There is revolution underway enabled by new advances in instrument technologies, spacecraft design, software, and analysis capabilities enabled by CubeSats and NanoSats for remote sensing. Miniaturization of critical subsystems that can maintain, and in some cases exceed, the capability of legacy systems is influencing the scientific community to reassess what measurements are possible at a fundamental level. That same community has also been inspired to explore how constellation observations can produce data to improve model and forecasting accuracy, and how advances in mathematics can impact the quality of attitude and determination control systems for constellations through platform-independent software systems. They have developed innovative deployable systems for first-of-a-kind remote sensing measurements from CubeSats and new electronics and instrument systems expanding the range of electromagnetic spectrum measurements capable from nanosatellites. They are even exploring how remote sensing can go beyond science to develop instruments and platforms to assess and characterize the performance of space vehicles in flight.

In this special section we have compiled a suite of high-quality papers that run the gamut from fundamentally new measurements, with high-quality science results performed from CubeSat and NanoSat systems, to the development of new remote sensing instruments, to the assessment of the quality of data products that can be expected from CubeSats and their impact on weather prediction. The variety and depth of papers presented give a glimpse into the broad activities on-going in the remote sensing community to expand the reach of CubeSats and NanoSats to play a disruptive role in advancing technologies and measurement approaches for future observations. We thank the authors and the reviewers for their dedication and thoughtfulness in producing this special section.