The Earth Surface Mineral Dust Source Investigation, EMIT, is planned to operate from the International Space Station starting no earlier than the fall of 2021. EMIT will use visible to short wavelength infrared imaging spectroscopy to determine the mineral composition of the arid land dust source regions of the Earth to advance our knowledge of the radiative forcing effect of these aerosols. Mineral dust emitted into the atmosphere under high wind conditions is an element of the Earth system with many impacts to the Earth's energy balance, atmosphere, surface, and oceans. The Earth's mineral dust cycle with source, transport, and deposition phases are studied with advanced Earth System Models. Because the chemical composition, optical and surface properties of soil particles vary strongly with the mineral composition of the source, these models require knowledge of surface soil mineral dust source composition to accurately understand dust impacts on the Earth system now and in the future. At present, compositional knowledge of the Earth's mineral dust source regions from existing data sets is uncertain as a result of limited measurements. EMIT will use spectroscopically-derived surface mineral composition to update the prescribed boundary conditions for state-of-the-art Earth System Models. The EMIT-initialized models will be used to investigate the impact of direct radiative forcing in the Earth system that depends strongly on the composition of the mineral dust aerosols emitted into the atmosphere. These new measurements and related products will be used to address the EMIT science objectives and made available to the science community for additional investigations. An overview of the EMIT science, development, and mission is presented in this paper.

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The first Deep Impact Network Experiment (DINET I) was performed by personnel at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory with the cooperation of the EPOXI project on the Deep Impact (DI) spacecraft. Using nine ground-based computers controlled from the Experiment Operations Center (EOC) in JPL's Protocol Technology Lab (PTL) and the DI spacecraft, all connected via JPL's interplanetary overlay network (ION) disruption-tolerant network (DTN) protocol implementation, the DINET I experiment successfully integrated and tested the first link of the interplanetary internet over the course of 27 days in 2008. The DTN concept allows for automated scheduling and routing of data through an overlay network that bridges smaller local networks. The accomplished technical goal of DINET I was to prove the capabilities of delay-tolerant networking protocols -specifically the Licklider transmission protocol (LTP) and bundle protocol (BP) -in an interplanetary operational environment. The accomplished strategic goal of DINET I was to provide a venue in which to simultaneously raise the JPL technology readiness level of ION and encourage mission project acceptance of DTN technology in space operations communications. A follow-on experiment with the Deep Impact spacecraft, DINET II, is planned by JPL and funded byNASA. DINET II has developed and will test new DTN capabilities such as key-based authentication, mixed-route file delivery, and improvements to DINET I software on the EPOXI ground-based testbed system with the addition of network nodes at JHU-APL, CU Boulder and the International Space Station.

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