Earth Imaging From the Surface of the Moon With a DSCOVR/EPIC-Type Camera

Nick Gorkavyi, Simon Carn, Matt DeLand, Yuri Knyazikhin, Nick Krotkov, Alexander Marshak, Ranga Myneni, Alexander Vasilkov
2021 Frontiers in Remote Sensing  
The Earth Polychromatic Imaging Camera (EPIC) on the Deep Space Climate Observatory (DSCOVR) satellite observes the entire Sun-illuminated Earth from sunrise to sunset from the L1 Sun-Earth Lagrange point. The L1 location, however, confines the observed phase angles to ∼2°–12°, a nearly backscattering direction, precluding any information on the bidirectional surface reflectance factor (BRF) or cloud/aerosol phase function. Deploying an analog of EPIC on the Moon's surface would offer a unique
more » ... pportunity to image the full range of Earth phases, including observing ocean/cloud glint reflection for different phase angles; monitoring of transient volcanic clouds; detection of circum-polar mesospheric and stratospheric clouds; estimating the surface BRF and full phase-angle integrated albedo; and monitoring of vegetation characteristics for different phase angles.
doi:10.3389/frsen.2021.724074 fatcat:ehk42sov7fcrrj52zanwtdzkva