Global-scale Observations of the Limb and Disk, or GOLD, is a NASA mission launched
at 5:20 p.m. EST, Thursday, Jan. 25. GOLD is intended to perform a two-year mission imaging
Earth's thermosphere and ionosphere from geostationary orbit. GOLD is a two-channel far-ultraviolet (FUV)
imaging spectrograph built by the Laboratory for Atmospheric and Space Physics at the University of
Colorado Boulder and flown as a hosted payload on the commercial communications satellite SES-14.
SES-14 is a hybrid satellite with C- and Ku-band wide beam coverage,
as well as Ku- and Ka-band High Throughput Satellite (HTS) coverage across the
Americas and the North Atlantic region. The satellite will fully rely on electric
propulsion and will be equipped with an electric plasma propulsion system for orbit
raising and in-orbit manoeuvres. The electric propulsion system delivers significant
reduction in the weight of the satellite, enabling larger payloads to be carried.
The new spacecraft will also feature a Digital Transparent Processor (DTP), increasing
the payload flexibility to provide customized bandwidth solutions to SES's customers.