The new NASA-Italian Space Agency (ASI/Agenzia Spaziale Italiana) partnership will soon launch a mission focusing on air pollution.
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Nasa Administrator Bill Nelson speaks during a visit to the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) Goddard Space Flight Center on November 5, 2021 in Greenbelt, Maryland.
The international space union decided to work with ASI to identify the negative effects of tiny airborne particles found across populous cities. Their new mission is called the Multi-Angle Imager for Aerosols (MAIA) mission.
If this becomes successful, MAIA will be the first space mission that involves public health experts and epidemiologists. MAIA will also be NASA's first mission focusing on societal health.
New NASA-Italian Space Agency Partnership
According to JPL NASA Gov's latest report, the new NASA-ASI partnership plans to launch the MAIA mission before 2024 ends.
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NASA logos are seen in the conference room of the Astronaut Crew Quarters (ACQ) at Kennedy Space Center, in Cape Canaveral, Florida, on June 14, 2022. - NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Florida has played a leading role in the American space program for 60 years.
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This air pollution-focused space mission will include ASI's satellite PLATiNO-2. NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory's science instrument will also be launched as part of the MAIA mission.
Once MAIA reaches outer space, it will analyze and collect essential data from the MAIA observatory, atmospheric models, and ground sensors.
After that, the acquired data will be related to hospitalization, death, and birth records. MAIA will do this so that NASA and ASI will know the health effects of solid and liquid pollution particles.
MAIA's Other Details
The official NASA JPL MAIA blog post explained that the new air pollution mission can observe certain cities every day.
MAIA will focus on urban areas across the globe; each of the covered areas will be around 27,000 square miles.
The MAIA instrument will collect data from its targeted areas to determine the physical properties of airborne particulate matter (PM).
These properties include their sizes, shapes, and abilities to absorb sunlight.
"Breathing airborne pollution particles has been associated with many health problems, but the toxicity of different particle mixtures has been less well understood," explained NASA MAIA Principal Investigator David Diner.
He explained that MAIA could help them understand how airborne particle pollution really affects people's health.
If you want to learn more about the new MAIA mission of NASA and ASI, you can visit this link.
While NASA is still preparing for its MAIA launch, it is focusing on other important space missions as well.
Previously, NASA scientists mapped the carbon of 10 billion African dryland trees. We also reported about the new NASA Mars challenge, which seeks help from fans to create a VR environment.
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