Raindrop Signature from Microwave Radiometer Over Deserts

You, Y and Joseph Munchak, S and Ferraro, R and Mohr, K and Peters-Lidard, C and Prigent, C and Ringerud, S and Rudlosky, S and Wang, H and Norouzi, H and Prakash, S (2020) Raindrop Signature from Microwave Radiometer Over Deserts. In: Geophysical Research Letters, 47 (16).

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Abstract

Rainfall estimates from spaceborne microwave radiometers form the foundation of global precipitation data sets. Since the beginning of the satellite microwave rainfall estimation era in the 1980s, the primary signature leveraged over land for these estimates has been the brightness temperature (TB) depression due to ice particle scattering. Contrary to this practice, time series analyses based on observations from two spaceborne radars and two spaceborne radiometers reveal a TB increase at H19 due to raindrop emission as the primary cloud particle signature over desert terrain. Low surface emissivity supports the use of liquid raindrop emission as the primary signature over desert surfaces. In these regions, the surface rain rate better correlates with the liquid raindrop emission signal than with the scattering induced by ice further aloft, suggesting a new potential for improving rainfall estimation over deserts by exploiting the liquid raindrop emission signature. ©2020. American Geophysical Union. All Rights Reserved.

Item Type:	Journal Article
Publication:	Geophysical Research Letters
Publisher:	Blackwell Publishing Ltd
Additional Information:	The copyright of this article belongs to Blackwell Publishing Ltd
Keywords:	Arid regions; Landforms; Liquids; Microwave devices; Microwave measurement; Radiometers; Rain; Rain gages; Time series analysis, Brightness temperatures; Global precipitation; Microwave radiometers; Microwave rainfall; Rainfall estimates; Rainfall estimations; Spaceborne radiometers; Surface emissivity, Drops
Department/Centre:	Division of Mechanical Sciences > Divecha Centre for Climate Change
Date Deposited:	04 Sep 2020 06:52
Last Modified:	04 Sep 2020 06:52
URI:	http://eprints.iisc.ac.in/id/eprint/66475

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