scholarly journals Utilizing a new soil effective temperature scheme and archived satellite microwave brightness temperature data to estimate surface soil moisture in the Nagqu region, Tibetan Plateau of China

2018 ◽  
Vol 10 (1) ◽  
pp. 84-100
Author(s):  
Hui Tian ◽  
Mudassar Iqbal
2014 ◽  
Vol 607 ◽  
pp. 830-834
Author(s):  
Hong Zhang Ma ◽  
Su Mei Liu

—Surface soil moisture is an important parameter in describing the water and energy exchanges at the land surface/atmosphere interface. Passive microwave remote sensors have great potential for monitoring surface soil moisture over land surface. The objective of this study is going to establish a model for estimating the effective temperature of land surface covered with vegetation canopy and to investigate how to compute the microwave radiative brightness temperature of land surface covered with vegetation canopy in considering of the canopy scatter effect.


2009 ◽  
Vol 6 (1) ◽  
pp. 1233-1260 ◽  
Author(s):  
X. K. Shi ◽  
J. Wen ◽  
L. Wang ◽  
T. T. Zhang ◽  
H. Tian ◽  
...  

Abstract. As the satellite microwave remote sensed brightness temperature is sensitive to land surface soil moisture (SM) and SM is a basic output variable in model simulation, it is of great significance to use the brightness temperature data to improve SM numerical simulation. In this paper, the theory developed by Yan et al. (2004) about the relationship between satellite microwave remote sensing polarization index and SM was used to estimate the land surface SM from AMSR-E (Advanced Microwave Scanning Radiometer – Earth Observing System) brightness temperature data. With consideration of land surface soil texture, surface roughness, vegetation optical thickness, and the AMSR-E monthly SM products, the regional daily land surface SM was estimated over the eastern part of the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau. The results show that the estimated SM is lower than the ground measurements and the NCEP (American National Centers for Environmental Prediction) reanalysis data at the Maqu Station (33.85° N, 102.57° E) and the Tanglha Station (33.07° N, 91.94° E), but its regional distribution is reasonable and somewhat better than that from the daily AMSR-E SM product, and its temporal variation shows a quick response to the ground daily precipitations. Furthermore, in order to improve the simulating ability of the WRF (Weather Research and Forecasting) model to land surface SM, the estimated SM was assimilated into the Noah land surface model by the Newtonian relaxation (NR) method. The results indicate that, by fine tuning of the quality factor in NR method, the simulated SM values are improved most in desert area, followed by grassland, shrub and grass mixed zone. At temporal scale, Root Mean Square Error (RMSE) values between simulated and observed SM are decreased 0.03 and 0.07 m3/m3 by using the NR method in the Maqu Station and the Tanglha Station, respectively.


2020 ◽  
Vol 12 (24) ◽  
pp. 4121
Author(s):  
Wei Zhang ◽  
Shuhua Yi ◽  
Yu Qin ◽  
Yi Sun ◽  
Donghui Shangguan ◽  
...  

Surface soil moisture (SSM) is a key limiting factor for vegetation growth in alpine meadow on the Qinghai-Tibetan Plateau (QTP). Patches with various sizes and types may cause the redistribution of SSM by changing soil hydrological processes, and then trigger or accelerate alpine grassland degradation. Therefore, it is vital to understand the effects of patchiness on SSM at multi-scales to provide a reference for alpine grassland restoration. However, there is a lack of direct observational evidence concerning the role of the size and type of patches on SSM, and little is known about the effects of patches pattern on SSM at plot scale. Here, we first measured SSM of typical patches with different sizes and types at patch scale and investigated their patterns and SSM spatial distribution through unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV)-mounted multi-type cameras at plot scale. We then analyzed the role of the size and type of patchiness on SSM at both patch and plot scales. Results showed that: (1) in situ measured SSM of typical patches was significantly different (P < 0.01), original vegetation patch (OV) had the highest SSM, followed by isolate vegetation patch (IV), small bare patch (SP), medium bare patch (MP) and large bare patch (LP); (2) the proposed method based on UAV images was able to estimate SSM (0–40 cm) with a satisfactory accuracy (R2 = 0.89, P < 0.001); (3) all landscape indices of OV, with the exception of patch density, were positively correlated with SSM at plot scale, while most of the landscape indices of LP and IV showed negative correlations (P < 0.05). Our results indicated that patchiness intensified the spatial heterogeneity of SSM and potentially accelerated the alpine meadow degradation. Preventing the development of OV into IV and the expansion of LP is a critical task for alpine meadow management and restoration.


