Sun glint and sea surface salinity remote sensing

The Aquarius/SAC-D mission will employ three L-band (1.41 GHz) radiometers dedicated to remote sensing of sea surface salinity. The mission will be in a dawn/dusk sun- synchronous orbit with the beam oriented toward the night time side of the orbit in order to limit interference from the Sun. The effect of surface roughness on solar radiation reflected from the surface will be examined. It will be shown that including the small scale roughness (waves) can have a major impact. Also, it will be shown that when the small scale waves are included it is possible to have significant radiation reflected into the main beam during seasonal extremes when a portion of the main beam is on the illuminated side of day-night terminator.