Starting in 1978, a new window on our world was opened. That’s the year NASA’s Coastal Zone Color Scanner (CZCS) was launched to monitor the color of the ocean. This satellite had 6 channels (wavelengths of light) that it measured: 443nm, 520nm, 550nm, 670nm, 750nm, and 11500 nm. With these 6 bands, we began to monitor the ocean’s temperature, chlorophyll concentrations, and surface vegetation. Now 47 years later, NASA’s PACE mission has launched a hyperspectral satellite measuring channels at 5nm intervals across a spectrum of 350 to 885nm, opening a range of new parameters to monitor from satellites.
Ocean color is one of the branches of ocean optics, the field of study investigating how light interacts with water and the materials in water, and the focus of one of Sequoia’s crosswords; follow this link to complete it! Sequoia Scientific #2 | Crosshare crossword puzzle
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