101021 A New Solution to Richards' Equation for Application to P-Band Radar Remote Sensing of Root Zone Soil Moisture.

Poster Number 348-101

See more from this Division: SSSA Division: Soil Physics and Hydrology
See more from this Session: Remote Sensing of Land Surface and Vadose Zone Hydrologic Processes Poster

Tuesday, November 8, 2016
Phoenix Convention Center North, Exhibit Hall CDE

Morteza Sadeghi, Department of Plants, Soils and Climate, Utah State University, Logan, UT, Alireza Tabatabaeenejad, Department of Electrical Engineering, University of Southern California, Los Angeles, CA, Markus Tuller, Soil, Water and Environmental Science, University of Arizona, Tucson, AZ, Ebrahim Babaeian, Department of Soil, Water and Environmental Science, University of Arizona, Tucson, AZ and Scott B. Jones, 4820 Old Main Hill, Utah State University, Logan, UT
Abstract:
The Airborne Microwave Observatory of Subcanopy and Subsurface (AirMOSS) mission is aimed at estimation of North America Net Ecosystem Exchange (NEE) via estimation of root-zone soil moisture (RZSM) from low frequency P-band radar remote sensing data. Due to the substantial penetration depth of the P-band frequency, AirMOSS is able to retrieve RZSM profile down to about 0.5 m. A mathematical function is used for continuous presentation of the vertical moisture distribution from 3 radar observations (i.e. one frequency and three polarizations of HH, VV and HV). Since no more than 3 free parameters is allowed, an empirical second order polynomial is being used currently. In this presentation, a physically-based soil moisture profile (SMP) model with 3 free parameters is introduced based on a new solution to Richards’ equation for unsaturated flow in soils. Evaluation of the new SMP model based on both numerical simulations and measured data revealed that it exhibits broad flexibility for fitting measured and simulated SMPs. The new solution improves upon the second order polynomial SMP model employed in the AirMOSS retrieval algorithm, by adding physically-based parameters and modeled SMP.

See more from this Division: SSSA Division: Soil Physics and Hydrology
See more from this Session: Remote Sensing of Land Surface and Vadose Zone Hydrologic Processes Poster