Evaluation of the SMOS L-MEB passive microwave soil moisture retrieval algorithm

Soil moisture will be mapped globally by the European Soil Moisture and Ocean Salinity (SMOS) mission to be launched in 2009. The expected soil moisture accuracy will be 4.0 %v/v. The core component of the SMOS soil moisture retrieval algorithm is the L-band Microwave Emission of the Biosphere (L-MEB) model which simulates the microwave emission at L-band from the soil-vegetation layer. The model parameters have been calibrated with data acquired by tower mounted radiometer studies in Europe and the United States, with a typical footprint size of approximately 10 m. In this study, aircraft L-band data acquired during the National Airborne Field Experiment (NAFE) intensive campaign held in South-eastern Australia in 2005 are used to perform the first evaluation of the L-MEB model and its proposed parameterization when applied to coarser footprints (62.5 m). The model could be evaluated across large areas including a wide range of land surface conditions, typical of the Australian environment. Soil moisture was retrieved from the aircraft brightness temperatures using L-MEB and ground measured ancillary data (soil temperature, soil texture, vegetation water content and surface roughness) and subsequently evaluated against ground measurements of soil moisture. The retrieval accuracy when using the L-MEB ‘default’ set of model parameters was found to be better than 4.0 %v/v only over grassland covered sites. Over crops the model was found to underestimate soil moisture by up to 32 %v/v. After site specific calibration of the vegetation and roughness parameters, the retrieval accuracy was found to be equal or better than 4.8 %v/v for crops and grasslands at 62.5-m resolution. It is suggested that the proposed value of roughness parameter H_R for crops is too low, and that variability of H_R with soil moisture must be taken into consideration to obtain accurate retrievals at these scales. The analysis presented here is a crucial step towards validating the application of L-MEB for soil moisture retrieval from satellite observations in an operational context.     

Impact of surface heterogeneity on surface soil moisture retrievals from passive microwave data at the regional scale: The Upper Danube case

Water and energy fluxes at the interface between the land surface and atmosphere are strongly depending on the surface soil moisture content which is highly variable in space and time. The sensitivity of active and passive microwave remote sensing data to surface soil moisture content has been investigated in numerous studies. Recent satellite borne mission concepts, as e.g. the SMOS mission, are dedicated to provide global soil moisture information with a temporal frequency of 1-3 days to capture it's high temporal dynamics. Passive satellite microwave sensors have spatial resolutions in the order of tens of kilometres. The retrieved soil moisture fields from that sensors therefore represent surface information which is integrated over large areas. It has been shown that the heterogeneity within an image pixel might have considerable impact on the accuracy of soil moisture retrievals from passive microwave data.The paper investigates the impact of land surface heterogeneity on soil moisture retrievals from L-band passive microwave data at different spatial scales between 1 km and 40 km. The impact of sensor noise and quality of ancillary information is explicitly considered. A synthetic study is conducted where brightness temperature observations are generated using simulated land surface conditions. Soil moisture information is retrieved from these simulated observations using an iterative approach based on multiangular observations of brightness temperature. The soil moisture retrieval uncertainties resulting from the heterogeneity within the image pixels as well as the uncertainties in the a priori knowledge of surface temperature data and due to sensor noise, is investigated at different spatial scales. The investigations are made for a heterogeneous hydrological catchment in Southern Germany (Upper Danube) which is dedicated to serve as a calibration and validation site for the SMOS mission.     

Pixel-scalesoil Moisture Monitoring Network and Its Preliminary Validation of L-band Soil Moisture Products

