Real-time data, used in everything from weather forecasts to disasters, is now being transmitted to Earth from the cone-shaped addition of the Earth’s latest Earth observation satellite.

The High Rate Data (HRD) link is an antenna of the Finnish National Polar-Orbiting Partnership (NPP) satellite that transmits “live broadcast” to users in real time. Scientists around the world can then use customized algorithms or mathematical formulas that turn raw data into images to help control rapidly changing regional events such as rapidly spreading forest fires, floodwaters and floating icebergs at poles that may affect shipping. and the fishing industry.

“Direct Broadcast data is unique in that it provides real-time information on a regional basis, allowing for a quick assessment of events at the local level,” said Patrick Coronado, of NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md. .

Typically, a satellite stores data on a train until it passes over a ground station where it downloads or “loads” the data. In the case of the Finnish nuclear power plant, the data is poured whenever it passes over a ground station in the Norwegian Svalbard, about 14 times a day. Using this storage space, called Storage Mission Data, ensures that data is not lost when the spacecraft is out of sight of ground stations, such as when it is at sea.

This collected data then passes through an on-site computer system called the Interface Data Processing Segment (IDPS), which uses scientific algorithms to create data products for environmental monitoring and research. However, this process may take some time, and some users will need the information as soon as possible.

For example, the USDA Forest Service needs data to quickly map forest fires as they begin and spread to surrounding areas to use direct transmission data, feeding them into customized algorithms that help remote sensing and image analysts process the data quickly. images and map products to allow firefighters and other first aiders to respond appropriately.

“We use live shipment data on a daily basis to produce a full line of fire mapping and geospatial products,” said Brad Quayle, image analyst at the USDA Forest Service Remote Sensing Applications Center. “We can produce about a dozen scientific products in 20 minutes after we receive raw data from the satellite, including the detection of active fires. Using other means to acquire images and manage products can add several hours to the process. Providing accurate and reliable data regions, “he added.

Currently, the USDA Forest Service uses live transmission data from the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectrometer (MODIS) on both Aqua and Terra satellites. With the new direct transmission antenna at the Finnish nuclear power plant, the organization intends to utilize the data from the nuclear power plant’s VIIRS (Visible Infrared Imaging Radiometer Suite) to strengthen its current MODIS capability and continue to produce immediate active fire maps for rescue authorities.

The USDA also uses direct shipment data to map the location and extent of burns and to track approximately 700 million acres of forest land throughout the United States.

After all, the Finnish nuclear power plant’s live data does two things: continue NASA’s role in data continuity by continuing where MODIS is, and allow users to extract important information from the Finnish nuclear power plant’s data repository.

Ultimate Public Reach

NASA Goddard’s Direct Readout Laboratory organizes and manages the routing of data to approximately 200 ground stations around the world that use it.

In the early stages of satellite development, a team of 15 scientists and engineers at Direct Readout Laboratory worked on the mission to ensure that users could receive data once the satellite had taken to space. They then provided spacecraft around the world with spacecraft-compatible software that would allow them to intercept live broadcast data, and they do all this for free.

“It’s important to do this for free because it makes it accessible to everyone; it builds relationships and promotes the exchange of information with other research and earth observation application organizations, not to mention help save lives and property,” Coronado said.

But acquiring all this free-to-air, live satellite data coming down from space requires more than just an antenna.

“Getting data from satellites is a tricky business without the right equipment, and the data is useless if you don’t have algorithms,” Coronado said.

Coronado and his team dive into the numerous algorithms that make up a global computing system to find the ones they have deemed useful to communities or that are specific to ground stations.

The Direct Readout Laboratory then compresses each individual algorithm, which can range from vegetation fire detection to cloud temperature, into a “Science Processing Algorithm” (SPA) wrapper to operate outside of the advanced IDPS environment and with direct transmission data. The Direct Readout Laboratory then creates computer programs that convert the direct transmission data into data that the wrappers can read and ensure that the data is useful as it is incorporated into the algorithm.

The Direct Readout Laboratory also provides the user community with a basic processing system called the International Polar Orbiter Processing Package (IPOPP). This framework is a real-time computing system that allows the user community to process, generate, and visualize live transmission data as it is transmitted to Earth.

The IPOPP architecture acts as a compiler, so when algorithms are connected to the software, it supports the creation of products for use in models ranging from vegetation tracking to sea surface properties, which simplifies processing tremendously.

“NASA’s Direct Readout Laboratory has made significant efforts to transfer to IPOPP the full range of the latest science processing algorithms for terrestrial, marine, and atmospheric algorithms that can be processed in a direct reading environment,” said Brian Schwind, director of the USDA Center. Forest Service Remote Sensing Application Center.

Operating in more than 15 countries, IPOPP works with live broadcast data to provide, for example, weather alerts, water measurements, sea ice data, air quality monitoring, and forest fire / smoke detection to organizations worldwide, including the U.S. Air Force and Navy. , USDA Forest Service and National Weather Service.

The Space Science and Engineering Center (SSEC) at the University of Wisconsin-Madison plays an important role as a software provider for users of the Finnish nuclear power plant’s live broadcasts. The SSEC, known as the Community Satellite Processing Package (CSPP), has already provided 40 different users, including educational institutions and government agencies, with software that converts digital signals received by an antenna into useful physical quantities such as reflectivity and temperature.

“Users are looking forward to the new sensors and features offered by the Finnish nuclear power plant, both in the United States and around the world,” says Liam Gumley, CSPP Project Manager at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. “The University is pleased to be involved in the effort to share this new weather and environmental satellite resource with the world.”