ALOS (Advanced Land Observing Satellite)
The Japanese Earth observing satellite program consists of two series: those used mainly for atmospheric and marine observation, and those used mainly for land observation.
The ALOS (Advanced Land Observing Satellite) uses advanced technology to observe land applied for cartography, disaster monitoring e resources inventory.
The ALOS has three remote-sensing instruments: the PRISM (Panchromatic Remote-sensing Instrument for Stereo Mapping) that's capable of getting tridimentional images of the Earth surface, AVNIR-2 (Advanced Visible and Near Infrared Radiometer Type 2) used for precise land coverage observation and the PALSAR (Phased Array type L-bans Synthetic Aperture Radar) that's capable of getting day-and-night and all-weather land observation.
Designed with two of the most advanced technologies: high speed and large capacity mission data handling technology and, precision spacecraft position and attitude determination capability. They will be essential to high-resolution remote-sensing satellites in the next decade. ALOS was launched from Tanegashima Space center, Japan in January 2006.
Launch Date |
Jan. 24, 2006 |
Launch Vehicle |
H-IIA |
Launch Site |
Tanegashima Space Center |
Spacecraft Mass |
Approx. 4 tons |
Generated Power |
Approx. 7 kW (at End of Life) |
Design Life |
3 -5 years |
Orbit |
Sun-Synchronous Sub-Recurrent |
Repeat Cycle: 46 days
Sub Cycle: 2 days |
Altitude: 691.65 km (at Equator) |
Inclination: 98.16 deg. |
Attitude Determination
Accuracy |
2.0 x 10-4degree (with GCP) |
Position Determination
Accuracy |
1m (off-line) |
Data Rate |
240Mbps (via Data Relay Technology
Satellite)
120Mbps (Direct Transmission) |
Onboard Data Recorder |
Solid-state data recorder (90Gbytes) |
Mainly expectations of use of ALOS in cartography
PRISM sensor:
AVNIR-2 sensor:
-
Scaled mapping 1:50.000
- Thematic Mapping
PALSAR sensor:
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