Simulation of Spaceborne Microwave Radiometer Measurements of Snow Cover using In-Situ Data and Emission Models

In this paper, three different models for the extinction coefficient of snow are compared by simulating the brightness temperature of snow-covered ground with HUT snow emission model. The input in-situ data set was measured in Sodankyla, Finland during winter 2006-2007. The simulation results are compared with AMSR-E measurements. All the extinction coefficient models are developed for dry snow. Thus, in addition to the whole winter time series, the dry snow periods are studied. Since all the three models calculate extinction coefficient from snow grain size, the effect of grain size is studied by minimizing the simulation error using grain size as optimization parameter.