New NASA mission launched to observe ‘invisible universe’ on Earth | Maqvi News

FLORIDA  –  A revolutionary new satellite that will provide an unprecedented look at Earth’s microscopic marine life and tiny atmo­spheric particles has launched. The NASA PACE, or Plankton, Aerosol, Cloud, and ocean Ecosystem, mission lifted off at 1:33 a.m. ET Thursday aboard a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket from Cape Canaveral Space Force Station in Florida. The rock­et’s booster successfully landed back on Earth about 10 minutes after launch. Just over half an hour after liftoff, the team confirmed that the spacecraft’s solar ar­rays deployed and it was receiving power. The launch, initially set for Tuesday morn­ing, was delayed twice due to high winds and cumulus clouds. But the weather con­ditions were more than 95% favorable for launch Thursday morning. Scientists began envisioning a way to better under­stand how oceanic and atmospheric pro­cesses shape the planet about 20 years ago, said Jeremy Werdell, PACE project scientist. The mission will shed light on how aerosols and clouds as well as phyto­plankton in the ocean serve as indicators for ocean health and global warming. The three instruments aboard PACE, includ­ing two polarimeters and one camera, will capture a rainbow of data across differ­ent wavelengths of light that “allows us to see things we’ve never been able to see before,” said Karen St. Germain, director of NASA’s Earth Science Division. “What we’re doing here with PACE is really the search for the microscopic, mostly invis­ible universe in the sea and the sky, and in some degrees, on land, too,” Werdell said. Although designed as a three-year mis­sion, PACE has enough fuel to continue orbiting and studying Earth for up to 10 years. The spacecraft will join a fleet of more than two dozen NASA Earth sci­ence missions circling our planet that gather data on oceans, land, ice and the atmosphere to provide more in­sights into how Earth’s climate is changing. Together, missions like PACE and the international Surface Water and Ocean Topography mission, known as SWOT, that launched in 2022 could also change the way researchers understand Earth’s oceans. “We are un­deniably in the midst of a climate crisis,” said NASA Deputy Administrator Pam Melroy. “Our planet is undergoing trans­formative changes from the surge in ex­treme weather events and devastating wildfires to the rising sea levels. NASA is not just a space and aeronautics agency. We are a climate agency.