MIT professor will lead science team for NASA satellite to map Earth's water cycle

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The orbiting SMAP satellite will make simultaneous radiometer and radar measurements using a shared reflector antenna that is rotated to scan the Earth surface. The large 6 meter in diameter reflector is made up of light-weight deployable mesh materi ...
The orbiting SMAP satellite will make simultaneous radiometer and radar measurements using a shared reflector antenna that is rotated to scan the Earth surface. The large 6 meter in diameter reflector is made up of light-weight deployable mesh material that stows for launch in the rocket enclosure. Image Courtesy of NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory

MIT Professor Dara Entekhabi will lead the science team designing a NASA satellite mission to make global soil moisture and freeze/thaw measurements, data essential to the accuracy of weather forecasts and predictions of global carbon cycle and climate. NASA announced recently that the Soil Moisture Active-Passive mission (SMAP) is scheduled to launch December 2012.


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