Advanced Microwave Precipitation Radiometer

Status

Status
Operational
Operated By
PI

The AMPR is a total power passive microwave radiometer producing calibrated brightness temperatures (TB) at 10.7, 19.35, 37.1, and 85.5 GHz. These frequencies are sensitive to the emission and scattering of precipitation-size ice, liquid water, and water vapor. The AMPR performs a 90º cross-track data scan perpendicular to the direction of aircraft motion. It processes a linear polarization feed with full vertical polarization at -45º and full horizontal polarization at +45º, with the polarization across the scan mixed as a function of sin2, giving an equal V-H mixture at 0º (aircraft nadir). A full calibration is made every fifth scan using hot and cold blackbodies. From a typical ER-2 flight altitude of ~20 km, surface footprint sizes range from 640 m (85.5 GHz) to 2.8 km (10.7 GHz). All four channels share a common measurement grid with collocated footprint centers, resulting in over-sampling of the low frequency channels with respect to 85.5 GHz.

Instrument Type
Measurements
Recent Missions
(ER-2 - AFRC)
;
(P-3 Orion - WFF)
;
(P-3 Orion - WFF)
;
(ER-2 - AFRC)
;
(ER-2 - AFRC)
;
(ER-2 - AFRC)
Point(s) of Contact
(POC; PI),
(Prev PI)
Range of Measurement
Ground
Instrument Pointing
Cross-track scanning
Measurement Wavelengths
10.7 GHz,
19.35 GHz,
37.1 GHz,
85.5 GHz

 

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