Azimuthal Modulation of C-Band Scatterometer Over Southern Ocean Sea Ice

• Main Authors: Long, David G., Early, David S.
• Format: Text
• Language: English
• Published: BYU ScholarsArchive 1997
• Subjects: backscatter; oceanographic regions; oceanographic techniques; radar cross-sections; remote sensing by radar; sea ice; water; spaceborne radar; synthetic aperture radar; Electrical and Computer Engineering; Antarctic; Southern Ocean; The Antarctic; Antarc*; ice pack; Sea ice
• Online Access: https://scholarsarchive.byu.edu/facpub/662; https://scholarsarchive.byu.edu/context/facpub/article/1661/viewcontent/IR_CISOPTR_662.pdf

In a continuing evaluation of the ERS-1 C-band scatterometer as a tool for studying polar sea ice, the authors evaluate the azimuthal modulation characteristics of Antarctic sea ice. ERS-1 AMI scatterometer mode data sets from several study regions dispersed in the Antarctic seasonal sea ice pack are evaluated for azimuthal modulation. When appropriate, the incidence angle dependence is estimated and removed in a study region before determining whether azimuthal modulation is present in the data. Other comparisons are made using the fore and aft beam measurement difference. The results show that over the ice pack, azimuthal modulation is less than 1 dB at the scale of observation of the ERS-1 C-band scatterometer.