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David E. Steitz
Headquarters, Washington      Jan. 27, 2003
(Phone: 202/358-1730)

Lynn Chandler
Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, Md.
(Phone: 301/286-2806)

RELEASE: 03-022

NASA'S SORCE SATELLITE SOARS INTO SPACE TO CATCH SOME RAYS

     NASA's Solar Radiation and Climate Experiment (SORCE) 
successfully launched Saturday aboard a Pegasus XL rocket.

"Saturday's successful launch adds to our constellation of 
Earth-viewing satellites that help us to understand and protect our 
home planet," said Dr. Ghassem Asrar, NASA's Associate Administrator 
for Earth Sciences, Washington.

"We are all tremendously excited by what we will learn about the solar 
climate connection from SORCE," said Bill Ochs, SORCE Project Manager 
at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md.  "We're very 
proud of the mission team led by the University of Colorado and 
supported by Orbital Sciences Corporation. This mission is a great 
example of how NASA, universities, and industry can partner to create
successful missions." 

Over the next few days, the mission team will ensure the spacecraft is 
functioning properly. The SORCE science instruments will then be 
turned on and their health verified.  Approximately 21 days after 
launch, the instruments will start science data collection, and
calibration will begin. SORCE will study the sun's influence on the 
Earth. It will measure how the sun affects the ozone layer, 
atmospheric circulation, clouds, and oceans.

This mission is a joint partnership between NASA and the University of 
Colorado's Laboratory for Atmospheric and Space Physics in Boulder, 
Colorado. The mission is a principal investigator led mission with 
NASA providing management and scientific oversight and engineering 
support. Scientists and engineers at the University of Colorado
designed, built, calibrated, and tested the four science instruments 
on the spacecraft.

The University subcontracted with Orbital Sciences Corporation for the 
spacecraft and observatory integration and testing. The Mission 
Operations Center and the Science Operations Center are both operated 
at the University. The University will operate the spacecraft over its 
five-year mission life and is responsible for the acquisition,
management, processing, and distribution of the science data.

For more information about the this mission to explore Earth's climate 
please see:

http://lasp.colorado.edu/sorce

For more information about NASA's Earth Science Enterprise and it's 
role in climate change research please see:

http://www.earth.nasa.gov

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