spectral information will be averaged over the observable disk
and integration time. The latter may vary between several days
and weeks to build up an adequate signal-to-noise ratio to
detect biosignatures, depending on the target and mission
concept. For example, in the specific case of JWST, which
pushes the limits from detecting toward characterizing Jovian
to super-Earth exoplanets, the accumulation of transmission
spectra from hundreds of transits is required in order to reach a
signal-to-noise ratio high enough to potentially confirm the
presence of biosignature pairs like O
2
and CH
4
or O
3
and N
2
O
(e.g., Krissansen-Totton et al. 2016; Fauchez et al. 2019;
Lustig-Yaeger et al. 2019; Wunderlich et al. 2019; Tremblay
et al. 2020). Hence, considering the mission’s lifetime and the
telescope time necessary for the detection of atmospheric
biosignatures, probably only a few attempts will be made on
specific targets. Therefore, JWST as well as other current
technologies are not yet capable of detecting and characterizing
the atmospheres of temperate, terrestrial exoplanets in a
statistically meaningful sample and the community has to wait
until space-based direct imaging is realized in future missions
like the Habitable Exoplanet Observatory (Gaudi et al. 2020),
Large Ultraviolet Optical Infrared Surveyor (Tan et al. 2019)or
Large Interferometer For Exoplanets (Quanz et al. 2018).
During the integration time of such direct imaging missions,
the spectral appearance and characteristics of a planet change as
it rotates around its spin axis and as spatial differences from
clear and cloudy regions, contributions from different surface
types as well as from different hemispheres evolve with time.
In addition, 20 yr of exoplanet discovery have revealed a vast
diversity of planets regarding their masses, sizes, and orbits
(e.g., Batalha 2014; Burke et al. 2015; Paradise et al. 2022)and
it is thought that this diversity also extends to their atmospheric
mass and composition, making the characterization of the
planetary environment even more difficult. Specifically, the
interpretation of the spectrum is not unique and a plethora of
solutions exist to describe the planet’s surface and atmospheric
characteristics.
To achieve the fundamental goal of detecting signs of life on
planets beyond our solar system, we will need to be able to
interpret this space and time-averaged data. Ideally, an
exoplanet candidate with the potential of harboring life would
be observed by multiple observing techniques in both the
reflected and thermal emission spectrum in order to attempt to
fully characterize the planet’s nature. Yet, especially for
biosignatures, the potential for both false positives and false
negatives remains (e.g., Selsis 2002; Meadows 2006; Reinhard
et al. 2017; Catling et al. 2018; Krissansen-Totton et al. 2022).
One way to break this degeneracy and narrow down the set of
possible solutions is by adding information coming from time-
dependent signals such as atmospheric seasonality.
The phenomenon of planetary seasonality generally arises
for nonzero obliquity or orbital eccentricity planets, and the
extent of the atmospheric response is governed by stellar flux
incident as well as planetary and atmospheric characteristics
(e.g., Kopparapu et al. 2013; Guendelman & Kaspi 2019).In
our solar system, seasonal variations were observed for the gas
giant planets such as Uranus, Saturn, and Jupiter (e.g., Nixon
et al. 2010; Fletcher et al. 2015; Shliakhetska & Vidmachenko
2019; Fletcher 2021)as well as for Mars, which is prone to the
most diverse seasons in the solar system, due to its 25°. 2 tilt of
the spin axis and eccentricity of 0.093 (e.g., Leffler et al. 2019;
Trainer et al. 2019).
On Earth, the seasonal variation in atmospheric composition,
for example of carbon dioxide (CO
2
), is a well-documented and
mechanistically understood biologically modulated occurrence
(e.g., Keeling 1960)that is driven by the time-variable
insolation and the reacting biosphere. Net fluxes of methane
and other trace biological products evolve seasonally, respond-
ing to temperature-induced changes in biological rates, gas
solubility, precipitation patterns, density stratification, and
nutrient recycling (e.g., Khalil & Rasmussen 1983; Olson
et al. 2018b; Schwieterman 2018).
Since atmospheric seasonality arises naturally on Earth, it is
very likely to occur on other inhabited planets as well. Hence,
the search for seasonality as a biosignature on exoplanets is
particularly promising and has been proposed by Olson et al.
(2018b). Yet, the discussion of time-varying biosignatures has
remained qualitative (e.g., Tinetti et al. 2006a,2006b;
Meadows 2006,2008; Schwieterman et al. 2018)and the field
of exoplanet research lacks a comprehensive understanding of
which spectral features are impacted by observable seasonality
on inhabited worlds and how these impacts would be
modulated by stellar, planetary, and biological circumstances.
Earth offers a unique opportunity to study this aspect, yet it
requires investigating our planet from a remote vantage point.
Although there are several methods to study Earth from afar
such as Earth-shine measurements or spacecraft flybys (for a
recent review see, e.g., Robinson & Reinhard 2018, and
references therein), we chose a remote sensing approach, which
offers the extensive temporal, spatial, and spectral coverage
needed to investigate the effect of observing geometries on
disk-integrated thermal emission spectra and time-varying
signals. However, for Earth-orbiting spacecraft it is impossible
to view the full disk of Earth and the spatially resolved satellite
observations have to be stitched together to a disk-integrated
view (e.g., Tinetti et al. 2006a; Hearty et al. 2009; Gómez-Leal
et al. 2012).
In a previous paper (Mettler et al. 2020), we analyzed 15 yr
of thermal emission Earth observation data for five spatially
resolved locations. The data was collected by the Moderate
Imaging Spectroradiometer on board the Aqua satellite in the
wavelength range of 3.66–14.40 μm in 16 discrete thermal
channels. By constructing data sets with a long time baseline
spanning more than a decade and hence several orbital periods,
we investigated flux levels and variations as a function of
wavelength range and surface type (i.e., climate zone and
surface thermal properties)and looked for periodic signals.
From the spatially resolved single-surface-type measurements,
we found that typically strong absorption bands from CO
2
(15 μm)and O
3
(9.65 μm)are significantly less pronounced
and partially absent in data from the polar regions. This implies
that estimating correct abundance levels for these molecules
might not be representative of the bulk abundances in these
viewing geometries. Furthermore, it was shown that the time-
resolved thermal emission spectrum encodes information about
seasons/planetary obliquity, but the significance depends on
the viewing geometry and spectral band considered. In this
paper, we expand our analyses from spatially resolved
locations to disk-integrated Earth views and present an
exclusive data set of 2690 disk-integrated mid-infrared (MIR)
thermal emission spectra (3.75–15.4 μm: R≈1200)derived
from remote sensing observations for four full-disk observing
geometries (North and South Pole, Africa and Pacific-centered
equatorial view)over four consecutive years at a high temporal
2
The Astrophysical Journal, 946:82 (21pp), 2023 April 1 Mettler et al.