page_title: Landsat 8
section_title: Thermal InfraRed Sensor
hierarchical_section_title: Landsat 8 / Technical details / Sensors / Thermal InfraRed Sensor
caption_attribution_description: English: The Thermal Infrared Sensor (TIRS) was added to the LDCM payload to continue thermal imaging and to support emerging applications such as evapotranspiration rate measurements for water management. TIRS was built by NASA GSFC and it has a three-year design life. The 100 m TIRS data will be registered to the OLI data to create radiometrically, geometrically, and terrain-corrected 12-bit LDCM data products.
context_page_description: Landsat 8 is an American Earth observation satellite launched on 11 February 2013. It is the eighth satellite in the Landsat program; the seventh to reach orbit successfully. Originally called the Landsat Data Continuity Mission, it is a collaboration between NASA and the United States Geological Survey. NASA Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland, provided development, mission systems engineering, and acquisition of the launch vehicle while the USGS provided for development of the ground systems and will conduct on-going mission operations. It comprises the camera of the Operational Land Imager and the Thermal Infrared Sensor which can be used to study earth surface temperature and is used to study global warming.
  The satellite was built by Orbital Sciences Corporation, who served as prime contractor for the mission. The spacecraft's instruments were constructed by Ball Aerospace and NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center, and its launch was contracted to United Launch Alliance.
context_section_description: The Thermal InfraRed Sensor (TIRS), built by the NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, conducts thermal imaging and supports emerging applications such as evapotranspiration rate measurements for water management. The TIRS focal plane uses GaAs Quantum Well Infrared Photodetector arrays (known as QWIPs) for detecting the infrared radiation — a first for the Landsat program. The TIRS data will be registered to OLI data to create radiometrically, geometrically, and terrain-corrected 12-bit Landsat 8 data products. Like OLI, TIRS employs a pushbroom sensor design with a 185 km swath width. Data for two long wavelength infrared bands will be collected with TIRS. This provides data continuity with Landsat 7's single thermal IR band and adds a second.
  With TIRS being a late addition to the Landsat 8 satellite, the design life requirement was relaxed in order to expedite development of the sensor. As such, TIRS only has a three-year design life.
caption: Thermal Infrared Sensor Design
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