Two Approaches for Inter-Satellite Radiometer Calibrations between TMI and WindSat
Journal
Journal of the Meteorological Society of Japan
Date Issued
March 31, 2009
DOI
10.2151/jmsj.87A.223
Abstract
This paper presents recent progress in inter-satellite microwave radiometric cross-calibration to eliminate brightness temperature measurement biases between a pair of radiometer channels operating at slightly different frequencies and incidence angles. The motivation of this research is to develop robust analytical cross-calibration techniques for inter-calibration of various satellite radiometer instruments, with the first projected application being the multi-satellite Global Precipitation Measurement (GPM) constellation to be launched in 2013. The significance of this work is that it will allow the formation of consistent multi-decadal time series of geophysical measurements for multiple satellite microwave radiometers that are free of instrumental biases and other long-term changes in radiometric calibration, which will allow researchers to study global climate change.
Descriptions are given for two independent calibration techniques: a Taylor series expansion of the oceanic brightness temperature (Tb) spectrum between dissimilar radiometer channels and a non-linear regression among multi-channel Tb measurements. In the first approach, predictions were made of Tb's at a destination frequency from Tb's of a close by source frequency by expansion of the oceanic brightness temperature spectrum in a Taylor series centered at the source frequency. The relationships between Tb's and frequencies were derived from simulations using a radiative transfer model (RTM), which accounts for the total collected emissions from the ocean surface and the atmosphere. Further, earth incidence angle differences between radiometer channels were transformed in a similar manner using the partial derivatives of Tb with incidence angle derived from RTM simulations. In the second approach, we used a prediction algorithm that relies on the correlation between radiometer Tb's at various frequencies and polarizations and which uses a regression on the Tb's and their non-linear transformations developed using an independent radiative transfer model.
As a demonstration, near-simultaneous pair-wise ocean Tb comparisons are presented between the TRMM Microwave Imager (TMI), which is not sun synchronous, and the sun-synchronous polar orbiting WindSat, using oceanic Tb observations from 2003-04. The corresponding results between these two inter-satellite calibration techniques are highly correlated, and results demonstrate that fixed channel-by-channel differences, of order 1-2 K exist between TMI and WindSat. These are significant radiometric calibration differences, which can be removed prior to forming joint data sets of geophysical parameter retrievals.
Descriptions are given for two independent calibration techniques: a Taylor series expansion of the oceanic brightness temperature (Tb) spectrum between dissimilar radiometer channels and a non-linear regression among multi-channel Tb measurements. In the first approach, predictions were made of Tb's at a destination frequency from Tb's of a close by source frequency by expansion of the oceanic brightness temperature spectrum in a Taylor series centered at the source frequency. The relationships between Tb's and frequencies were derived from simulations using a radiative transfer model (RTM), which accounts for the total collected emissions from the ocean surface and the atmosphere. Further, earth incidence angle differences between radiometer channels were transformed in a similar manner using the partial derivatives of Tb with incidence angle derived from RTM simulations. In the second approach, we used a prediction algorithm that relies on the correlation between radiometer Tb's at various frequencies and polarizations and which uses a regression on the Tb's and their non-linear transformations developed using an independent radiative transfer model.
As a demonstration, near-simultaneous pair-wise ocean Tb comparisons are presented between the TRMM Microwave Imager (TMI), which is not sun synchronous, and the sun-synchronous polar orbiting WindSat, using oceanic Tb observations from 2003-04. The corresponding results between these two inter-satellite calibration techniques are highly correlated, and results demonstrate that fixed channel-by-channel differences, of order 1-2 K exist between TMI and WindSat. These are significant radiometric calibration differences, which can be removed prior to forming joint data sets of geophysical parameter retrievals.
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