Lidar, meteor radar, and optical imagers observing the atmosphere from 30 to 250 km — above Cerro Pachón in the southern Andes.
Multi-static system with five receiver sites — four currently operational. Continuous neutral wind retrieval in the 70–110 km region.
Night-time temperature, 3D wind, and Na density between 80 and 110 km. Resolution ~1 min and 500 m.
Multi-wavelength airglow observations at OH, O greenline, and O redline emission layers. Used to study gravity waves and small-scale atmospheric structure.
High spatial and temporal resolution OH airglow imaging of atmospheric turbulence.
The Andes Lidar Observatory (ALO), established in 2009 at Cerro Pachón, is the central node of the network. In 2019 the CONDOR multi-static meteor radar system added continuous wind measurements, with receivers at Las Campanas Observatory (LCO), Southern Cross Observatory (SCO), and CASLEO in Argentina.
Combining lidar, radar, and optical instruments at co-located and distributed sites, the Andes Network exemplifies the Distributed Arrays of Scientific Heterogeneous Instruments (DASHI) concept prioritized in the 2024 Heliophysics Decadal Survey for systems-level understanding of the Sun–Earth environment. Ongoing expansion eastward into Argentina extends three-dimensional observation of atmospheric waves across the southern Andes.