Photonic Integrated Circuits in Space: The Hyperspectral Microwave Photonic Instrument (HyMPI)

Our Team's Hyperspectral Microwave Photonic Instrument (HyMPI) breaks away from 40-year old microwave sounding technology and breaks through to a new era of advanced measurements of Earth's atmospheric temperature and water vapor profiles. Hyperspectral (a few hundred to a few thousand channels) microwave sensors have been strongly advocated by numerous space and meteorological agencies worldwide, to augment Earth atmosphere sounding capability of temperature and water vapor from space. In general, the strength of a microwave sensor rests in its high cloud penetrability, which enables retrieval of temperature and water vapor under all sky conditions. However, the current Program of Record (POR), (e.g., the Advanced Technology Microwave Sounder (ATMS), the Time Resolved Observations of Precipitation structure and storm Intensity with a Constellation of Smallsats (TROPICS)) only have a couple dozen sparsely sampled channels. This hinders vertical resolution and accuracy in the retrieved temperature and water vapor soundings, limiting data utilization. The Earth's planetary boundary layer (PBL) is the most affected region, due to the opacity introduced by the overlaying atmospheric layers. The reason for stalled progress in hyperspectral microwave technology rests in the numerous technological challenges associated with simultaneously processing an ultra-wide bandwidth (20-200 GHz) at hyperspectral resolution (< 1 GHz), while maintaining a feasible instrument size, weight and power consumption, and cost (SWaP-C). Traditional microwave radiometers are based on radio-frequency (RF) technology whose constraints limit the capabilities of current spectrometers. However, SWaP-C can be improved by means of photonic signal processing techniques, enabled by up-conversion of a microwave signal to an optical carrier. This proposal aims to solve the SWaP-C challenge of current RF technology by combining Photonic Integrated Circuits (PICs) and Application Specific Integrated Circuits (ASICs) into a "PICASIC" module, the heart of the hyperspectral microwave spectrometer. The results will yield a low mass, low power, high spectral resolution and wide band instrument. The PICASIC modular approach enables full-spectrum (20 – 200 GHz) and contiguous spectral coverage with a tunable capability to measure the spectrum with higher resolution where higher structure in the signal is exhibited. The proposed PICASIC is the missing puzzle piece, the critical technology element, needed to realize HyMPI, a first of a kind combined hyperspectral microwave imager and sounder. The NASA Planetary Boundary Layer (PBL) Incubation Study Team Report lists hyperspectral microwave sensors as an "Essential Component" of the future global PBL observing system, to provide "accurate PBL and free tropospheric 3D temperature and water vapor structure context". We studied a Hyperspectral Microwave Photonic Instrument (HyMPI) design configured to respond to the requirements outlined in the PBL Study Team Report. One of the primary goals of this proposal is to finalize instrument design trade studies and derive a final optimal configuration ready for follow-on airborne flight demonstrations. Key to improved retrieval thermodynamic structure are the HyMPI's enhanced spectral coverage and resolution, uniquely enabled by the PICASIC technology. Thanks to the reduced SWaP-C also enabled by the PICASIC technology, HyMPI can meet the 5km spatial resolution requested by the PBL Study Team Report and achieve a Smallsat/Cubesat deployable capability, key to provide high temporal refresh for weather applications. Following the proposed research effort, the PICASIC can be proposal-ready for the first in-space demonstration of an integrated hyperspectral microwave photonic system with science-grade performance. The period of performance is February 1, 2022 to January 31, 2025. The entry TRL is 2, the exit TRL is 5.

Enabling lower cost innovative remote sensing instrument development from concept through breadboard and demonstration

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