earth online

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Earth Explorers

ESA's Earth Explorer missions are dedicated to addressing key scientific challenges identified by the EO community. Each mission employs the latest technological developments to observe different EO fields.

  • EarthCARE

    EarthCARE examines the role clouds and aerosols play in trapping infrared radiation emitted from Earth's surface.

  • Swarm

    Swarm is dedicated to creating a highly detailed survey of Earth’s geomagnetic field and its temporal evolution as well as the electric field in the atmosphere using a constellation of three identical satellites.

  • CryoSat

    CryoSat determines variations in the thickness of continental ice sheets and marine ice cover. Europe's first ice mission is an advanced radar altimeter specifically designed to monitor the most dynamic sections of Earth's cryosphere.

  • SMOS

    The Soil Moisture and Ocean Salinity (SMOS) mission is dedicated to making global observations of soil moisture over land and salinity over oceans.

  • Biomass

    The objective of the Biomass mission is to determine the global distribution of forest biomass.

  • FLEX

    The FLEX mission will provide global maps of vegetation fluorescence, which can be converted into an indicator of photosynthetic activity.

  • Aeolus

    The Aeolus mission which was launched into space on 22 August 2018 and was retired on 30 April 2023, provided global observations of wind profiles from space to improve the quality of weather forecasts, and to advance our understanding of atmospheric dynamics and climate processes.

  • GOCE

    ESA's Gravity field and Ocean Circulation Explorer (GOCE) mission mapped Earth's geoid very accurately, opening a window into Earth's interior structure as well as the currents circulating within the depths of its oceans.

  • Swarm Product Data Handbook

    The Swarm Product Data Handbook provides a detailed description of Level 1b and Level 2 products derived from Swarm data.