80NSSC24M0010

Extending the air/sea essential climate variable record with observations from two new satellite microwave sensors: MWI and AMSR-3

Remote Sensing Systems

THE OBJECTIVE OF THE PROPOSED INVESTIGATION IS TO MERGE THE MWI AND AMSR-3 OBSERVATIONS INTO THE EXISTING AS-ECV DATA RECORD THEREBY EXTENDING THE DATA RECORD POSSIBLY FOR ANOTHER 15 YEARS. THE END RESULT WOULD BE A 5-DECADE ESDR OF AIR-SEA INTERACTION DYNAMICS.TO ACCOMPLISH THIS THE EXISTING DATA PROCESSING SYSTEMS (DPS) FOR WINDSAT GMI AND AMSR-2 NEED TO BE ADAPTED TO HANDLE THE NEW MWI AND AMSR-3 OBSERVATIONS. THEN AFTER LAUNCH A PRECISE INTER-CALIBRATION OF THE NEW OBSERVATIONS WITH THE EXISTING OBSERVATIONS NEEDS TO BE PERFORMED. THIS INTER-CALIBRATION IS A CRUCIAL PART OF THE INVESTIGATION TO ENSURE CONSISTENCY IN THE MULTI-DECADAL CLIMATERECORD. THE FOUNDATION FOR THE CURRENT AS-ECV DATA RECORD IS NASA S GMI SENSOR. GMI S ON-BOARD CALIBRATION SYSTEM AND ITS POST-LAUNCH ORBITAL MANEUVERS ENABLED AN ABSOLUTE CALIBRATION OF THE MW BRIGHTNESS TEMPERATURES. MWI HAS THE SAME ON-BOARD CALIBRATION SYSTEMAS GMI AND IT WILL PROVIDE THE ABSOLUTE CALIBRATION REFERENCE TO TIE TOGETHER THE NEXT GENERATION OF SATELLITE MW IMAGERS (COWVR AMSR-3 CIMR). OVER THE COURSE OF THIS 5-YEAR INVESTIGATION WE WILL ASSESS THE LONG-TERM STABILITY OF MWI/AMSR-3 AS WELL AS THE ACCURACY OF THE RETRIEVALS. ANNUAL ASSESSMENT REPORTS WILL BE PREPARED. THESE ASSESSMENTS WILL BE BASED ON COMPARISONS WITH IN-SITU OBSERVATIONS NUMERICAL MODELS AND INDEPENDENT SATELLITE RETRIEVALS. THE UNCERTAINTIES IN THE AS-ECV RETRIEVALS WILL BE CHARACTERIZEDBY ASSIGNING 1-SIGMA ERROR BARS TO EACH RETRIEVAL.

43.001 - Science

Shared Services Center (NSSC) [NASA]

Santa Rosa, California 95401-5288 United States

Single Zip Code

NOT APPLICABLE

Amendment Since initial award the total obligations have increased 104% from $558,351 to $1,140,869.