2020 ◽  
Vol 12 (1) ◽  
pp. 183 ◽  
Author(s):  
Chenyang Xu ◽  
John J. Qu ◽  
Xianjun Hao ◽  
Di Wu

Surface soil moisture (SSM), the average water content of surface soil (up to 5 cm depth), plays a key role in the energy exchange within the ecosystem. We estimated SSM in areas with vegetation cover (grassland) by combining microwave and optical satellite measurements in the central Tibetan Plateau (TP) in 2015. We exploited TERRA moderate resolution imaging spectroradiometer (MODIS) and Sentinel-1A synthetic aperture radar (SAR) observations to estimate SSM through a simplified water-cloud model (sWCM). This model considers the impact of vegetation water content (VWC) to SSM retrieval by integrating the vegetation index (VI), the normalized difference water index (NDWI), or the normalized difference infrared index (NDII). Sentinel-1 SAR C-band backscattering coefficients, incidence angle, and NDWI/NDII were assimilated in the sWCM to monitor SSM. The soil moisture and temperature monitoring network on the central TP (CTP-SMTMN) measures SSM within the study area, and ground measurements were applied to train and validate the model. Via the proposed methods, we estimated the SSM in vegetated area with an R2 of 0.43 and a ubRMSE of 0.06 m3/m3 when integrating the NDWI and with an R2 of 0.45 and a ubRMSE of 0.06 m3/m3 when integrating the NDII.


2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sibo Zhang ◽  
Wei Yao

&lt;p&gt;In the past, soil moisture can be retrieved from microwave imager over most of land conditions. However, the algorithm performances over Tibetan Plateau and the Northwest China vary greatly from one to another due to frozen soils and surface volumetric scattering. The majority of western Chinese region is often filled with invalid retrievals. In this study, Soil Moisture Operational Products System (SMOPS) products from NOAA are used as the learning objectives to train a&amp;#160; machine learning (random forest) model for FY-3C microwave radiation imager (MWRI) data with multivariable inputs: brightness temperatures from all 10 MWRI channels from 10 to 89 GHz, brightness temperature polarization ratios at 10.65, 18.7 and 23.8 GHz, height in DEM (digital elevation model) and statistical soil porosity map data. Since the vegetation penetration of MWRI observations is limited, we exclude forest, urban and snow/ice surfaces in this work. It is shown that our new method performs very well and derives the surface soil moisture over Tibetan Plateau without major missing values. Comparing to other soil moisture data, the volumetric soil moisture (VSM) from this study correlates with SMOPS products much better than the MWRI operational L2 VSM products. R&lt;sup&gt;2&lt;/sup&gt; score increases from 0.3 to 0.6 and ubRMSE score improves significantly from 0.11 m&lt;sup&gt;3&lt;/sup&gt; m&lt;sup&gt;-3&lt;/sup&gt; to 0.04 m&lt;sup&gt;3&lt;/sup&gt; m&lt;sup&gt;-3&lt;/sup&gt; during the time period from 1 August 2017 to 31 May 2019. The spatial distribution of our MWRI VSM estimates is also much improved in western China. Moreover, our MWRI VSM estimates are in good agreement with the top 7 cm soil moisture of ECMWF ERA5 reanalysis data: R&lt;sup&gt;2&lt;/sup&gt; = 0.62, ubRMSD = 0.114 m&lt;sup&gt;3&lt;/sup&gt; m&lt;sup&gt;-3&lt;/sup&gt; and mean bias = -0.014 m&lt;sup&gt;3&lt;/sup&gt; m&lt;sup&gt;-3&lt;/sup&gt; for a global scale. We note that there is a risk of data gap of AMSR2 from the present to 2025. Obviously, for satellite low frequency microwave observations, MWRI observations from FY-3 series satellites can be a benefit supplement to keep the data integrity and increase the data density, since FY-3B\-3C\-3D satellites launched in November 2010\September 2013\November 2017 are still working today, and FY-3D is designed to work until November 2022.&lt;/p&gt;


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