Skip to main content
Satellite orbiting Earth with the Sun and stars in the background.

Services

The services included in the Core Operational Services for AEOLUS Mission (COSA) are the following:

  • Data acquisition
  • Systematic Data Processing and Data Delivery
  • Data Archive Management
  • ECMWF Data Flow Monitoring, L2B and L2C Data Delivery and L2B Gap Production:
  • Limited Data Reprocessing

Data Acquisition

The data acquisition service covers the downlink of the X-Band telemetry, including the scientific payload data, instrument calibration data and the play-back house-keeping telemetry data.

The service also covers reconstruction of source packets with individual annotations, grouping the source packets into annotated source packets (ASP) according to their virtual channel ID and the timely transmission to the operational processing chain (APF) in Tromsø. The timely delivery of the annotated Instrument Source Packets is done via a network controlled by KSAT. The Tromsø situated APF will, in addition to the processing, timely circulate data to the following parts of the PDGS:

  • all acquired housekeeping telemetry data to FOS
  • specific monitoring reports generated by the acquisition chain to the Aeolus PDGS Surveillance Facility (APSF) to support end-to end PDGS monitoring.

The service also provides temporal storage of all acquired Aeolus data for a given time period of 3 months.

The KSAT ground stations involved in the Acquisition service are the Troll and Svalbard stations.

Systematic Data Processing and Data Delivery (from AISP up to L2A)

The Systematic Data Processing and Data Delivery service covers systematic processing from AISP data level up to L2A data products. The service is carried out for the Aeolus mission in Quasi-real time and Near-real-time performance using the APF system.

Included in the service is the timely electronic circulation using the ESA EO Network of the following products:

  • All systematically processed products to the Aeolus Data Dissemination Facility (ADDF) located in ESA’s DISSHARM infrastructure for HTTP end-user data access to nominal and meteo users
  • All systematically processed L1B products (and level 2) to the dedicated FTP server located in ESA’s DISSHARM infrastructure to be accessed by ECMWF.
  • Automatic generation of Browse information associated to L0, L1A, L1B, L2A products using the APF system
  • Automatic checking of the processed products using the quality control module (QCF) of the APF
  • Automatic packaging of output products in EO-SIP format using the APF system
  • The operational systematic processing activities include in detail:
  • Quasi Real Time processing and delivery (AISP to L0 to L1A to L1B) for a fraction of the AISP input data only (last 10 minutes of each acquired orbit):
  • Near Real Time processing and data delivery (AISP to L0 to L1A to L1B) for all the rest of the AISP input data not processed in quasi-real time
  • Systematic L2 data processing in (close to) NRT condition (L1B to L2A) for all science data

Data Archive Management

The data archive management service covers the monitoring of the arrival of Aeolus data to the operational APF system, and to the correct data ingestion and archival in the APF archive of all data received as well as all the data processed with the APF system. It furthermore covers the systematic population of the APF inventory with all Aeolus data products and associated ADFs. In addition to the archival operations related to the operational APF component, the service also includes tasks to ensure that a complete copy of all Aeolus data (including auxiliary data) is correctly circulated from the APF to the ESA Preservation Element.

The Preservation element consist of the Data Archival Service (DAS) and the cold-backup archive. Furthermore, the service also includes verification of Aeolus data archival completeness in the DAS and the cold-backup archive. Finally, the service includes verification of completeness of Aeolus data (including auxiliary data) circulation and archival in the ACMF component.

ECMWF (European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts) Data Flow Monitoring, L2B and L2C Data Delivery and L2B Gap Production:

The ECMWF data flow monitoring and gap production service ensures the arrival of Level 2B and L2C products at the APF from the ECMWF processing chain as well as timely delivery (forwarding) of these Level 2B and L2C products to the ESA Dissemination Service. The ECMWF is situated in Reading, UK.

The service also covers the processing of any missing L2B products in case of gaps in the ECMWF L2B production and the delivery of these products to the ESA Dissemination service.

Finally, the service also includes monitoring and tasks to ensure that calibration data and other mandatory auxiliary data are correctly and timely circulated from the APF system to ECMWF for Level-2 production and generation of meteorological auxiliary data.

Limited Data Reprocessing

The limited data reprocessing service covers the set-up, monitoring and reprocessing of a limited amount of Aeolus data using the ESA provided APF system. The timely dissemination of the reprocessed Aeolus data to ESA for end-user data access is also covered.

Reprocessing activities will become necessary in the case of:

  • Availability of an updated improved Aeolus IPF processor
  • Data gaps in the level 0, L1A, L1B, L2A, L2B dataset to be filled