The radiobrightness thermal inertia measure of soil moisture

Author

England, A.W. ; Galantowicz, J.F. ; Schretter, M.S.

Author_Institution

Dept. of Electr. Eng. & Comput. Sci., Michigan Univ., Ann Arbor, MI, USA

Volume

30

Issue

1

fYear

1992

fDate

1/1/1992 12:00:00 AM

Firstpage

132

Lastpage

139

Abstract

Radiobrightness thermal inertia (RTI) is proposed as a method for using day-night differences in satellite-sensed radiobrightness to monitor the moisture of Great Plains soils. Diurnal thermal and radiobrightness models are used to examine the sensitivity of the RTI method. Model predictions favor use of the 37.0 and 85.5 GHz, H-polarized channels of the Special Sensor Microwave/Imager (SSM/I). The model further predicts that overflight times near 2:00 AM/PM would be nearly optimal for RTI, that midnight/noon and 4:00 AM/PM are nearly as good, but that the 6:00 AM/PM overflight times of the current SSM/I are particularly poor. Data from the 37.0 GHz channel of the Scanning Multichannel Microwave Radiometer (SMMR) are used to demonstrate that the method is plausible

Keywords

hydrological techniques; moisture measurement; remote sensing; soil; 37 GHz; 85.5 GHz; EHF; Great Plains; H-polarized channels; RTI method; SMMR; SSM/I; Scanning Multichannel Microwave Radiometer; Special Sensor Microwave/Imager; day-night differences; overflight times; radiobrightness thermal inertia; satellite-sensed radiobrightness; soil moisture; Electromagnetic heating; Frequency; Microwave radiometry; Moisture measurement; Predictive models; Satellite broadcasting; Soil measurements; Soil moisture; Spatial resolution; Vegetation mapping;

fLanguage

English

Journal_Title

Geoscience and Remote Sensing, IEEE Transactions on

Publisher

ieee

ISSN

0196-2892

Type

jour

DOI

10.1109/36.124223

Filename

124223