AIM Spacecraft Deployment

The Aeronomy of Ice in the Mesosphere (AIM) mission will provide the first detailed exploration of the Earth's unique and elusive noctilucent or night shining clouds that are found literally on the 'edge of space'. Located near the top of the Earth's mesosphere (the region just above the stratosphere), very little is known about how these polar mesospheric clouds form or why they vary. They are being seen at lower latitudes than ever before and have been growing brighter and more frequent, leading some scientists to suggest that this recent increase may be the direct result of human-induced climate change. Over the course of it's two-year mission AIM will shed light on how noctilucent clouds form and what processes are causing these mysterious changes in their behavior.