ROSA on Oceansat-2

Abstract

ROSA (Radio Occultation Sounder of Atmosphere) is a space instrument which uses the Radio Occultation Technique to provide highly accurate measurements of the atmospheric refractive indexes from which it is possible to derive, atmospheric vertical profiles of temperature, pressure and humidity, as well as profiles of electron content in the ionosphere. The measurements, generally, are made by using meteorological balloons, able to give a very detailed atmospheric profiles but only on a local scale. From the space, ROSA, flying on a LEO orbit, is able to perform more than 500 atmospheric profiles per day on a global scale, The ROSA instrument is the core of a scientific program, of the same name, promoted by the Italian Space Agency (ASI) to contribute to a better understanding of Climate Change. This program foresees the installation of the ROSA instruments on several space missions and the developments of an ad hoc Ground Segment for the acquisition and processing of the data. The ISRO (Indian Space Research Organization) mission OCEANSAT-2 will be the first mission that will embark ROSA. OCEANSAT-2 is an operative mission for the study of the Ocean that will be launched next July 2007.