Upper Atmosphere Research Satellite Upper Atmosphere Research Satellite The Upper Atmosphere Research Satellite (UARS) was a NASA-operated orbital observatory whose mission was to study the Earth’s atmosphere, particularly the protective ozone layer. The satellite was deployed from Space Shuttle "Discovery" during the STS-48 mission on 15 September 1991. It entered Earth orbit at an operational altitude of , with an orbital inclination of 57 degrees. The original mission duration was to be only three years, but was extended several times. When the mission finally ended in June 2005 due to funding cuts, 14 years after the satellite's launch, six of its ten instruments were
Idealized greenhouse model for the required amount of heat energy finally to be radiated out into space from the top of the atmosphere. The greenhouse effect can be illustrated with an idealized planet. This is a common "textbook model": the planet will have a constant surface temperature T and an atmosphere with constant temperature T. For diagrammatic clarity, a gap can be depicted between the atmosphere and the surface. Alternatively, T could be interpreted as a temperature representative of the surface and the lower atmosphere, and T could be interpreted as the temperature of the upper atmosphere. In order to justify that T