Ground-based Remote Sensing

Since 1999, the OT group has operated an infrared Fourier transform spectrometer (FTS) at a primary observing site of the Network for the Detection of Stratospheric Change (NDSC). The site is located at Thule Air Force Base, Greenland where we are able to view the sun, our source of infrared radiation, from approximately mid-February to mid-October. The system is based around a Bruker 120M spectrometer with a spectral resolution of 0.0013 cm-1). Custom devices acquire and track the sun, fill the detectors with liquid nitrogen, control the operation, acquisition and storage of data, all in an autonomous mode.

Results from observations at Thule, and from the entire NDSC are contained in an archive maintained by NOAA.