DESIS - DLR Earth Sensing Imaging Spectrometer

Abstract

Space-based hyperspectral instruments are used in many applications requiring identification of materials or helping to monitor the environment. Although there are lots of useful applications, the amount of space born data is limited. The DLR Earth Sensing Imaging Spectrometer (DESIS) is a new space-based hyperspectral instrument developed by DLR and operated under collaboration between the German Aerospace Center (DLR) and Teledyne Brown Engineering (TBE). The primary goal of DESIS is to measure and analyze quantitative diagnostic parameters describing key processes on the Earth sur-face. This goal can be reached with the instrument parameters of 235 spectral bands from 400 nm to 1000 nm and a GSD of 30 m. DESIS was installed on the International Space Station on the MUSES platform in August 2018 and is providing hyperspectral Earth Observation in the wavelength range from visible to near-infrared with high resolution and near global coverage. This contribution presents the de-sign of the compact instrument. With its interface constraints it would be also suitable for small satellite platforms.