A Simulation Method for Thermal Infrared Imagery from Moon-Based Earth Observations

Jingjuan Liao,Linan Yuan,Chenwei Nie

doi:10.1109/jsen.2021.3049912

Jingjuan Liao, Linan Yuan + Show 1 more

Open Access

https://doi.org/10.1109/jsen.2021.3049912

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Abstract

As a unique natural satellite of the Earth, the Moon has always attracted much attention, and one subject of interest is the establishment of an Earth observation platform on the Moon. Compared with the existing spaceborne and airborne observation platforms, a Moon-based Earth observation platform would have the unique advantage of the ability to obtain global and large-scale observation data. At present, the study on Moon-based Earth observations is in theory, so it is necessary to use simulation methods to understand the observation performance of a Moon-based Earth observation platform. In this study, a method for Moon-based Earth observation imaging simulation in the thermal infrared band is developed to study the Moon-based thermal infrared imaging process. The method comprises three parts, including the estimation of Moon-based imaging coverage, the acquisition of the radiation intensity at the entrance pupil, and the simulated image output from the Moon-based thermal infrared sensor. Then, the simulated results are validated with the existing spaceborne observation data. Results show that the absolute error of Moon-based thermal infrared simulations is between 1.3-5.7 K, the RMSE is between 1.38 - 3.12 K, and the relative error is between 0.44% - 2.12%, indicating that the thermal infrared imaging model can more realistically simulate the true conditions of ground surface and that a Moon-based Earth observation platform could observe the Earth in the thermal infrared band.

Highlights

R EMOTE sensing technology is currently a unique tool for quickly achieving global or large-scale Earth observations due to its global, fast, quantitative, and periodic characteristics, so it has been used in many fields such as resources, environment, socioeconomics, and national security
Because the detector module and signal processing module are related to the manufacturing process, these two parts are not described in this study, and we focus on the sensor optical system and grayscale quantification simulation
When we conduct the simulation of the Moon-based Earth observation platform, the whole Earth is divided into four regions based on the latitude and season on January 1, 2015, and every region has a unique water vapor column

Summary

Introduction

R EMOTE sensing technology is currently a unique tool for quickly achieving global or large-scale Earth observations due to its global, fast, quantitative, and periodic characteristics, so it has been used in many fields such as resources, environment, socioeconomics, and national security. Spaceborne Earth observation platforms, such as polar orbit satellites, geostationary satellites, and the Deep Space Climate Observatory (DSCOVR), have many limitations regarding acquiring global-scale data. Polar orbit satellites have high spatial resolution but low temporal resolution due to their limited orbit height and coverage, so they cannot quickly. Date of publication January 11, 2021; date of current version February 17, 2021. The associate editor coordinating the review of this article and approving it for publication was Prof.

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