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Where we are today,
think of as the box of eight crayons,

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and you can do a lot of amazing things
with that.

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So the information content
for any singular

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instrument on PACE is way
more than we're used to.

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OCI is going to be the box of 96
or 128 crayons.

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And so suddenly the tools you have at
your fingertips will fill

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in all the gaps of color
that we could possibly want.

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This observatory is going to provide
global coverage every day.

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That is another scale of this total volume
that is really, really increasing

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the amount of information
we have to work with.

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We know the atmosphere is changing.

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We know carbon
dioxide levels have increased.

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We know that has warmed our atmosphere.

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Circulation patterns are changing.

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Places are warmer than they used to be.

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The deeper dive
we take into the relationships

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between land, ocean and atmosphere,

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the more we realize we don't know
and we need to learn.

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NASA is preparing to take that deeper dive
with the Plankton,

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Aerosol, Cloud, ocean Ecosystem
mission, or PACE.

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The PACE mission
and its suite of instruments

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will gather new data
on these interconnected Earth systems.

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The exchange of carbon
between the oceans, land and atmosphere.

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The impacts of atmospheric particles
on marine communities of phytoplankton.

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The changes these communities
are experiencing in a warmer Earth.

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Reducing the uncertainty of aerosols
and scientific climate models.

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PACE will improve our understanding
of these complex connections

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and how these systems are affected
in a changing climate.

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The color of the oceans can tell us a lot
about our changing Earth systems,

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but there's much more to it
than just what the eye can see.

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And so PACE carries
the Ocean Color Instrument, or OCI,

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to continuously measure the interaction
of sunlight with substances

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in seawater, such as the green
photosynthetic pigment chlorophyll-a.

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We're very good

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today at saying there's a lot of green,
meaning there are a lot of plants.

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Where we want to go with OCI is
what kind of plant is actually there.

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And so by looking at more color,
you can actually start

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getting the subtleties
of this green versus

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the slightly different shade of green

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and then relate that to the composition
of what you're looking at.

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To measure very subtle differences
in shades of any color,

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OCI needs to measure light at much finer
wavelength resolutions

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than any other NASA sensor.

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From the sea to sky,

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PACE’s other two instruments
are multiangle polarimeters,

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one hyperspectral
and the other hyperangular.

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Together, they'll take on aerosols, tiny
airborne particles, and clouds,

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both of which change how
sunlight interacts with the atmosphere.

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So by those two polarimeters
keeping their eyes on our home planet

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all of the time, because they're making
measurements on global scales,

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we'll have a much better sense of general
evolving

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air quality on multiple local,
regional and global scales.

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With very few exceptions,
we not only make these data available

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in rapid semi-real time,
but we've developed tools

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that are open source that allow anybody
who wishes of accessing these data

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and coming to their own conclusions.

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The data from PACE will help

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scientists reveal complex relationships
that connect the atmosphere, ocean

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and land in ways that help explain changes
we see in our own lives

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and in ways that
impact generations to come.

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