Measurements of the volume scattering function in a coastal environment

The Volume Scattering Function (VSF) is an essential variable in the context of marine radiative transfer modeling and of the inversion of ocean colour remote sensing data. However, an important lack of knowledge on the VSF natural variability affects the present models, in particular for the coastal environment. Measurements of the Volume Scattering Function between 0.6° and 177.3° with an angular resolution of 0.3° were performed in the northern coastal Adriatic Sea onboard an oceanographic platform in October 2004 using a prototype instrument. Observed differences with the commonly used Petzold's functions are significant, in particular for the "open ocean" and "coastal" types in the backward directions. The use of an empirical relationship for the derivation of bb(λ) from a unique measurement of β(ψ,λ) at ψ=140 for the Hydroscat-6 was validated for this coastal site at that season. Finally, the use of the Kopelevich VSF model together with a measurement of bp(λ) at λ=555 nm allowed the reconstruction of the VSF to within about 35%.© (2007) COPYRIGHT SPIE--The International Society for Optical Engineering. Downloading of the abstract is permitted for personal use only.