Lexington, Massachusetts – Atmospheric and Environmental Research, Inc. (AER) has been selected as lead algorithm developer by the National Polar-orbiting Operational Environmental Satellite System (NPOESS) Integrated Program Office for the Conical Microwave Imager Sounder (CMIS) weather instruments. AER will be supporting Boeing Satellite Systems (BSS) of El Segundo, CA. BSS is a unit of The Boeing Company, the largest aerospace company in the world and the United States' leading exporter. AER's algorithm team will include Remote Sensing Systems of Santa Rosa, CA.

NPOESS, the next generation of low earth orbit environmental satellite system, combines the country's military and civilian weather satellite programs, NOAA's Polar-orbiting Operational Environmental Satellites and the Department of Defense's Defense Meteorological Satellite Program into a single system, which is expected save up to $1.8 billion over the life of the program.

The CMIS payload will be an "all weather" sensor with microwave imager and sounder capability to provide 20 different environmental data records. The microwave imager channels help measure environmental data such as wind speed and direction over the ocean, and soil moisture. The microwave sounder channels measure the vertical profiles of atmospheric temperature and moisture.

"The AER CMIS team builds on over 20 years of corporate experience in microwave remote sensing and weather prediction science," said Ron Isaacs, AER senior vice president. "Once again, we are very pleased to be part of this great national effort."
AER is the premier algorithm developer for NPOESS. In June1999, an AER team was selected to develop algorithms for the Ozone Mapping and Profiler Suite (OMPS), which will measure how much ozone is in our atmosphere and how the ozone concentration varies with altitude. In September, 1999, an AER team was selected to develop the algorithms for the Cross-Track Infrared Sounder (CrIS), which will infer the vertical profiles of atmospheric temperature, moisture, and pressure for the initialization of numerical weather prediction models.

Founded in 1977, Atmospheric and Environmental Research, Inc. is an award-winning environmental research and consulting company with demonstrated expertise in remote sensing, satellite meteorology, atmospheric sounding, numerical weather prediction, climatology, circulation diagnostics, atmospheric chemistry, air quality and risk assessment, mathematical modeling, planetary sciences, and systems engineering. In addition to its Lexington, MA headquarters, AER has offices in Washington, D.C., San Francisco and Los Angeles, CA and Omaha, NE.