Fundamental challenges to remote sensing of exo-earths

Surface biosignatures of exo-earths: remote detection of extraterrestrial life.

Exoplanet discovery has made remarkable progress, with the first rocky planets having been detected in the central star's liquid water habitable zone. The remote sensing techniques used to characterize such planets for potential habitability and life rely solely on our understanding of life on Earth. The vegetation red edge from terrestrial land plants is often used as a direct signature of lif...

Operational Remote Sensing of ET and Challenges

Challenges in Coordinating Remote Sensing Systems

Earth scientists require timely, coordinated access to remote sensing resources, either directly by requesting that the resource be targeted at a specific location, or indirectly through access to data that has been, or will be acquired and stored in data archives. The information infrastructure for effective coordinated observing does not currently exist. This paper describes a set of capabili...

High-dispersion spectroscopy of extrasolar planets: from CO in hot Jupiters to O2 in exo-Earths.

Ground-based high-dispersion spectroscopy could reveal molecular oxygen as a biomarker gas in the atmospheres of twin-Earths transiting red dwarf stars within the next 25 years. The required contrasts are only a factor of 3 lower than that already achieved for carbon monoxide in hot Jupiter atmospheres today but will need much larger telescopes because the target stars will be orders of magnitu...

Future Opportunities and Challenges in Remote Sensing of Drought

Future Opportunities and Challenges in Remote Sensing of Drought Brian D. Wardlow, Martha C. Anderson, Justin Sheffield, Brad Doorn, Xiwu Zhan, Matt Rodell, and Others National Drought Mitigation Center, University of Nebraska-Lincoln U.S. Department of Agriculture, Agricultural Research Service Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, Princeton University National Aeronautics and Spa...