GFZ Rapid Science Orbits

DOI

Orbital products describe positions and velocities of satellites, be it the Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS) satellites or Low Earth Orbiter (LEO) satellites. These orbital products can be divided into the fastest available ones, the Near Realtime Orbits (NRT), which are mostly available within 15 to 60 minutes delay, followed by Rapid Science Orbit (RSO) products with a latency of two days and finally the Precise Science Orbit (PSO) which, with a latency of up to a few weeks, are the most delayed. The absolute positional accuracy increases with the time delay.

This dataset compiles the RSO products for various LEO missions and the appropriate GNSS constellation in sp3 format. The individual solutions for each satellite mission are published with individual DOI as part of this compilation.

GNSS Constellation:
• GNSS 24h (v01)
• GNSS 30h (v02)

LEO Satellites:
• CHAMP
• GRACE
• GRACE-FO
• SAC-C
• TanDEM-X/ TerraSAR-X

Each solution is given in the Conventional Terrestrial Reference System (CTS).

• The GNSS RSOs are 30-hour long arcs starting at 21:00 the day before the actual day and ending at 03:00 the day after. The accuracy of the GPS RSO sizes at the 3-cm level in terms of RMS values of residuals after Helmert transformation onto IGS combined orbit solutions (Version 1 GNSS RSOs are 24-hour long arcs starting at 00:00 and ending at 24:00 the actual day).

• The LEO RSOs are generated based on these 30-hour GNSS RSOs in two pieces for the actual day with arc lengths of 14 hours and overlaps of 2 hours. One starting at 22:00 and ending at 12:00, one starting at 10:00 and ending at 24:00. The accuracy of the LEO RSOs is at the level of 1-2 cm in terms of SLR validation.

The exact time covered by an arc is defined in the header of the files and indicated as well as in the filename.

This dataset compiles RSO products for various LEO missions and the corresponding GNSS constellation in sp3 format in a revised processing version 2. The switch from previous version 1 to 2 was performed on 18-Feb-2019. Major changes from version 1 to 2 are the change from IERS 2003 to IERS 2010 conventions and ITRF 2008 to ITRF-2014, as well as the temporal extension of the GNSS constellation from previous 24 hours (version 1) to 30 hours (version 2) arcs. This temporal expansion eliminates the chaining of two consecutive 24-hour GNSS constellation solutions previously used to process day-overlapping LEO arcs in Version 1.

This 24h GNSS constellation (Version 1) will continue to operate and be stored on the ISDC ftp server, as discussed in more detail in Section 8.1. All RSO LEO arcs will no longer be continued in version 1 after the changeover date and will only be available in version 2 since then.

Identifier
DOI https://doi.org/10.5880/GFZ_ORBIT/RSO
Related Identifier https://doi.org/10.48440/gfz.b103-22067
Related Identifier https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-10228-8
Related Identifier https://gssc.esa.int/wp-content/uploads/2018/07/sp3d.pdf
Related Identifier https://www.gfz-potsdam.de/en/section/global-geomonitoring-and-gravity-field/topics/earth-system-parameters-and-orbit-dynamics/operational-rso-and-nrt-orbit-determination/
Related Identifier https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-11-6687-2011
Related Identifier https://doi.org/10.1016/j.asr.2012.03.027
Related Identifier https://doi.org/10.1007/3-540-26800-6_10
Related Identifier https://doi.org/10.1007/3-540-29522-4_2
Related Identifier https://doi.org/10.1016/S0273-1177(03)00158-3
Related Identifier https://doi.org/10.1016/S0273-1177(02)00297-1
Related Identifier https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-540-38366-6_15
Related Identifier https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-10228-8_6
Related Identifier https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-10228-8_39
Related Identifier http://media.gfz-potsdam.de/geotechnologien/doc/Science_reports/SR11.pdf
Related Identifier https://doi.org/10.1007/3-540-29522-4
Related Identifier https://doi.org/10.1007/s00190-004-0379-0
Related Identifier https://doi.org/10.5880/GFZ_ORBIT/NRT
Related Identifier https://doi.org/10.5880/GFZ_ORBIT/PSO
Metadata Access http://doidb.wdc-terra.org/oaip/oai?verb=GetRecord&metadataPrefix=oai_datacite&identifier=oai:doidb.wdc-terra.org:7584
Provenance
Creator Schreiner, Patrick ORCID logo; Neumayer, Hans; König, Rolf ORCID logo
Publisher GFZ Data Services
Contributor Schreiner, Patrick; GFZ German Research Centre for Geosciences, Section 1.2
Publication Year 2022
Funding Reference Helmholtz-Zentrum Potsdam - Deutsches GeoForschungsZentrum GFZ
Rights CC BY-NC 4.0; https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/
OpenAccess true
Contact Schreiner, Patrick (GFZ German Research Centre for Geosciences, Potsdam, Germany)
Representation
Resource Type Collection
Discipline Geosciences
Spatial Coverage (-180.000W, -90.000S, 180.000E, 90.000N)