Soil moisture is a key variable in the process of crop growth,ground-air water heat exchange and global water cycle,which plays an important role in drought monitoring,hydrological land surface processes and climate change.Passive microwave remote sensing has become the main means of monitoring soil moisture with the sensitivity to soil moisture.In this study,the authenticity test of SMAP（Soil Moisture and Active and Passive） and SMOS（Soil Moisture and Ocean Salinity）passive microwave soil moisture products using the soil moisture sensor network monitoring data carried out against the underlying surface of farmlands in Jilin Province was carried out.The following conclusions were obtained：（1）Compared with the in situ measured data,SMOS L3(ascending and descending overpasses) and SMAP L3 passive microwave soil moisture products generally underestimated the ground data,but With the occurrence of rainfall events,there will be the phenomenon which is the value of soil moisture products is higher than the in situ data; although the unbiased root mean square error (unRMSE) of the two soil moisture products was greater than 0.07 m3/m3,the unRMSE of SMAP passive microwave soil moisture product data which was 0.078 m3/m3 was slightly lower;（2）Since the depth of induction of the L-band is lighter than the depth of detection of the sensor(5cm),and the dryness of the soil surface after rainfall causes the vertical inhomogeneity of soil moisture,which is one of the reasons why SMOS and SMAP passive microwave soil moisture products underestimate soil moisture; （3）SMOS has a higher value than the range of SMAP brightness temperature,which may be caused by radio frequency interference (RFI),which makes the error of soil moisture Retrieval and affects the validation accuracy.The comparison of bright temperature distribution of SMOS and SMAP shows that the effect of RFI on SMOS is more serious due to the influence of electromagnetic radio frequency interference (RFI),which may be the reason why the RMSE of soil moisture product of SMOS is higher than that of passive microwave soil moisture product of SMAP.     

反演策略对SMOS土壤水分反演算法的影响研究

为降低SMOS土壤水分反演算法的复杂度、提高土壤水分反演精度,对SMOS土壤水分反演策略进行调整：将多参数反演改为单参数反演以简化观测与模拟亮温的代价函数,以固定步长（0.001 m3/m3）代替不定步长从而避免复杂的矩阵运算,将围绕土壤水分先验值的少量局部搜索调整为全土壤水分区间（0~0.05 m³/m³）的密集全局搜索。利用美国USCRN 44个站点实测土壤水分分别与SMOS官方反演的土壤水分和SMOS调整算法反演的土壤水分进行对比分析。结果表明：与SMOS相比,算法调整后土壤水分的平均绝对偏差MAD、均方根误差RMSE和无偏均方根误差ubRMSE分别降低了0.012、0.018和0.020 m3/m3。     

Towards deterministic downscaling of SMOS soil moisture using MODIS derived soil evaporative efficiency

A deterministic approach for downscaling ～ 40 km resolution Soil Moisture and Ocean Salinity (SMOS) observations is developed from 1 km resolution MODerate resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) data. To account for the lower soil moisture sensitivity of MODIS surface temperature compared to that of L-band brightness temperature, the disaggregation scale is fixed to 10 times the spatial resolution of MODIS thermal data (10 km). Four different analytic downscaling relationships are derived from MODIS and physically-based model predictions of soil evaporative efficiency. The four downscaling algorithms differ with regards to i) the assumed relationship (linear or nonlinear) between soil evaporative efficiency and near-surface soil moisture, and ii) the scale at which soil parameters are available (40 km or 10 km). The 1 km resolution airborne L-band brightness temperature from the National Airborne Field Experiment 2006 (NAFE'06) are used to generate a time series of eleven clear sky 40 km by 60 km near-surface soil moisture observations to represent SMOS pixels across the three-week experiment. The overall root mean square difference between downscaled and observed soil moisture varies between 1.4% v/v and 1.8% v/v depending on the downscaling algorithm used, with soil moisture values ranging from 0 to 15% v/v. The accuracy and robustness of the downscaling algorithms are discussed in terms of their assumptions and applicability to SMOS.     

The SMOS Mediterranean Ecosystem L-Band characterisation EXperiment (MELBEX-I) over natural shrubs

