EO·Atlas
SAPHIR
Compiled from public sources on 2026-06-11. Not independently verified by Centre National d'Etudes Spatiales.
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SAPHIR is a passive microwave humidity sounder for tropical atmospheric profiling.
SAPHIR (Sondeur Atmospherique du Profil d'Humidite Intertropicale par Radiometrie) is a cross-track passive microwave humidity sounder developed by CNES for the Megha-Tropiques mission, a joint CNES-ISRO satellite dedicated to tropical atmospheric observation.[1][2] The instrument operates six channels clustered around the 183.311 GHz water-vapour absorption line at offsets of +/-0.20, +/-1.10, +/-2.80, +/-4.20, +/-6.80, and +/-11.0 GHz, enabling vertical humidity profiling in the tropical troposphere.[1] IFOV is 10 km at nadir and swath width is 1700 km.[1] Instrument mass is 18 kg and average power consumption is 30 W.[1]
Megha-Tropiques operated in a low-inclination orbit of 19 degrees, providing more frequent revisits over the tropics than sun-synchronous polar-orbiting platforms.[3] The mission was declared nominal through December 2021.[3] Data availability from SAPHIR was reduced from late 2018 onward due to instrument degradation.[4]
Compositional position
- [1]WMO OSCAR - SAPHIR instrument recordagency doc2026-06-11
- [2]SAPHIR instrument overview, AERIS data centeroperator engineering2026-06-11
- [3]Megha-Tropiques Mission Overview, eoPortalcommunity2026-06-11
- [4]Megha-Tropiques Payloads, ISRO MOSDACagency doc2026-06-11