The Matera Laser Ranging
Observatory
Giuseppe Bianco
Centro di Geodesia Spaziale, ASI – Matera, Italy
FSP-06, Frascati, Italy, 21-23 March 2006
SLR concept
LAGEOS
Inclination
Perigee (km)
64.8°
19,120
diameter (cm) 129.4
mass (kg)
1415
109.8° 52.6°
5,860 5,620
60
60
411 405.4
50°
1,490
215
685
GFZ-1
Stella
Starlette
Ajisai
LAGEOS-II
LAGEOS-I
Etalon-I & -II
Geodetic satellites
50° 98.6° 51.6°
810 800 396
24 24 20
47.3 47.3 20.6
Lunar targets
Lunar reflectors
Centro di Geodesia Spaziale
Giuseppe Colombo
Matera, Italy
MLRO specifications
 Astronomical
quality telescope, 1” pointing
accuracy, 1.5 m aperture
 Day
& night, 1- and 2-color ranging
capability to satellites from 400 km orbit to
the Moon
 Single-shot
•
•
•
•
RMS jitter
 5 mm on LAGEOS ( 1 mm NP)
 5 mm on Starlette, ERS ( 1 mm NP)
 15 mm on Etalon, Glonass ( 3 mm NP)
 15 mm on Moon ( 10 mm NP)
TX-RX table
LAGEOS II observations from MLRO
20
Lageos 2 pass on 98/10/15
15
pass length = 46 min.
number of obs. = 21945
10
return rate = 80%
5
rms= 5.08 mm
0
skewness = 0.17
-5
kurtosis = -0.13
-10
700
-20
7000
7500
8000
8500
Time (sec)
9000
Number of observations
-15
600
9500
10000
500
400
300
200
100
0
-2
-1.5
-1
-0.5
0
0.5
Residuals (cm)
1
1.5
2
Ajisai residual analysis
LAGEOS I residual analysis
LAGEOS II MLRO observations
20
15
10
5
0
-5
-10
Lageos 2 pass on 29/05/2000
-15
number of obs. = 14481
mean = 0.00 mm
-20
0
500
1000
1500
Time (sec) from the pass start
2000
rms= 5.67 mm
2500
3000
LAGEOS II residual analysis
(October 15, 1998)
LAGEOS II residual analysis
(May 29, 2000)
Observed LAGEOS-2 down-spinning rate (exponential fit)
60
55
post-fit RMS 88.5 ms
50
Down-spinning rate:
factor of 2 every 1.5 years
factor of 10 every 4.9 years
Period (s) = 11.1 * e (Year-1998.79)/ 2.1
Rotation Period (s)
45
40
35
30
25
20
15
10
1998.5
1999
1999.5
2000
2000.5
2001
2001.5
2002
2002.5
Year
MLRO lunar observations
MLRO lunar observations
Two color SLR
MLRO
MM
C-MENDES
MLRO
MM
C-MENDES
Differences wrt MLRO DD
Difference of Models w.r.t. MLRO observed
10
5
Residuals (mm)
0
C-MENDES
-5
-10
MM
-15
-20
MENDES
-25
-30
10
20
30
40
50
60
Elevation (deg)
70
80
90
Quantum telecommunications
Conclusions
 Millimeter-level
 Two-color
single shot precision
capable (355 & 532 nm),
Moon capable
 Ready
for other experiments
(transponders, quantum, active optics)
 Severe
funding problems