In the framework of ESA's SMOS mission (Soil Moisture and Ocean Salinity), many studies have been carried out over different land surface types to model their microwave emission at L-band (1.4 GHz). Results of these studies have been integrated in the emission model L-MEB (L-Band Microwave Emission of the Biosphere), which is the core of the SMOS Level 2 soil moisture retrieval algorithm. The Mediterranean Ecosystem L-Band characterisation EXperiment (MELBEX-I) was carried out at the SMOS validation site near Valencia in autumn 2005. The main objective of MELBEX-I was to calibrate L-MEB over Mediterranean shrub land, as no data were available over this biome. For that purpose, multi-angular and dual polarimetric measurements (H, V) were obtained by the EMIRAD L-band radiometer from a 14-m tower. Results of this study indicate a small and constant impact of vegetation on the microwave emission of shrub land, and L-MEB parameters for shrub land were obtained. In addition, the study highlights the need for calibrating microwave soil roughness, which was found to be constant at the site. Depending on the number of retrieved parameters, soil moisture (SM) near the surface could be estimated with errors between 0.035 m³ m^− 3 (if only SM was retrieved) and 0.057 m³ m^− 3 (if SM, optical depth and a roughness parameter were simultaneously retrieved). Finally, no modelling improvements were observed when coarse estimates of the fraction of exposed rocks were accounted for in the model.     

国地球资源遥感卫星的工作状况和研制动态

In order to reduce the complexity of SMOS official soil moisture retrieval algorithm and improve the accuracy of soil moisture retrievals, a new retrieval strategy on SMOS soil moisture retrieval algorithm was developed. In the new retrieval strategy on SMOS soil moisture retrieval algorithm, the fixed step size (0.001 m3/m3) was used to replace the flexible step size obtained by the SMOS matrix operation. The multi-parameter was changed to a single-parameter in the cost function. The data from 44 USCRN sites in the United States were compared with the soil moisture retrieved from SMOS official algorithm as well as the adjustment of SMOS algorithm. The results show that compared with the SMOS official algorithm, the average absolute deviation, root mean square error,and unbiased root mean square error of the adjustment of SMOS algorithm are reduced by 0.012 m3/m3, 0.018 m3/m3,and 0.020 m3/m3,respectively.     

Soil moisture retrievals at L-band using a two-step inversion approach (COSMOS/NAFE'05 Experiment)

COSMOS (Campaign for validating the Operation of Soil Moisture and Ocean Salinity), and NAFE (National Airborne Field Experiment) were two airborne campaigns held in the Goulburn River catchment (Australia) at the end of 2005. These airborne measurements are being used as benchmark data sets for validating the SMOS (Soil Moisture and Ocean Salinity) ground segment processor over prairies and crops. This paper presents results of soil moisture inversions and brightness temperature simulations at different resolutions from dual-polarisation and multi-angular L-band (1.4 GHz) measurements obtained from two independent radiometers. The aim of the paper is to provide a method that could overcome the limitations of unknown surface roughness for soil moisture retrievals from L-band data. For that purpose, a two-step approach is proposed for areas with low to moderate vegetation. Firstly, a two-parameter inversion of surface roughness and optical depth is used to obtain a roughness correction dependent on land use only. This step is conducted over small areas with known soil moisture. Such roughness correction is then used in the second step, where soil moisture and optical depth are retrieved over larger areas including mixed pixels. This approach produces soil moisture retrievals with root mean square errors between 0.034 m³ m^− 3 and 0.054 m³ m^− 3 over crops, prairies, and mixtures of these two land uses at different resolutions.     

A field experiment on microwave forest radiometry: L-band signal behaviour for varying conditions of surface wetness

From July-December 2004 the experimental campaign ‘Bray 2004’ was conducted in the coniferous forest of Les Landes near Bordeaux, France, using a multi-angle L-band (1.4 GHz) radiometer to measure from above the forest at horizontal polarization. At the same time, ground measurements were taken of soil and litter moisture content, while precipitation was also permanently monitored. This experiment was done in the context of the upcoming SMOS mission in order to improve our understanding of the behaviour of the L-band signal from forested areas for different wetness conditions and viewing angles. This is especially relevant for solving the problem of heterogeneity since a large fraction of SMOS pixels (∼ 30 × 30 km²) is partially covered by forest.This paper describes the objectives and the overall set-up of the Bray-2004 experiment and shows some first results. The greater part of the horizontally polarized L-band signal is found to be dominated by the influence of physical temperature. Variations in soil and/or litter moisture content are visible in the angular signal and in the above-canopy microwave emission, although the dynamic range of this last effect is very small. This, together with the fact that emissivity values are very high, is possibly due to the presence of a substantial litter layer. However, decoupling of soil and litter effects is difficult because of the strong correlation found between soil and litter moisture.     

