Displaying items by tag: atmosphere

The National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR) is a North American federally funded research and development center devoted to service, research and education in the atmospheric and related sciences.

NCAR's mission is to understand the behavior of the atmosphere and related physical, biological and social systems; to support, enhance and extend the capabilities of the university community and the broader scientific community – nationally and internationally; and to foster transfer of knowledge and technology for the betterment of life on Earth.

The National Science Foundation is NCAR's primary sponsor, with significant additional support provided by other U.S. government agencies, other national governments and the private sector.

GATS, Inc. is an aerospace company founded in 1986.

GATS primary area of business is support of satellite-based atmospheric remote sensing projects. This includes all phases of project life cycle, from concept development to data dissemination and research efforts. GATS propose calibration and performance analysis software, radiative transfer packages, flight operations utilities, and web-based project and data management systems.

MSG, Meteosat Second Generation, is a serie of geostationary meteorological satellites operated by EUMETSAT. 

It consists of a series of four geostationary meteorological satellites, along with ground-based infrastructure, that will operate consecutively until 2020. The MSG satellites carry a pair of instruments — the Spinning Enhanced Visible and InfraRed Imager (SEVIRI), which has the capacity to observe the Earth in 12 spectral channels and provide image data which is core to operational forecasting needs, and the Geostationary Earth Radiation Budget (GERB) instrument supporting climate studies.

It was designed in response to user requirements to serve the needs of Nowcasting applications and numerical weather prediction. In addition the GERB instrument provides important data for climate monitoring and research.

The MSG satellites are spin-stabilised like the previous generation, but with many design improvements. The more frequent and comprehensive data collected by MSG also aids the weather forecaster in the swift recognition and prediction of dangerous weather phenomena such as thunderstorms, fog and explosive development of small but intense depressions which can lead to devastating wind storms.

The MSG satellites are 3.2 m in diameter and 2.4 m high and spins anti-clockwise at 100 RPM at an altitude of 36,000 km.

On January 29, 2004 the first Meteosat Second Generation satellite MSG-1, renamed to Meteosat-8, commenced routine operations.