SMEX02

Soil moisture is the most significant boundary condition that controls summer precipitation over the central US and other large mid-latitude continental regions, and essential initial information for seasonal predictions. A common goal of a wide range of agencies and scientists is the development of a global soil moisture observing system. Providing a global soil moisture product for research and application remains a significant challenge. Precise in-situ measurements of soil moisture and sparse and each value is only representative of a small area. Remote sensing, if achievable with sufficient accuracy and reliability, would provide truly meaningful wide-area soil wetness or soil moisture data for hyrdrological studies over large continental regions.

Objectives

The main elements of the experiment are to understand land-atmosphere interactions, validation of AMSR brightness temperature and soil moisture retrievals, extention of instrument observations and algorithms to more challenging vegetation conditions, and the evaluation of new instrument technologies for soil moisture remote sensing.