Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectrometer - A progress report (April 1989)

The Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectrometer (MODIS) is a facility instrument to be flown on the first Earth Observing System (scheduled launch in the late 1990s). The MODIS has two components. One component is a 110-deg-scan-angle instrument called MODIS-N (nadir). This instrument has 40 selected bands supporting observations of the land surface, the oceans, and atmosphere in the visible, NIR, short-wave IR (1.0-3.0 microns), and thermal IR (3.0-15.0 microns). The other component is a 90-deg-scan-angle scanning instrument that can tilt fore and aft along the satellite track, called MODIS-T (tilt). Both MODIS-N and MODIS-T are nearing the end of detailed design studies. The driving scientific requirements include absolute calibration accuracy 2 percent, instrument-induced polarization less than 2 percent, SNR reaching 800:1 for observing ocean color at large solar zenith angles, and dynamic range allowing observations of cloud characteristics and snow-covered areas.