Effect of microwave radiometer inter-calibration on rainfall accumulation for the global precipitation measurement mission

Author

Kroodsma, Rachael ; McKague, Darren ; Ruf, C.

Author_Institution

Univ. of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI, USA

fYear

2013

fDate

21-26 July 2013

Firstpage

1147

Lastpage

1150

Abstract

The effect of inter-calibration on a Level 3 rainfall product for the Global Precipitation Measurement (GPM) mission is examined using two spaceborne microwave radiometers that are currently used to derive rain measurements, the Tropical Rainfall Measuring Mission Microwave Imager (TMI) and the Special Sensor Microwave/Imager (SSM/I). It is found that inter-calibrating the microwave radiometer brightness temperatures from the two instruments improves the agreement of the derived rain accumulations between the two radiometers. The average difference between TMI and F13 derived rain accumulations is 0.60 mm/day before inter-calibration is applied. This difference decreases to 0.08 mm/day when F13 is inter-calibrated to TMI.

Keywords

atmospheric techniques; calibration; meteorological instruments; microwave measurement; radiometers; radiometry; rain; remote sensing; GPM mission; Global Precipitation Measurement mission; Level 3 rainfall product; SSM/I; Special Sensor Microwave/Imager; TMI; TRMM Microwave Imager; Tropical Rainfall Measuring Mission; global precipitation measurement mission; microwave radiometer brightness temperature; microwave radiometer intercalibration effects; rain accumulation; rain measurements; rainfall accumulation; spaceborne microwave radiometers; Calibration; Extraterrestrial measurements; Microwave imaging; Microwave measurement; Microwave radiometry; Rain; Sea measurements; Inter-calibration; Microwave radiometry; Rainfall retrieval;

fLanguage

English

Publisher

ieee

Conference_Titel

Geoscience and Remote Sensing Symposium (IGARSS), 2013 IEEE International

Conference_Location

Melbourne, VIC

ISSN

2153-6996

Print_ISBN

978-1-4799-1114-1

Type

conf

DOI

10.1109/IGARSS.2013.6721368

Filename

6721368