Scattering and emission from dry snow in the range 35-140 GHz

Scattering and emission models for an irregular layer of dense inhomogeneous medium is developed and applied in the analysis of dry snow scattering and emission in the range 35-140 GHz. The models are developed based on the matrix doubling formulation, and accounts for full incoherent multiple scattering inside the snow layer. The effects of close spacing and first order coherent interactions between scatterers inside the snow layer are included in the model via a dense medium phase matrix. The dense medium phase matrix is derived using the extended concept of three-dimensional antenna array theory which accommodate randomly located scatterers. The final expression for the dense medium phase matrix differs from the conventional (sparse medium) one in two major aspects in that there is an amplitude and a phase correction. The rough interfaces of the air-snow and snow-ground (or snow-ice) boundaries are modeled using the IEM rough surface model. Emission model predictions agree well with field measurements reported in the literature. Backscattering calculations from the theory are compared with measurements from field measurements of dry snowpack. Predictions from such a theory agree well with the measured data