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SMOS (Soil Moisture Ocean Salinity)

SMOS was launched on November 2, 2009 on a Russian rocket launcher from the Plesetsk cosmodrome in northern Russia. It is the first satellite designed to both map sea surface salinity and monitor soil moisture on a global scale, thus contributing to a better understanding of the Earth's water cycle. As a secondary objective, SMOS will also provide observations over snow and ice-covered regions, contributing to the study of the cryosphere.