Analysis of in-situ soil moisture data and validation of SMOS soil moisture products at selected agricultural sites over a tropical region

Calibration and validation activities on Soil Moisture and Ocean Salinity (SMOS)-derived soil moisture products have been conducted worldwide since the data became available, but this has not been the case over tropical regions. This study focuses on the setting up of a soil moisture data collection network over an agricultural site in a tropical region in Peninsular Malaysia and on the validation of SMOS soil moisture products. The in-situ data over a one-and-a-half-year period was analysed and the validation of the SMOS soil moisture products with this in-situ data was conducted. Bias and root mean square error (RMSE) were computed between the SMOS soil moisture products and the in-situ surface soil moisture collected at the satellite passing times (6 am and 6 pm local time). Due to the known limitations of SMOS soil moisture retrieval over vegetated areas with a vegetation water content higher than 5 kg m^?2, an overestimation of SMOS soil moisture products to in-situ data was noticed in this study. The bias ranged from 0.064 to 0.119 m³ m^?3 and the RMSE was from 0.090 to 0.158 m³ m^?3, when both ascending and descending mode data were measured. This RMSE was found to be similar to those of a number of studies conducted previously at different regions. However, a wet bias was found during the validation, while previous validation activities at other locations showed dry biases. The result of this study is useful to support the continuous development and improvement of the SMOS soil moisture retrieval model, aiming to produce soil moisture products with higher accuracy, especially in tropical regions.     

Estimates of surface soil moisture under grass covers using L-band radiometry

The scope of this study is to establish the parameters of the L-band (1.4 GHz) Microwave Emission of the Biosphere model (L-MEB) for grass covers, and to assess surface soil moisture retrievals in areas covered by grass. L-MEB parameters are key ancillary information for the Soil Moisture and Ocean Salinity mission (SMOS) retrieval algorithm that produces estimates of the surface soil moisture from measurements of the surface brightness temperature at L-band.L-band data sets from three ground-based experiments over grass are analysed in this paper: BARC (orchard grass and alfalfa), ELBARA-ETH (clover grass), and SMOSREX (grass and litter from a field left fallow). Modelling of the brightness temperature using the zero-th order radiative transfer model in L-MEB indicates that the vegetation appears isotropic to microwaves propagating with horizontal polarisation, and that the single scattering albedo can be neglected. At vertical polarisation, non-zero scattering is observed for all the grass data sets. Surface soil moisture is retrieved with enough accuracy for all data sets as long as the soil and litter emission are calibrated beforehand. Then surface soil moisture and vegetation optical depth can be left as free parameters in the retrieval process. Finally, the study highlights the importance of detecting strong emission and attenuation by wet vegetation and litter due to rainfall interception in order to obtain accurate estimates of the surface soil moisture. The study illustrates how strong rainfall interception can be flagged straightforwardly using a microwave polarisation index.     

Influence of forest cover fraction on L-band soil moisture retrievals from heterogeneous pixels using multi-angular observations

Airborne L-band data from the Australian National Airborne Field Experiment 2005 (NAFE '05) field campaign were used to investigate the influence of fractional forest cover on soil moisture retrievals from heterogeneous (grass/forest) pixels. This study is, to our knowledge, the first to use experimental data on this subject and was done in view of the SMOS mission, in order to contribute to calibration/validation studies and the analysis of heterogeneous surfaces. Because the multi-angle observations were contained in swaths, swaths were used instead of pixels as the basic surface unit in this study. Simultaneous retrievals of soil moisture (SM) and vegetation optical depth (τ_NAD) were undertaken by inversion of the L-MEB zero-order radiative transfer model. This was done for two different retrieval configurations, the first consisting of swath-effective values of SM and τ_NAD and the second consisting of values of SM and τ_NAD for the non-forested (i.e. grass) fraction of the swath, with forest emission known from forward modelling. Model inputs for non-retrieved parameters were either default values taken from the literature or site- and time-specific values obtained from observations of nearby homogeneous swaths gathered during the same flight. The main focus of this study was on retrieval behaviour for various soil moisture conditions and forest fractions. Area-averaged retrieval results were generally very reasonable for both retrieval configurations. When retrieving swath-effective values of SM and τ_NAD, τ_NAD showed an increased overestimation with increased forest fraction. Highest retrieved values of SM were found at intermediate values of forest fraction. The results show the difficulty in flagging upper limits of pixel forest fraction during soil moisture retrievals, besides the fact that erroneous parameter values can lead to high errors in retrieved SM, especially in wet conditions. This study is the first to give a realistic idea of the errors and uncertainties involved in soil moisture retrievals from partly forested swaths, and as such will contribute to a better understanding of SMOS calibration/validation issues.     

