AMSR-E Satellite Brightness Temperature Measurements from 2007

NASA's AMSR-E instrument collected global passive microwave radiometer data throughout 2007. The system recorded vertically and horizontally polarized brightness temperatures at six frequencies ranging from 6.925 GHz to 89.0 GHz. Data was produced by the AMD_KOPRI organization from the NASA Earthdata platform.

Use Cases

• Estimate sea ice concentration and extent by analyzing polarization differences at 6.925 GHz and 18.7 GHz channels.
• Retrieve atmospheric water vapor content using the 23.8 GHz channel, which is sensitive to this parameter.
• Monitor soil moisture levels over land by utilizing the lower frequency channels (6.925 GHz and 10.65 GHz) which penetrate vegetation.
• Derive precipitation rates over oceans by combining data from the 18.7 GHz, 23.8 GHz, and 36.5 GHz channels.

Strengths

• Provides dual-polarization (vertical and horizontal) measurements at all six frequency channels.
• Offers a wide swath width due to a conical scan with a constant 55-degree Earth incidence angle.
• Includes calibration via cosmic background radiation and an on-board warm target.

Limitations

• Spatial resolution is coarse, varying from 56 km at 6.9 GHz to 5.4 km at 89.0 GHz, limiting fine-detail analysis.
• Dataset is from a single year (2007), providing only a temporal snapshot.
• Specific row count, file size, and column details are unknown.

Provenance

Source

NASA Earthdata platform, from the Advanced Microwave Scanning Radiometer for EOS (AMSR-E) instrument.

Collection Method

Measured via a 1.6-meter offset parabolic reflector scanning conically, with radiation carried to radiometers by six feedhorns.

Time Range

2007

Freshness

Data collection ended in December 2007; this is a historical snapshot.

Geography

Global coverage from satellite orbit.