ESA's sentinel missions in support of Earth system science

Abstract The spatial and temporal characteristics of the new Sentinel missions, primarily designed to provide routine multidisciplinary observations for operational services, are also very suitable for addressing some of the challenges associated with advancing Earth System sciences. The Sentinels are ensuring long-term observational commitment and will operate a range of instruments with different spectral bands and spatial resolutions with global coverage and high revisit times. The complexity of Earth System models has been increasing gradually and most simulations of future climate and Earth system evolution are based on coupled models that include aspects of physics, bio/geo-chemistry,…