A simulator for the images acquired by the optical payloads on board of PRISMA mission

In the framework of PRISMA (PRecursore IperSpettrale della Missione Applicativa) mission for Earth observation, the Italian Space Agency (ASI) granted five independent scientific research contracts for investigating the possible applications and performance of the optical payload (a hyperspectral sensor and a panchromatic camera). One of these contract named OPTIMA ("Metodologie avanzate per l'analisi, l'integrazione e l'ottimizzazione dei prodotti di livello 1 e 2 della missione PRISMA") was assigned to CNR-IFAC. OPTIMA is mainly devoted to assess the performance of the hyperspectral sensor and the panchromatic camera and to improve level 1 and 2 products. In order to characterize the performances of the mission before the launch, an image simulator for taking into account most of the phenomena that influence the acquired hyperspectral images has been developed. For the simulation of hyperspectral images the major effects characterizing each PRISMA acquisition have been considered: illumination and acquisition geometry, spatial and spectral variability of the simulated scenes, and the interaction of the electromagnetic radiation with the soil and with the atmospheric constituents. The algorithms designed for PRISMA mission data processing applications will be tested using the images produced by our simulator. In this paper, the development of a software tool devoted to simulate the images acquired by the hyperspectral imager of the PRISMA mission is presented. Results coming from the software implementation are shown and discussed, pointing out the critical topics of each simulation block.