Intersatellite laser ranging instrument for the GRACE follow-on mission
Date
2012
Authors
Sheard, Benjamin
Heinzel, G
Danzmann, Karsten
Shaddock, Daniel
Klipstein, William
Folkner, William
Journal Title
Journal ISSN
Volume Title
Publisher
Springer
Abstract
The Gravity Recovery and Climate Experiment (GRACE) has demonstrated that low-low satellite-to-satellite tracking enables monitoring the time variations of the Earth's gravity field on a global scale, in particular those caused by mass-transport within the hydrosphere. Due to the importance of long-term continued monitoring of the variations of the Earth's gravitational field and the limited lifetime of GRACE, a follow-on mission is currently planned to be launched in 2017. In order to minimise risk and the time to launch, the follow-on mission will be basically a rebuild of GRACE with microwave ranging as the primary instrument for measuring changes of the intersatellite distance. Laser interferometry has been proposed as a method to achieve improved ranging precision for future GRACE-like missions and is therefore foreseen to be included as demonstrator experiment in the follow-on mission now under development. This paper presents the top-level architecture of an interferometric laser ranging system designed to demonstrate the technology which can also operate in parallel with the microwave ranging system of the GRACE follow-on mission.
Description
Keywords
Keywords: GRACE; gravimetry; gravity field; interferometry; satellite laser ranging; tracking GRACE; Intersatellite ranging; Laser interferometry
Citation
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Source
Journal of Geodesy
Type
Journal article