The University of Michigan Project/Grant F006241 Legacy 043356 Preparation for Radiometric Measurements of Snow Covered Terrain at the Fraser Forest Site of CLPX I. Project Summary

• Main Authors: Roger D. De Roo, A. W. Engl
• Other Authors: The Pennsylvania State University CiteSeerX Archives
• Format: Text
• Language: English
• Published: 2005
• Subjects: north slope; Alaska
• Online Access: http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/summary?doi=10.1.1.402.4134; http://www.eecs.umich.edu/RADLAB/html/techreports/RL1011.pdf

number of microwave radiometer instruments so that they could be used in the Cold Lands Processes Experiment (CLPX) held at Fraser Colorado in the Winter of '02-'03. Specifically, the repackaging of the Microwave Geophysics Group 19GHz and 37GHz dual-polarized radiometers were completed under this project. The repackaging involved the removal of the RF hardware from an existing tower-based system and the design of a new thermal enclosure for each radiometer. The new thermal enclosure incorporates a Thermo-Electric Cooler (TEC, manf TECA model AHP300CPHC), a TEC controller (manf McShane model 5C7-378), and a microcontroller (manf Z-World model BL1720) for instrument management. The inclusion of a microcontroller in each radiometer has resulted in very robust operation. No data were lost in subsequent experiments due to radiometer management/control failure. The repackaged instruments were built to be compatible with new 1.4GHz and 6.7GHz dual polarized instruments (developed under separate projects) and the entire suite of instruments were mounted on the hydraulic boom of the Microwave Geophysics portable laboratory (a Norstar truck). Other related activities completed under this project include the fabrication of a separate power supply box to provide DC power to the radiometers, and the initial testing, thermal calibration and radiometric calibration of the repackaged radiometers. These radiometers repackaged under this project were subsequently used at the Cold Lands Processes Experiment in the Winter '03 and at a Radiobrightness and Energy Balance Experiment on the North Slope of Alaska in Spring/Summer '04. These