, focusing on the laser ranging instrument, which will be the first inter-satellite laser ranging interferometer in Space.