Climate monitoring satellite EarthCARE with star sensors from Jena has been successfully in space for the first 100 days.

EarthCARE (short for: Earth Clouds, Aerosols and Radiation Explorer) investigates, among other things, the interactions between clouds and aerosols and how these influence the Earth's radiation budget and therefore its climate. Just one month after the launch, one of the four Earth observation instruments on board delivered the first image, providing insights into the structures of clouds and their dynamics.

The satellite, built by Airbus as prime contractor, is a joint project of the European Space Agency ESA and the Japanese space agency JAXA. The successful launch of the mission took place 100 days ago today on May 29, 2024 with a SpaceX rocket (Vandeburg, California, USA).

Over 75 companies, institutes and agencies are involved in the mission for climate and environmental research. Among them is the Thuringian space technology company Jena-Optronik GmbH. The Jena-based specialists are supporting EarthCARE with two ASTRO APS star sensors. As part of the satellite's attitude control system, the sensors from Jena enable it to be positioned with high precision in its orbit 393 km above the Earth.

The special technical feature here: EarthCARE navigates without a gyroscope, i.e. its attitude control is made possible mainly by the Jena sensors. The satellite is the first to demonstrate this technology in agile low Earth orbit.