Multiscale Modeling of CHAMP-Data

The following three papers present recent developments in multiscale gravitational field modeling by the use of CHAMP or CHAMP-related data. Part A - The Model SWITCH-03: Observed orbit perturbations of the near-Earth orbiting satellite CHAMP are analyzed to recover the long-wavelength features of the Earth's gravitational potential. More precisely, by tracking the low-flying satellite CHAMP by the high-flying satellites of the Global Positioning System (GPS) a kinematic orbit of CHAMP is obtainable from GPS tracking observations, i.e. the ephemeris in cartesian coordinates in an Earth-fixed coordinate frame (WGS84) becomes available. In this study we are concerned with two tasks: First we present new methods for preprocessing, modelling and analyzing the emerging tracking data. Then, in a first step we demonstrate the strength of our approach by applying it to simulated CHAMP orbit data. In a second step we present results obtained by operating on a data set derived from real CHAMP data. The modelling is mainly based on a connection between non-bandlimited spherical splines and least square adjustment techniques to take into account the non-sphericity of the trajectory. Furthermore, harmonic regularization wavelets for solving the underlying Satellite-to-Satellite Tracking (SST) problem are used within the framework of multiscale recovery of the Earth's gravitational potential leading to SWITCH-03 (Spline and Wavelet Inverse Tikhonov regularized CHamp data). Further it is shown how regularization parameters can be adapted adequately to a specific region improving a globally resolved model. Finally we give a comparison of the developed model to the EGM96 model, the model UCPH2002_02_0.5 from the University of Copenhagen and the GFZ models EIGEN-1s and EIGEN-2. Part B - Multiscale Solutions from CHAMP: CHAMP orbits and accelerometer data are used to recover the long- to medium- wavelength features of the Earth's gravitational potential. In this study we are concerned with analyzing preprocessed data in a framework of multiscale recovery of the Earth's gravitational potential, allowing both global and regional solutions. The energy conservation approach has been used to convert orbits and accelerometer data into in-situ potential. Our modelling is spacewise, based on (1) non-bandlimited least square adjustment splines to take into account the true (non-spherical) shape of the trajectory (2) harmonic regularization wavelets for solving the underlying inverse problem of downward continuation. Furthermore we can show that by adapting regularization parameters to specific regions local solutions can improve considerably on global ones. We apply this concept to kinematic CHAMP orbits, and, for test purposes, to dynamic orbits. Finally we compare our recovered model to the EGM96 model, and the GFZ models EIGEN-2 and EIGEN-GRACE01s. Part C - Multiscale Modeling from EIGEN-1S, EIGEN-2, EIGEN-GRACE01S, UCPH2002_0.5, EGM96: Spherical wavelets have been developed by the Geomathematics Group Kaiserslautern for several years and have been successfully applied to georelevant problems. Wavelets can be considered as consecutive band-pass filters and allow local approximations. The wavelet transform can also be applied to spherical harmonic models of the Earth's gravitational field like the most up-to-date EIGEN-1S, EIGEN-2, EIGEN-GRACE01S, UCPH2002_0.5, and the well-known EGM96. Thereby, wavelet coefficients arise and these shall be made available to other interested groups. These wavelet coefficients allow the reconstruction of the wavelet approximations. Different types of wavelets are considered: bandlimited wavelets (here: Shannon and Cubic Polynomial (CP)) as well as non-bandlimited ones (in our case: Abel-Poisson). For these types wavelet coefficients are computed and wavelet variances are given. The data format of the wavelet coefficients is also included