The Spectrum of Earthshine: A Pale Blue Dot Observed from the Ground
arXiv:astro-ph/0203465 · doi:10.1086/340929
Abstract
We report the visible reflection spectrum of the integrated Earth, illuminated as it would be seen as an spatially-unresolved extrasolar planet. The spectrum was derived from observation of lunar earthshine in the range 4800 to 9200 Angstrom at a spectral resolution of about 600. We observe absorption features of ozone, molecular oxygen and water. We see enhanced reflectivity at short wavelengths from Rayleigh scattering, and apparently negligible contributions from aerosol and ocean water scattering. We also see enhanced reflectivity at long wavelengths starting at about 7300 Angstrom, corresponding to the well-known red reflectivity edge of vegetation due to its chlorophyll content; however this signal is not conclusive, due to the breakdown of our simple model at wavelengths beyond 7900 Angstrom.
11 pages, 3 figures, accepted by ApJ 20 March 2002
References in corpus (2)
Cited by in corpus (73)
- Exoplanet Biosignatures: A Review of Remotely Detectable Signs of Life
- Exoplanet Atmospheres
- Vegetation's Red Edge: A Possible Spectroscopic Biosignature of Extraterrestrial Plants
- The Pale Orange Dot: The Spectrum and Habitability of Hazy Archean Earth
- Transits of Earth-Like Planets
- Imaging Spectroscopy for Extrasolar Planet Detection
- Spectral Evolution of an Earth-Like Planet
- Spectral signatures of photosynthesis II: coevolution with other stars and the atmosphere on extrasolar worlds
- Optical Interferometry in Astronomy
- How to Characterize Habitable Worlds and Signs of Life
- Alien Maps of an Ocean-Bearing World
- The transmission spectrum of Earth through lunar eclipse observations
- Detecting the Glint of Starlight on the Oceans of Distant Planets
- Spectropolarimetric signatures of Earth-like extrasolar planets
- The Habitability of Proxima Centauri b: II: Environmental States and Observational Discriminants
- The Response of Atmospheric Chemistry on Earthlike Planets around F, G and K Stars to Small Variations in Orbital Distance
- Detection of Ocean Glint and Ozone Absorption Using LCROSS Earth Observations
- Vegetation signature in the observed globally-integrated spectrum of Earth: Modeling the red edge strength using simultaneous cloud data and application for extrasolar planets
- Mapping Earth Analogs from Photometric Variability: Spin-Orbit Tomography for Planets in Inclined Orbits
- Detecting planetary geochemical cycles on exoplanets: Atmospheric signatures and the case of SO2
- Global Mapping of Earth-like Exoplanets from Scattered Light Curves
- Deciphering Spectral Fingerprints of Habitable Extrasolar Planets
- Characterizing Habitable Exo-Moons
- The Earth as an extrasolar transiting planet: Earth's atmospheric composition and thickness revealed by Lunar eclipse observations
- Colors of a Second Earth II: Effects of Clouds on Photometric Characterization of Earth-like Exoplanets
- The search for habitable worlds: 1. The viability of a starshade mission
- Prospects for Detecting Oxygen, Water, and Chlorophyll on an Exo-Earth
- Rotational Variability of Earth's Polar Regions: Implications for Detecting Snowball Planets
- Mapping Clouds and Terrain of Earth-like Planets from Photometric Variability: Demonstration with Planets in Face-on Orbits
- Using Deep Space Climate Observatory Measurements to Study the Earth as An Exoplanet
- Detecting Volcanism on Extrasolar Planets
- Cryptic photosynthesis, Extrasolar planetary oxygen without a surface biological signature
- Globally integrated measurements of the Earth's visible spectral albedo
- Biomarkers in disk-averaged near-UV to near-IR Earth spectra using Earthshine observations
- The Dawes Review 3: The Atmospheres of Extrasolar Planets and Brown Dwarfs
- Characterizing the purple Earth: Modelling the globally-integrated spectral variability of the Archean Earth
- Earthshine observation of vegetation and implication for life detection on other planets - A review of 2001 - 2006 works
- On the effects of the evolution of microbial mats and land plants on the Earth as a planet. Photometric and spectroscopic light curves of paleo-Earths
- Habitable worlds with no signs of life
- The Vegetation Red Edge Biosignature Through Time on Earth and Exoplanets
- Measurement of the earthshine polarization in the B, V, R, and I band as function of phase
- Phase Variation of Earthshine Polarization Spectra
- Simultaneous optical and near-infrared linear spectropolarimetry of the earthshine
- The Earth as an extrasolar planet: The vegetation spectral signature today and during the last Quaternary climatic extrema
- Colors of extreme exo-Earth environments
- Transmission Spectroscopy with the ACE-FTS Infrared Spectral Atlas of Earth: A Model Validation and Feasibility Study
- Mid-Infrared Properties of Disk Averaged Observations of Earth with AIRS
- Rounding up the wanderers: optimizing coronagraphic searches for extrasolar planets
- Clouds in the atmospheres of extrasolar planets. III. Impact of low and high-level clouds on the reflection spectra of Earth-like planets
- Possibilities for an Aerial Biosphere in Temperate Sub Neptune-Sized Exoplanet Atmospheres
- Notch Filter Masks: Practical Image Masks for Planet-Finding Coronagraphs
- Towards a comprehensive model of Earth's disk-integrated Stokes vector
- Earthshine as an Illumination Source at the Moon
- Expanding the Timeline for Earth's Photosynthetic Red Edge Biosignature
- Geology and Photometric Variation of Solar System Bodies with Minor Atmospheres: Implications for Solid Exoplanets
- Laser Guide Star for Large Segmented-Aperture Space Telescopes, Part I: Implications for Terrestrial Exoplanet Detection and Observatory Stability
- Colors of an Earth-like exoplanet -- Temporal flux and polarization signals of the Earth
- In Search of the Edge: A Bayesian Exploration of the Detectability of Red Edges in Exoplanet Reflection Spectra
- Atmospheric characterization of cold exoplanets using a 1.5-m coronagraphic space telescope
- Reconstructing the photometric light curves of Earth as a planet along its history
- Tohoku-Hiroshima-Nagoya planetary spectra library: A method for characterizing planets in the visible to near infrared
- Surface and Temporal Biosignatures
- The pale blue dot: using the Planetary Spectrum Generator to simulate signals from hyper realistic exo-Earths
- High-resolution spectroscopy and spectropolarimetry of the total lunar eclipse January 2019
- Towards a data-driven model of the sky from low Earth orbit as observed by the Hubble Space Telescope
- Polarized Signatures of a Habitable World: Comparing Models of an Exoplanet Earth with Visible and Near-infrared Earthshine Spectra
- Earthshine observations at high spectral resolution: Exploring and detecting metal lines in the Earth's upper atmosphere
- Earthshine observations of an inhabited planet
- Photometric Variability in Earthshine Observations
- On the colour of the dark side of the Moon
- Exoplanet Analog Observations of Earth from Galileo Disk-integrated Photometry
- The Detectability of Earth's Biosignatures Across Time
- Detectability Simulations of a NIR Surface Biosignature on Proxima Centauri b with Future Space Observatories