Alternative GRACE-FO LRI Ranging Datasets: AEI-LRI1B and AEI-RTC1B v52

## General Introduction: GRACE Follow-On GRACE (Gravity Recovery And Climate Experiment) Follow On is a gravity-measuring satellite pair orbiting Earth in a low-Earth orbit. Gravity information is inferred from distance measurement between the two formation flying satellites. This distance is measured by two instruments: The conventional microwave instrument (MWI) and the novel laser ranging interferometer (LRI). See [Sheard et al., 2012](https://doi.org/10.1007/s00190-012-0566-3) or [Abich et al., 2020](https://doi.org/10.1103/physrevlett.123.031101) for more information. ## This Dataset This dataset contains Level1B-equivalent data products LRI1B and a newly derived Range Thermal Coupling product RTC1B. The data is supplementary to this publication: [Misfeldt et al., 2023](https://doi.org/10.3390/rs15030570). In this dataset derived on 2022-11-15, we provide the most significant outcome of the above publication, which is the newly derived LRI1B-v52 data product. We use a model for the cavity length (and thus the laser frequency) where the cavity resonance frequency exponentially converges to a final value. We furthermore provide the corresponding Range Thermal Coupling (RTC) data product. The data is available for the time from 2018-December-13 until 2021-December-31. More recent data can be found [in this repository](https://aei.mpg.de/grace-fo-ranging-datasets). The data products are further described in the release notes (pdf) available within this dataset. ## Changelog - 2022-11-15: *Version 1.0*, Initial Release