Theory for measuring the effective polarization parameters of rain from orthogonal linearly-polarized transmissions

The theory is presented for one method of determining the effective polarization parameters of rain from propagation measurements over a line-of-sight link. The method requires the transmission of orthogonal linearlypolarized signals and a set of three amplitude and two relative phase measurements. Approximate equations are given for determining both instantaneous and «statistical parametric» values of the effective parameters in a twoparameter Gaussian model of the raindrop canting angle distribution. The instantaneous values could be useful for comparison with in-situ measurements, while the statistical parametric values are required for prediction of rain depolarization statistics.