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Airborne Measurements of Snow Thickness: Using ultrawide-band frequency-modulated-continuous-wave radars

Authors :
S. Gogineni
Carlton J. Leuschen
D. Gomez-Garcia
Sinead L. Farrell
Fernando Rodriguez-Morales
John Brozena
Jacqueline A. Richter-Menge
John Paden
Jilu Li
Jie-Bang Yan
Richard D. Hale
David Braaten
Source :
IEEE Geoscience and Remote Sensing Magazine. 5:57-76
Publication Year :
2017
Publisher :
Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE), 2017.

Abstract

Frequency-modulated-continuous-wave (FM-CW) radar has been used extensively for the airborne measurement of snow thickness over sea ice and the mapping of annual accumulation over land ice. In contrast to conventional in situ measurements, FM-CW radar, when operated onboard an airborne platform, can be a useful tool for widearea surveys of snow deposition. Since the early 2000s, the Center for Remote Sensing of Ice Sheets (CReSIS) at the University of Kansas (KU) has designed, developed, and deployed airborne ultrawide-band (UWB) FM-CW radars, called Snow Radars, on National Science Foundation (NSF)-, NASA-, Naval Research Laboratory (NRL)-, and Alfred Wegener Institute (AWI)-provided aircraft in both Arctic and Antarctic regions and generated a large amount of snow data products. In addition to the significant standalone value of the snow-thickness measurements, these data are being used in estimating Arctic sea ice thickness, which is a key variable in the study of atmosphere-ocean-ice interactions. This article provides a review of snow remote sensing techniques with airborne FM-CW radars to document the operating principle, design, and evolution of CReSIS' UWB FM-CW radars and discuss and promote understanding of the advantages and limitations associated with these systems.

Details

ISSN :
21686831 and 24732397
Volume :
5
Database :
OpenAIRE
Journal :
IEEE Geoscience and Remote Sensing Magazine
Accession number :
edsair.doi...........953058b3217e792df0e8e2f9df7fdb8e
Full Text :
https://doi.org/10.1109/mgrs.2017.2663325