[A-CG36] Satellite Earth Environment Observation

[ACG36-04] NASA’s PACE Mission: shedding new light on the ocean and the atmosphere above

*Lachlan McKinna^1,2, Sean Bailey³, Brian Cairns⁴, Ivona Cetinić^1,5, Bryan Franz¹, Gerhard Meister⁴, Meng Gao^1,6, Amir Ibrahim¹, Kirk Knobelspiesse¹, Antonio Mannino¹, Frederick Patt^1,8, Andrew Sayer^1,7, Jeremy Werdell¹ (1.NASA GSFC, Code 616, Greenbelt, MD, USA, 2.GO2Q, Sunshine Coast, QLD, Australia, 3.NASA GSFC, Code 619, Greenbelt, MD, USA, 4.NASA GISS, New York, NY, USA, 5.GESTAR II, MSU, Baltimore, MD, USA, 6.SSAI, Lanham, MD, USA, 7.GESTAR II, UMBC, Baltimore, MD, USA, 8.SAIC, Greenbelt, MD, USA)

Keywords:Remote sensing, radiometry, polarimetry, oceanography, atmosphere, climate

On 8 February 2024, NASA successfully launched the Plankton, Aerosol, Cloud, ocean Ecosystem (PACE) Mission. PACE is a strategic climate continuity activity that will extend key heritage ocean color, cloud, and aerosol data records, and enable new insight into oceanographic and atmospheric responses to Earth's changing climate. The primary instrument, the Ocean Color Instrument (OCI), is a global imaging spectrometer that spans the ultraviolet (UV), visible (VIS) and near-infrared (NIR) region in 2.5 nm steps and includes seven discrete shortwave infrared bands from 940 to 2260 nm. This leap in technology will enable improved understanding of aquatic ecosystems and biogeochemistry, as well as provide new information on phytoplankton community composition, and improved water quality monitoring. PACE's spectrometer will also continue many aerosol, cloud, and land capabilities from MODIS and VIIRS, which in combination with its ocean measurements, will enable improved assessment of aerosol impacts on ocean biology and chemistry. The PACE payload will be complemented by two multi-angle polarimeters, the Spectro-polarimeter for Planetary Exploration (SPEXone) and the Hyper-Angular Rainbow Polarimeter 2 (HARP2). SPEXOne will span the UV-VIS-NIR region while HARP2 four discrete spectral channels (441, 549, 669, 873 nm). Data collected by SPEXOne and HARP2 will significantly improve aerosol and hydrosol characterizations. The PACE instrument suite will revolutionize studies of global biogeochemistry, carbon cycles, hydrosols/aerosols, and clouds in the ocean-atmosphere system. In this presentation, I will provide an overview of the PACE mission’s science objectives, sensor payload, distributed data products, and the field validation activities. A highlight will be a series of images captured by PACE showcasing the mission’s unique capabilities.