On-board Data Processing for Earth and Atmospheric Observations

Abstract

The next generation Earth and Atmospheric Observation satellites, such as BIOMASS, CoReH2O, PREMIER and METOP-SG, demands sensors with higher resolution and sensitivity, resulting in higher data volumes generated by the sensors, while the downlink capacity of the modern spacecraft does not increase with the same pace. A solution to this challenge is to perform more data compression or processing on-board the satellite. In this contribution, we will introduce a data processing board, coined On-board Payload Data Processing (OPDP), which could enable such onboard processing, especially for SAR and spectrometers. We will describe how data from this type of sensors could be processed by OPDP.