Consider it the "mother of all tests." This summer, the PACE spacecraft (short for Plankton, Aerosol, Cloud, ocean Ecosystem) completed a critical phase of its launch journey: the thermal vacuum test (TVAC), where it was subjected to extreme temperatures and pressures in a specialized chamber at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland. The …
NASA researcher Joaquin Chaves calls it "ground truthing," even though land is nowhere in sight. This spring, Chaves boarded the Atlantic Meridional Transect (AMT) research cruise for six weeks of sampling water and taking measurements as the ship traversed the Atlantic Ocean. His team, based at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland, uses …
Although PACE was formally authorized in 2015, its concept has been on the minds of NASA Earth scientists for over 21 years. In 2023, that concept is now an assembled spacecraft at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland. This past month, the PACE (Plankton, Aerosol, Cloud, ocean Ecosystem) mission advanced closer to launch, …
Whether in plants or animals, greenhouse gases or smoke, carbon atoms exist in various compounds as they move through a multitude of pathways within Earth's system. That's why NASA's Plankton, Aerosol, Cloud, ocean Ecosystem (PACE) mission – scheduled to launch in January 2024 – was designed to peer down at Earth from space to see …
The Ocean Color Instrument (OCI) is integrated onto the PACE spacecraft in the cleanroom at Goddard Space Flight Center. Credit: NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center. The PACE satellite now has all three of its scientific instruments attached to the spacecraft, as the integration crew bolted the Ocean Color Instrument into place with its two polarimeter …
NASA's PACE mission, which will provide a major boost to scientists studying Earth's atmosphere and ocean health, completed a milestone test in October at the agency's Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland. The Ocean Color Instrument (OCI) on the Plankton, Aerosol, Cloud, ocean Ecosystem (PACE) mission passed thermal vacuum tests to ensure it can …
