GOLD & ICON Missions

These are two missions of NASA.  GOLD (Global-scale Observations of the Limb and Disk) and ICON (Ionospheric Connection Explorer) will team up to explore the ionosphere, a boundary area between Earth and the space where particles have been cooked into a sea of electrically-charged electrons and ions by the Sun’s radiation. The two missions can cooperate with each other when ICON passes through GOLD’s field of view and each mission can get a snapshot of the same region. This overlap in their data makes it easier to identify reasons for changes in the upper atmosphere at a given time.

More About Global-scale Observations of the Limb and Disk (GOLD)

NASA launched its Global-scale Observations of the Limb and Disk (GOLD) mission, attaching a scientific payload to a commercial satellite for the first time in history. The mission will examine the Earth’s upper atmosphere to see how the boundary between our planet and space changes over time.

The mission will focus on the temperature and makeup of Earth’s highest atmospheric layers. Along with another upcoming satellite, called ICON, GOLD will examine how the weather on Earth – and space weather caused by the Sun – affects those uppermost layers.

• GOLD will inspect the ultraviolet radiation that the upper atmosphere releases, and will also be the first to take comprehensive records of that atmospheric layer’s temperature
• GOLD will also explore how the upper atmosphere reacts to geomagnetic storms, which are temporary disturbances of Earth’s magnetic field caused by solar activity.

At night, GOLD will examine disruptions in the ionosphere, which are dense, unpredictable bubbles of charged gas that appear over the equator and tropics, sometimes interfering with radio communications.