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The International Laser Ranging Service (ILRS) provides global satellite and lunar laser ranging data and their related products to support geodetic and geophysical research activities as well as IERS products important to the maintenance of an accurate International Terrestrial Reference Frame (ITRF). The service develops the necessary global standards/specifications and encourages international adherence to its conventions. The ILRS is one of the space geodetic services of the International Association of Geodesy (IAG).

The ILRS collects, merges, archives and distributes Satellite Laser Ranging (SLR) and Lunar Laser Ranging (LLR) observation data sets of sufficient accuracy to satisfy the objectives of a wide range of scientific, engineering, and operational applications and experimentation. These data sets are used by the ILRS to generate a number of scientific and operational data products including:

Earth orientation parameters (polar motion and length of day)
Station coordinates and velocities of the ILRS tracking systems
Time-varying geocenter coordinates
Static and time-varying coefficients of the Earth's gravity field
Centimeter accuracy satellite ephemerides
Fundamental physical constants
Lunar ephemerides and librations
Lunar orientation parameters

The accuracy of SLR/LLR data products is sufficient to support a variety of scientific and operational applications including:

Realization of global accessibility to and the improvement of the International Terrestrial Reference Frame (ITRF)
Monitoring three dimensional deformations of the solid Earth
Monitoring Earth rotation and polar motion
Support the monitoring of variations in the topography and volume of the liquid Earth (ocean circulation, mean sea level, ice sheet thickness, wave heights, etc.)
Tidally generated variations in atmospheric mass distribution
Calibration of microwave tracking techniques
Picosecond global time transfer experiments
Astrometric observations including determination of the dynamic equinox, obliquity of the ecliptic, and the precession constant
Gravitational and general relativistic studies including Einstein's Equivalence Principle, the Robertson-Walker b parameter, and time rate of change of the gravitational constant
Lunar physics including the dissipation of rotational energy, shape of the core-mantle boundary (Love Number k2), and free librations and stimulating mechanisms
Solar System ties to the International Celestial Reference Frame (ICRF)

Recent News

Change to location of POS+EOP products in the CDDIS archive - The ILRS DCs have updated the archive location of the pos+eop products. Until today, the current year's products were archived in daily subdirectories at /slr/products/pos+eop/YYMMDD/. Beginning today, May 13, 2020, the products are now archived at /slr/products/pos+eop/YYYY/
YYMMDD/.

2021 ILRS Technical/Specialty Workshop - The ILRS Governing Board is pleased to announce that the 2021 ILRS Technical/Specialty Workshop will be held in the October 2021 timeframe in Arequipa, Peru. The workshop will be hosted by the Astronomical and Aerospace Institute at the University of San Agustin.

At this time, the ILRS continues planning for the 22nd International Workshop on Laser Ranging in November 2020 with the local hosts in Kunming, China.

New members of the ILRS Governing Board - Toshi Otsubo has announced that Jose Rodriguez (IGN Yebes) and Sven Bauer (GFZ Potsdam) have been elected by their EUROLAS colleagues as their representatives on the ILRS Governing Board. The change is effective 1 March 2020.

Toshi has sent his thanks to the former EUROLAS representatives Georg Kirchner and Pippo Bianco acknowledging that they worked not just for Europe on the Board but for the world-wide community for a long time. The ILRS hopes Georg and Pippo will stay actively involved in the ILRS.

New Software for ILRS Global Report Cards - The ILRS has been generating global report cards on a quarterly and monthly basis since 2012. A new version of the report card software is now available with changes that provide more accurate pass and NP counts, satellite RMS, and LAGEOS bias information. In addition, the table summarizing LLR data (Table 1 L) has been split into two parts (Table L1 and L2) to provide individual lunar retroreflector information. The report cards are available at: https://ilrs.cddis.eosdis.nasa.gov/network/system_performance/global_report_cards/monthly/.

For more information on the changes made to the report cards, please see: https://ilrs.eosdis.nasa.gov/network/system_performance/global_report_cards/report_card_differences_Jan01_2020.html.

Using the new software, data for the report cards between 2013 and 2020 has been regenerated and may be downloaded. The files are comma-delimited and available at https://ilrs.eosdis.nasa.gov/network/system_performance/global_report_cards/data_for_previous_report_cards.html.

Meetings

Many meetings have been canceled or postponed due to COVID-19. Please see the Meetings page for futher information.

EGU General Assembly 2020, Vienna Austria, May 04-08, 2020 - Replaced by "EGU2020: Sharing Geoscience Online"

Publications

2009/2010 ILRS Report

Proceedings from the 19th International Workshop on Laser Ranging

International Laser Ranging Service

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