Accurately measuring and monitoring the thickness distribution of thin ice is crucial for accurate estimation of ocean–atmosphere heat fluxes and rates of ice production and salt flux in iceaffected oceans. Here we present results from helicopter-borne brightness temperature (TB) measurements in the Southern Ocean in October 2012 and in the Sea of Okhotsk in February 2009 carried out with a por...

A method to retrieve soil moisture (SM) from Advanced Scanning Microwave Radiometer—Earth Observing System Sensor (AMSR-E) observations using Soil Moisture and Ocean Salinity (SMOS) Level 3 SM as a reference is discussed. The goal is to obtain longer time series of SM with no significant bias and with a similar dynamical range to that of the SMOS SM dataset. This method consists of training a n...

Brightness temperatures (TBs) from the special sensor microwave imager (SSM/I) and advanced microwave scanning radiometer (AMSR-E) from 2003 to 2007 are utilized to retrieve and evaluate the snow water equivalent (SWE) over the complex terrain of the Quesnel River Basin (QRB), British Columbia, Canada. Various algorithms including the Environment Canada (EC) algorithms, the spectral polarizatio...

The effect of air-sea temperature differences on the ocean microwave brightness temperature (Tb) was investigated using the Advanced Microwave Scanning Radiometer (AMSR) aboard the Advanced Earth Observing Satellite-II (ADEOS-II) during a period of seven months. AMSR Tb in the global ocean was combined with wind data supplied by the scatterometer SeaWinds aboard ADEOS-II and air temperature giv...

Statistical correction methods, the Cumulative Distribution Function (CDF) matching technique and Regional Statistics Method (RSM) are applied to adjust the limited temporal variability of Advanced Microwave Scanning Radiometer E (AMSR-E) data using the Common Land Model (CLM). The temporal variability adjustment between CLM and AMSR-E data was conducted for annual and seasonal periods for 2003...

The Advanced Microwave Scanning Radiometer (AMSR) is a multi-frequency, dual-polarized microwave radiometer that detects microwave emissions from the Earth's surface and atmosphere. Various geophysical parameters, particularly those related to water (H2O), can be estimated from AMSR data. In addition to the proven parameters such as water vapor, precipitation, and sea surface wind speed, novel ...

ADEOSIIwas launched on Dec., 2002. However, after about 10 months operation, it has lost most of its power due to the solar paddle failure. As a follow on of ADEOSIImission, JAXA is now planning GCOM mission which is composed of a series of satellites. They are now called GCOM-W and GCOM-C satellites. Both satellites are composed of 3 satellites with 5 year lifetime. Hence, 13 years of continuo...

For four decades, satellite-based passive microwave sensors have provided valuable snow water equivalent (SWE) monitoring at a global scale. Before continuous long-term SWE records can be used for scientific or applied purposes, consistency of SWE measurements among different sensors is required. SWE retrievals from two passive sensors currently operating, the Special Sensor Microwave Imager So...

The AMSR-E sea ice standard level 3 products include sea ice concentration, sea ice temperature, and snow depth on sea ice. The AMSR-E standard sea ice concentration product is generated using the enhanced NASA Team (NT2) algorithm described by Markus and Cavalieri (2000), the snow depth is produced from the algorithm described by Markus and Cavalieri (1998) for both hemispheres, but excluding ...