The first images attributed to NASA’s air pollution tracking satellite have been released

NASA’s air pollution monitoring satellite managed to release its first images. This satellite named TEMPO was placed at a distance of about 35 km from the earth at the beginning of the year and can observe the earth from this distance.

According to Tekna technology and technology news service, the initial images related to this satellite including two air pollution maps around Los Angeles have been published. In this map, the levels of nitrogen dioxide in the air will be clearly visible. Also, dark colors in this map show chemical compounds at higher levels. In addition, the pollution of some other urban areas such as New York and Washington can also be seen in the images of this satellite.

“This satellite can measure air pollution in North America on an hourly basis,” said Kelly Chance, principal investigator of the TEMPO support team. Also, the levels of ozone, nitrogen dioxide, formaldehyde and suspended particles in the air and other rare gases will also be measured by the instruments of this satellite. The data collected by this satellite is also supposed to be used for 50 scientific studies.

The new TEMPO satellite is capable of measuring air pollution with high resolution and can determine air pollution changes in short periods of time. The purpose of building and sending this satellite is also to collect data about factors affecting air pollution, such as peak traffic hours or smoke related to fires.

The initial images of TEMPO are related to the calibration process of the primary instrument of this satellite, and its pollution spectrometer can measure the wavelengths of light by the gases in the atmosphere.