Atmospheric Attenuation Models for Satellite-To-Earth Links

In an earlier paper by the authors1 it was mentioned that atmospheric attenuation effects could be included by assuming that the attenuation is directly proportional to number of air masses. While this assumption is valid for the optical region, it is not true in the microwave region (1 to 40 GHz). For a clear atmosphere, the two constituents which absorb microwaves are oxygen and water vapor. An analysis of the atmospheric attenuation data for the microwave region has been made and some rather simple expressions for computing the attenuation as a function of zenith angle are developed with an accuracy suitable for satellite antenna footprint calculations.