A first assessment of the SMOS data in southwestern France using in situ and airborne soil moisture estimates: The CAROLS airborne campaign

The Soil Moisture and Ocean Salinity (SMOS) satellite mission, based on an aperture synthesis L-band radiometer was successfully launched in November 2009. In the context of a validation campaign for the SMOS mission, intensive airborne and in situ observations were performed in southwestern France for the SMOS CAL/VAL, from April to May 2009 and from April to July 2010. The CAROLS (Cooperative Airborne Radiometer for Ocean and Land Studies) bi-angular (34°-0°) and dual-polarized (V and H) L-band radiometer was designed, built and installed on board the French ATR-42 research aircraft. During springs of 2009 and 2010, soil moisture observations from the SMOSMANIA (Soil Moisture Observing System-Meteorological Automatic Network Integrated Application) network of Météo-France were complemented by airborne observations of the CAROLS L-band radiometer, following an Atlantic-Mediterranean transect in southwestern France. Additionally to the 12 stations of the SMOSMANIA soil moisture network, in situ measurements were collected in three specific sites within an area representative of a SMOS pixel. Microwave radiometer observations, acquired over southwestern France by the CAROLS instrument were analyzed in order to assess their sensitivity to surface soil moisture (w_g). A combination of microwave brightness temperature (T_b) at either two polarizations or two contrasting incidence angles was used to retrieve w_g through regressed empirical logarithmic equations with good results, depending on the chosen configuration. The regressions derived from the CAROLS measurements were applied to the SMOS T_b and their retrieval performance was evaluated. The retrievals of w_g showed significant correlation (p-value < 0.05) with surface measurements for most of the SMOSMANIA stations (8 of 12 stations) and with additional field measurements at two specific sites, also. Root mean square errors varied from 0.03 to 0.09 m³ m^− 3 (0.06 m³ m^− 3 on average).     

Effects of sub-pixel heterogeneity on the retrieval of soil moisture from passive microwave radiometry

A simple formulation relating the L-band microwave brightness temperature detected by a passive microwave radiometer to the near surface soil moisture was developed using MICRO-SWEAT, a coupled microwave emission model and soil-vegetation-atmosphere-transfer (SVAT) scheme. This simple model provides an ideal tool with which to explore the impact of sub-pixel heterogeneity on the retrieval of soil moisture from microwave brightness temperatures. In the case of a bare soil pixel, the relationship between apparent emissivity and surface soil moisture is approximately linear, with the clay content of the soil influencing just the intercept of this relationship. It is shown that there are no errors in the retrieved soil moisture from a bare soil pixel that is heterogeneous in soil moisture and texture. However, in the case of a vegetated pixel, the slope of the relationship between apparent emissivity and surface soil moisture decreases with increasing vegetation. Therefore for a pixel that is heterogeneous in vegetation and soil moisture, errors can be introduced into the retrieved soil moisture. Generally, under moderate conditions, the retrieved soil moisture is within 3% of the actual soil moisture. Examples illustrating this discussion use data collected during the Southern Great Plains '97 Experiment (SGP97).     

Validation of SMOS Soil Moisture Products on Different Vegetation Types in Qilian Mountain

Observation data of 34 in-situ stations located in seven main vegetation types were used to evaluate the performance of SMOS soil moisture products in Qilian Mountain,Northwest China.SMOS data were processed to correspond to the observation data,and three indices：R、Biasand RMSE were calculated at both annual and seasonal scales for each observation station.Results show that SMOS products were credible in the study area,but underestimated soil moisture in Qilian Mountain,and failed to achieve the intended accuracy target of 0.04 m3/m3.SMOS performed better in estimating vegetation emission than soil emission,leading to its better performance in areas with higher vegetation coverage.Similarly,SMOS performed better in the humid condition than the arid condition,and also better in areas with smaller soil moisture variability than those with large soil moisture variability.At seasonal scale,SMOS products fitted the observations better in the summer and autumn than the spring.     

