Overview of the Aqua/AMSR-E 2003 soil moisture experiment in Brazil (SMEX03 Brazil)

This study presents an overview of the field design and satellite data analysis strategy of the Brazilian SMEX03 (Soil Moisture Experiment in 2003) campaign. The goal of the SMEX03 Brazil is to validate existing algorithms to retrieve soil moisture from Aqua/AMSR-E data under tropical savanna vegetation cover. The test site corresponded to the Barreiras region, located in the western part of the Bahia State (12°05´ south latitude; 45°00´ west longitude). The Barreiras study site offers low to intermediate vegetation cover (near the border of semiarid vegetation called Caatinga), gentle topography and large fields of annual crops (mainly soybean and maize) and cultivated pastures. Field surface soil moisture, soil temperature and leaf water content were acquired during the wet season of December, 2003 over a set of 12 sampling locations. Three other field campaigns are scheduled for 2004 (June, end of wet season; August, dry season; and November, beginning of the wet season). Remote sensing data analysis includes the processing of all AMSR-E brightness temperature images of 2004 with maximum elevation higher than 80° (3-4 scenes per month).