The Upper Atmosphere Research Satellite (UARS) was a NASA-operated orbital observatory whose mission was to study the Earth's atmosphere, particularly the protective ozone layer. The 5,900-kilogram (13,000 lb) satellite was deployed from Space Shuttle Discovery during the STS-48 mission on 15 September 1991. It entered Earth orbit at an operational altitude of 600 kilometers (370 mi), with an orbital inclination of 57 degrees.

The original mission duration was to be only three years, but was extended several times. When the mission finally ended in June 2005 due to funding cuts, 14 years after the satellite's launch, six of its ten instruments were still operational. A final orbit-lowering burn was performed in early December 2005 to prepare the satellite for deorbit. On 26 October 2010, the International Space Station performed a debris-avoidance maneuver in response to a conjunction with UARS.

The decommissioned satellite re-entered Earth's atmosphere on 24 September 2011. Considerable media attention surrounded the event, largely due to NASA's predictions that substantial parts of the satellite might reach the ground, potentially endangering inhabited areas. However, the satellite ultimately impacted in a remote area of the Pacific Ocean.

CLAES was a spectrometer that determined the concentrations and distributions of nitrogen and chlorine compounds, ozone, water vapor and methane. This platform produced the first global maps of ozone depleting chlorinated compounds. It did this by inferring the amount of gases in the atmosphere by measuring the unique infrared signature of each gas.

In order to differentiate the relatively weak signature of trace gases from the background radiation in the atmosphere, CLAES had to have high resolution and sensitivity. To achieve this, the instrument combined a telescope with an infrared spectrometer. The whole instrument was cryogenically cooled to keep heat from the instrument from interfering with the readings. The cryogenics system consisted of an inner tank of solid neon at −257 °C (−430 °F) and an outer tank of solid carbon dioxide at −150 °C (−238 °F). As the neon and carbon dioxide evaporated, they kept the instrument cool for a planned 19 months. The final cryogens evaporated from the instrument on May 5, 1993, and the instrument warmed up, ending its useful life.

The instrument looked sideways out of the UARS platform to allow the instrument to look through the stratosphere and the lower mesosphere. CLAES produced a 19-month global database showing the vertical distributions of important ozone-layer gases in the stratosphere and their variation with time of day, season, latitude, and longitude.

ISAMS is an infrared radiometer for measuring thermal emission from the Earth's limb (the line of the horizon as seen from UARS), on both sides of the spacecraft. It used the pressure-modulation technique to obtain high spectral resolution, and innovative stirling-cycle coolers to achieve high detector sensitivity. ISAMS uses 7 gas cells for 6 different gases: CO₂ (times 2), CO, CH₄, N₂O, NO₂ and H₂O. The CO₂ cells also allow measurement of ozone (O₃), nitric acid (HNO₃) and dinitrogen pentoxide (N₂O₅)

The specific objectives of ISAMS were: (i) To obtain measurements of atmospheric temperature as a function of pressure, from the tropopause to the mesopause, with good accuracy and spatial resolution, and hence to study the structure and dynamics of the region, (ii) To investigate the distribution and variability of water vapour in the middle atmosphere, to determine its role in the atmospheric general circulation, and its sources and sinks in the middle atmosphere, (iii) To measure the global distribution of oxides of nitrogen and hence to investigate their origins and their roles in catalytic cycles which control the amount of ozone in the stratospheric ozone layer. It also made extensive observations of volcanic aerosols and polar stratospheric clouds in the middle atmosphere. The instrument operated from September 1991–July 1992.