Terra Instruments

Features

Image from TERRA
Terra Observes Shark Bay, Australia
Tue, 01 Aug 2023 11:50 EDT

Hamelin Pool Marine Nature Reserve, seen here in an image from the Advanced Spaceborne Thermal Emission and Reflection Radiometer (ASTER) on the Terra spacecraft on Dec. 30, 2010, is a special site.

Image from TERRA
Katmai National Park
Tue, 18 Apr 2023 16:24 EDT

The Valley of Ten Thousand Smokes, located in Katmai National Park, forms a unique and ashen landscape. Encircled by volcanoes – both active and inactive – it has served as a perfect collection area for huge amounts of volcanic ash.

Image from TERRA
Eyes on the Snow as Water Supplies Dwindle
Tue, 20 Sep 2022 10:30 EDT

Water departments in the West are using maps and models originally created by a NASA team to help track water.

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CERES

Clouds and the Earth’s Radiant Energy System

CERES measures reflected and emitted from the top of Earth's atmosphere.

There are two identical CERES instruments aboard Terra that measure the Earth’s total radiation budget and provide cloud property estimates that enable scientists to assess clouds’ roles in radiative fluxes from the surface to the top of the atmosphere. One CERES instrument operates in a cross-track scan mode and the other in a biaxial scan mode. The cross-track mode essentially continues the measurements of the Earth Radiation Budget Experiment (ERBE) and the Tropical Rainfall Measuring Mission (TRMM), while the biaxial scan mode provides new angular flux information that has improved the accuracy of angular models used to derive the Earth’s radiation balance.

Two CERES sensors also fly aboard Terra’s sister ship—Aqua.

CERES Web Site (Langley Research Center)

CERES in the News