The Atmospheric Waves Experiment (AWE)

The NASA Atmospheric Waves Experiment (AWE) mission is a Heliophysics Small Explorers Mission of Opportunity designed to investigate the properties and effects of atmospheric gravity waves as they propagate from the lower atmosphere into the upper atmosphere. AWE was launched in November 2023 to the International Space Station (ISS) for an anticipated two-year period of performance. The AWE instrument is based on the Advanced Mesospheric Temperature Mapper (AMTM) and consists of four identical telescopes that observe the nighttime OH P1(2) and P1(4) emission lines of the OH (3,1) band and the Q1(1) emission line in the OH (2,0) band, as well as the atmospheric background emission. By combining the four observations, images of the nighttime gravity wave-induced temperature disturbances in the hydroxyl (OH) airglow layer (~87 km altitude) are obtained over a 600 km field of view. The images are collected once per second, co-added, and processed into temperature swaths along the ISS orbit. This poster will present an overview of the AWE mission and show first results.

The material is based upon work supported by the National Aeronautics and Space Administration under Contract Number 80GSFC18C0007. Any opinions, findings, and conclusions or recommendations expressed in this material are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the views of NASA