Microwave remote sensing of soil water content

Microwave remote sensing of soils to determine water content was considered. A layered water balance model was developed for determining soil water content in the upper zone (top 30 cm), while soil moisture at greater depths and near the surface during the diurnal cycle was studied using experimental measurements. Soil temperature was investigated by means of a simulation model. Based on both models, moisture and temperature profiles of a hypothetical soil were generated and used to compute microwave soil parameters for a clear summer day. The results suggest that, (1) soil moisture in the upper zone can be predicted on a daily basis for 1 cm depth increments, (2) soil temperature presents no problem if surface temperature can be measured with infrared radiometers, and (3) the microwave response of a bare soil is determined primarily by the moisture at and near the surface. An algorithm is proposed for monitoring large areas which combines the water balance and microwave methods

Modeling L-Band Microwave Emission From Soil-Vegetation System

During a field campaign covering the 2002 corn growing season, a dual polarized tower mounted L-band (1.4 GHz) radiometer (LRAD) provided brightness temperature (T¬B) measurements at preset intervals, incidence and azimuth angles. These radiometer measurements were supported by an extensive characterization of land surface variables including soil moisture, soil temperature, vegetation biomass, and surface roughness. During the period from May 22, 2002 to August 30, 2002 a range of vegetation water content (W) of 0.0 to 4.3 kg m-2, ten days of radiometer and ground measurements were available. Using this data set, the effects of corn vegetation on surface emissions are investigated by means of a semi-empirical radiative transfer model. Additionally, the impact of roughness on the surface emission is quantified using T¬B measurements over bare soil conditions. Subsequently, the estimated roughness parameters, ground measurements and horizontally (H)-polarized TB are employed to invert the H-polarized transmissivity (γh) for the monitored corn growing season

Dielectric properties of marsh vegetation

The present work is devoted to the measurement of the dielectric properties of mosses and lichens in the frequency range from 500 MHz to 18 GHz. Subjects of this research were three species of march vegetation – moss (Dicranum polysetum Michx), groundcedar (Diphasiastrum complanatum (L.) Holub) and lichen (Cladonia stellaris). Samples of vegetation were collected in Tomsk region, Western Siberia, Russia. Complex dielectric permittivity was measured in coaxial section by Agilent Technologies vector network analyzer E8363B. Green samples was measured for some moisture contents from 100% to 3–5 % during a natural drying. The measurements were performed at room temperature, which remained within 21 ÷ 23 ° C. The frequency dependence of the dielectric constant for the three species of marsh vegetation differ markedly. Different parts of the complex permittivity dependency on moisture were fitted by line for all frequency points. Two break point were observed corresponding to the transition of water in the vegetation in various phase states. The complex permittivity spectra of water in the vegetation allow determining the most likely corresponding dielectric model of water in the vegetation by the method of hypothesis testing. It is the Debye’s model. Parameters of Debye’s model were obtained by numerical methods for all of three states of water. This enables to calculate the dielectric constant of water at any frequency range from 500 MHz to 18 GHz and to find the parameters of the dielectric model of the vegetation

Effects of roughness on the radar response to soil moisture of bare ground

The radar response to soil moisture content was experimentally determined for three different bare fields with considerably different surface roughnesses at eight frequencies in the 2 to 8 GHz band and for Horizontal transmit-Horizontal receive (HH) and Vertical transmit-Vertical receive (VV) polarizations. Analysis of the data indicated that the effect of roughness on the radar backscattering coefficient can be minimized by proper choice of the radar parameters. If, in addition, sensitivity to soil moisture variations and system design constraints are considered, the following radar parameters for an operational soil moisture mapper are recommended: frequency= 4 GHz, angle of incidence range= 7 deg to 15 deg and either HH or VV polarization. The corresponding sensitivity is about 0.25 db/ 0.01 gram/cubic cm