Brief communication: Monitoring active layer dynamics using a lightweight nimble ground-penetrating radar system – a laboratory analogue test case

• Published in: The Cryosphere
• Main Authors: Léger, Emmanuel, Saintenoy, Albane, Serhir, Mohammed, Costard, François, Grenier, Christophe
• Other Authors: Géosciences Paris Saclay (GEOPS), Institut national des sciences de l'Univers (INSU - CNRS)-Université Paris-Saclay-Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS), CentraleSupélec, Sondra, CentraleSupélec, Université Paris-Saclay (SONDRA), ONERA-CentraleSupélec-Université Paris-Saclay, Laboratoire des Sciences du Climat et de l'Environnement Gif-sur-Yvette (LSCE), Université de Versailles Saint-Quentin-en-Yvelines (UVSQ)-Commissariat à l'énergie atomique et aux énergies alternatives (CEA)-Institut national des sciences de l'Univers (INSU - CNRS)-Université Paris-Saclay-Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS), Modélisation Hydrologique (HYDRO), Université de Versailles Saint-Quentin-en-Yvelines (UVSQ)-Commissariat à l'énergie atomique et aux énergies alternatives (CEA)-Institut national des sciences de l'Univers (INSU - CNRS)-Université Paris-Saclay-Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS)-Université de Versailles Saint-Quentin-en-Yvelines (UVSQ)-Commissariat à l'énergie atomique et aux énergies alternatives (CEA)-Institut national des sciences de l'Univers (INSU - CNRS)-Université Paris-Saclay-Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS)
• Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
• Language: English
• Published: HAL CCSD 2023
• Subjects: [SDU]Sciences of the Universe [physics]; [PHYS]Physics [physics]; [SDE]Environmental Sciences; The Cryosphere
• Online Access: https://hal.science/hal-04043201; https://hal.science/hal-04043201/document; https://hal.science/hal-04043201/file/tc-17-1271-2023.pdf; https://doi.org/10.5194/tc-17-1271-2023

International audience Monitoring active layer dynamics is critical for improving the understanding of near-surface thermal and hydrological processes in the cryosphere. This study presents the laboratory test of a low-cost ground-penetrating radar (GPR) system within a laboratory experiment of active layer freezing and thawing monitoring. The system is an in-housebuilt low-power monostatic GPR antenna coupled with a reflectometer piloted by a single-board computer (SBC) and was tested prior to field deployment. The correspondence between the frozen front electromagnetic (EM) reflection and temperature allowed us to test the ability of the system to closely monitor the frozen front and bottom of the active layer reflection.