青藏高原L波段微波辐射观测与土壤水分反演研究进展

土壤水分是地气间水热交换的重要变量,影响着地表感热潜热划分、水分收支和植被蒸腾等过程,青藏高原土壤水分的研究对于改进高原水分循环和能量平衡的模拟研究具有重要意义。随着SMOS、SMAP等卫星的发射,L波段被动微波遥感技术成为大尺度监测土壤水分的主要手段。分别从L波段星—机—地观测与微波辐射模拟、区域尺度土壤水分观测、卫星产品评估与土壤水分反演算法发展等方面系统回顾和总结了近年来L波段被动微波遥感及其土壤水分反演算法、产品在青藏高原的主要应用与研究进展。在此基础上,归纳了当前高原L波段被动微波辐射模拟与土壤水分反演存在的问题,主要包括缺乏高原尺度的微波辐射模拟评估和改进的卫星土壤水分产品、土壤冻结时期的水分监测产品依然缺失等问题。针对存在的问题,进一步提出了相关建议与展望,建议今后的研究应加强高原尺度的微波辐射模拟评估与土壤水分产品改进工作,并积极拓展土壤水分产品在高原水分循环和能量平衡模拟、植被生长与干旱监测的应用研究。     

荷兰农业水土资源利用研究与遥感技术的应用-赴荷兰访问考察团

根据中荷两国学者互访协议,中国科学院沙漠所派我们两人在1985年10月10日至11月6日对荷兰进行了为期四周的考察访问。在荷期间,我们受到荷方学者热情友好的接待,首后访问了国际农业中心(IAC—     

SMOS与SMAP过境时段表层土壤水分的稳定性研究

SMOS和SMAP都是为获取全球土壤水分信息而设计的专题卫星,均搭载了L波段辐射计。进行二者的横向对比是构建具有一致性的全球土壤水分数据集的关键基础。虽然SMAP、SMOS名义上的过境时刻是固定的,但二者的实际过境时刻随时间和空间发生变化,它们与地面实测数据三者之间难以匹配形成时序上严格统一的样本对,从而给土壤水分反演结果的精度评定带来困难。针对这一问题,以美国大陆地区为研究区,首先对2016~2017年SMOS、SMAP土壤水分数据的时间戳进行统计,判定二者过境的交叠时段;进而利用高观测频率、大空间尺度的实测数据,研究表层土壤水分在此时段内的自然变化特征。结果显示,按照全部、无降水、有降水3种条件,在样本量分别为98.14%、99.51%和88.49%的绝大多数情况下,表层土壤水分的变化量为0.007 m3/m3、0.007 m3/m3和0.012 m3/m3, 远小于SMOS、SMAP的目标精度（0.04 m3/m3）。初步证实： ①SMOS与SMAP的土壤水分反演结果（L2数据）可进行直接比对;②过境时刻差异对验证误差的影响可不计。     

A downscaling method for distributing surface soil moisture within a microwave pixel: Application to the Monsoon '90 data

A downscaling method for the near-surface soil moisture retrieved from passive microwave sensors is applied to the PBMR data collected during the Monsoon '90 experiment. The downscaling method requires (1) the coarse resolution microwave observations, (2) the fine-scale distribution of soil temperature and (3) the fine-scale distribution of surface conditions composed of atmospheric forcing and the parameters involved in the modeling of land surface-atmosphere interactions. During the Monsoon '90 experiment, eight ground-based meteorological and flux stations were operating over the 150 km² study area simultaneously with the acquisition of the aircraft-based L-band PBMR data. The heterogeneous scene is hence composed of eight subpixels and the microwave pixel is generated by aggregating the microwave emission of all sites. The results indicate a good agreement between the downscaled and ground-based soil moisture as long as the intensity of solar radiation is sufficiently high to use the soil temperature as a tracer of the spatial variability of near-surface soil moisture.