Measurement campaign

The term measurement campaign is in technology and science for a long-planned and organizationally well-prepared series of measurements used, which has a large scale and as a coordinated interaction of several persons or institutions is performed.

Measurement campaigns are used for comprehensive data acquisition on an interdisciplinary or global basis, especially for scientific research, in space travel and for the creation of surveying networks .

In the geosciences , their results can also be incorporated into regular international data exchange services - for example for GPS satellite orbits ( IGS ), radio interferometry ( IVS ) or Earth's rotation ( IERS ).

About the origin of the term:
The word component campaign (from Latin campus , field) used to refer to the military campaign and other coordinated actions in the open air. Today it is mainly used for information and advertising campaigns, but in the technical field mainly describes measuring activities in the great outdoors.

Characteristics of measurement campaigns

In contrast to continuous series of measurements or permanent monitoring , measurement campaigns are limited in time so that a concentrated use of the available means, people and resources is possible. For example, they can take place in cooperating laboratories , but much more often outdoors. In terms of location, they often extend over several countries or continents, for example in the geosciences.

The coordination of international or intercontinental campaigns is now mostly carried out by specially set up services that are, for example, affiliated with international associations or set up specifically for the purpose of a special campaign. Until a few decades ago, such campaigns were initiated or organized by individual institutions, sometimes even by individual leading scientists .

Cross-border measurement campaigns are of particular importance for astronomy and geodesy .

Examples from astronomy

• the " Himmelspolizey ", founded in 1799 by leading astronomers under Freiherr von Zach for the coordinated search for asteroids ;
• the simultaneous measurement of two long meridian arcs in Peru and Lapland, which the Paris Academy planned, organized and financed in the 18th century (see also degree measurement ). It gave the impetus for scientific earth measurements and the later meter convention .
• Survey of the sky divided between several observatories for star catalogs or for monitoring variable stars ;
• the worldwide measurement campaigns for the creation of the fundamental catalogs of the FK3, FK4 and FK5 , in which various observatories participated. They were the basis for today's basic reference systems of astronomy and geodesy (ICRF, ITRF ).
• repeated cooperation of around 5–20 radio telescopes as part of the Very Long Baseline Interferometry (VLBI), coordinated by the IVS service of the Astronomical Union IAU and the IUGG since around 2001 .

Examples from geodesy and satellite technology

• in the 19th century: the Eurasian surveying networks and their connection to the derivation of the Bessel ellipsoid and the geographic length system of Europe ( Albrechtian length compensation )
• Middle of the 20th century: the measurement campaigns to establish the European network , the ED50 and to measure islands (see also Central European Network and Baltic Ring )
• 1968–1974: the world network of satellite triangulation
• 1970–1990: various Doppler and satellite laser campaigns (for example DÖDOC , ALGEDOC, ISAGEX ). They were often in spatially overlapping segments - so-called sessions  - conducted
• since 1985: GPS and other GNSS campaigns; The International GNSS Service (IGS), a data service affiliated with the IAG, is responsible for global networks today
• since 1995: the international reference systems ITRF , ETRF and IGGOS
• some geographic information services located in Europe, Asia or the USA
• Limited campaigns in the context of larger research projects

Further subject areas

In geophysics , extensive measurement campaigns etc. a. to study the middle and lower crust of the earth - see geoseismics , gravimetry and exploration .

Among other things, there is a noticeable need for cross-border or cross-institute measurement campaigns

• the biology (for example, distribution of species and habitats)
• the soil science and environmental protection (air and soil pollution )
• the hydrology (e.g. runoff models, karst water)
• and geophysics (seismic traverses, civil engineering in the Alps, crustal movements , ÖKORP, etc.)

International agreements or standardizations often go back to previous, extensive measurement campaigns, of which the international meter convention is an example, or the length convention with the establishment of the prime meridian of Greenwich , which was successful after long efforts .