Abstract
Nowadays, planet Earth faces the possibility of rapid environmental change, including climate change, deforestation, desertification, ozone depletion, and acid rain. Such changes would have a profound impact to all nations.
However, we do not fully understand their long-term implications. For example, magnitude and timing of global warming are quite uncertain.
At present, it is difficult to quantify certain process at many temporal and spatial scales. We need to develop a clearer picture of regional as well as global processes.
Remote sensing from space can provide the global, repeatable, continuous observations of processes needed to understand the Earth system as a whole.
EOS (Earth Observing System) program is a NASA-initiated concept that uses space-based measurement systems to provide the scientific basis for understanding global change.
The Advanced Spaceborne Thermal Emission and Reflection Radiometer (ASTER), developed by the Ministry of International Trade and Industry (MITI), is a research facility instrument to be installed on NASA's EOS AM-1 platform in 1998. The primary science objective of the ASTER mission is to improve understanding of the local-and regional-scale processes occurring on or near the Earth's surface and lower atmosphere, including surface-atmosphere interactions.
