21st Century Complete Guide to Radar Imaging from Space - NASA 3D Mapping, Shuttle Radar Missions, Simulated Flyover Movies

This electronic book on CD-ROM provides comprehensive coverage of NASA's radar imaging of Earth from space, including the Shuttle Radar Topography Mission (SRTM), SIR-C and X-SAR. Over 350 image files in JPG and GIF format are provided for use in any computer graphics program, and fifteen flyover simulation movies in MOV and MPG format are also included.

The SRTM data flight occurred Feb. 11-22, 2000 on STS-99 and successfully fulfilled all mission objectives, mapping over 80% of the Earth's surface. Following a lengthy calibration and validation phase, the 12 terabytes of raw data are currently being processed into digital elevation maps. There is extensive imaging radar program data from JPL, and many images from the SIR-C and X-SAR programs. Image categories include: Archaeology * Cities * Ecology & Agriculture * Geology * Interferometry * Oceans * Rivers * Snow, Ice, Glaciers * Volcanoes.

Spaceborne Imaging Radar-C/X-Band Synthetic Aperture Radar (SIR-C/X-SAR) is a joint U.S.-German-Italian project that uses a highly sophisticated imaging radar to capture images of Earth that are useful to scientists across a great range of disciplines. The instrument was flown on two flights in 1994. One was on space shuttle Endeavour on mission STS-59 April 9-20, 1994. The second flight was on shuttle Endeavour on STS-68 September 30-October 11, 1994.

Also included is detailed material on the AIRSAR mission (Airborne Synthetic Aperture Radar) mission. The AIRSAR instrument is mounted aboard a modified NASA DC-8 aircraft. During data collection, the plane flies at 8 kilometers over the average terrain height at a velocity of 215 meters per second. The Airborne Synthetic Aperture Radar (AIRSAR) is an all-weather imaging tool able to penetrate through clouds and collect data at night. The longer wavelengths can also penetrate into the forest canopy and in extremely dry areas, through thin sand cover and dry snow pack. AIRSAR was designed and built by the Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) which also manages the AIRSAR project. AIRSAR serves as a NASA radar technology testbed for demonstrating new radar technology and acquiring data for the development of radar processing techniques and applications. As part of NASA's Earth Science Enterprise, AIRSAR first flew in 1988 and continues to conduct at least one flight campaign each year, either in the United States or on an international mission.

In all, the disc has over 6000 pages reproduced using Adobe Acrobat PDF software - allowing direct viewing on Windows and Apple Macintosh systems. Reader software is included on the CD.

Our CD-ROMs are privately-compiled collections of official public domain U.S. federal government files and documents. They are designed to provide a convenient user-friendly reference work utilizing the benefits of the Adobe Acrobat format to uniformly present thousands of pages that can be rapidly reviewed, searched by finding specific words, or printed without untold hours of tedious research and downloading. Vast archives of important public domain government information that might otherwise remain inaccessible are available for instant review no matter where you are. This book-on-a-disc makes a great reference work and educational tool. There is no other reference that is as fast, convenient, comprehensive, and portable - everything you need to know, from the federal sources you trust.