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Soil Moisture and Ocean Salinity (SMOS)

Source: http://vgomez.blogia.com, accessed on 28th, Apr. 2010

The SMOS satellite was launched on 2nd November 2009, making it the first satellite to provide continuous multi-angular L-band (1.4GHz) radiometric measurements over the globe. Over continental surfaces, SMOS provides near-surface soil moisture data at ~50km resolution with a repeat cycle of 2-3 days. The payload is a 2D interferometer yielding a range of incidence angles from 0° to 55° at both V and H polarisations, and a 1,000km swath width. Its multi-incidence angle capability is expected to assist in determining ancillary data requirements such as vegetation attenuation. This satellite has a 6:00am/pm equator overpass time (6:00am local solar time at ascending node). Due to the synthetic aperture approach of this satellite, brightness temperature observations will be processed onto a fixed hexagonal grid with an approximately 12km node separation. While the actual footprint size will vary according to position in the swath, incidence angle etc., it will be approximately 42km diameter on average. The features of SMOS are summarized below. SMOS data can be downloaded from ESA.


Mission SMOS
Sensor Microwave Imaging Radiometer using Aperture Synthesis (MIRAS) using passive microwave 2D-interferometer concept
Spacecraft SMOS
Launch date 2nd, Nov. 2009
Design life Minimum 3 years
Orbit Sun-synchronous, dawn/dusk, quasi-circular orbit at altitude 758km. 6.00am local solar time at ascending node.
Spacecraft operations control centre CNES,Toulouse, France
Center frequency (GHz) 1.413 (L-band; 21cm)
Band width (MHz) 24
Polarisation H & V (polarimetric mode optional)
Incidence angle (°) 0-55
Swath (km) 1000
Spatial resolution (km) 35 at centre of field of view
Radiometric resolution (K) 0.8 - 2.2
Temporal resolution 3 days revisit at Equator

SMOS overpass time

The SMOS overpass times for the Murrumbidgee Catchment have been calculated by the ESOV software based on the OSF file of 17th, Nov. 2009, and are provided in the table below. Date and time are in UTC.

  : Transect flight   : Patch flight
: Fully covered by narrow swath : Fully covered by wide swath

Ascending mode

UTC Date Flight Patch
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10
2010/09/08            
2010/09/09                      
2010/09/10 T01
2010/09/11                      
2010/09/12 P04          
2010/09/13      
2010/09/14                      
2010/09/15 P05
2010/09/16                    
2010/09/17                  
2010/09/18 P06
2010/09/19                      
2010/09/20 P07
2010/09/21 P08              
2010/09/22                      
2010/09/23 T02
2010/09/24                      
2010/09/25        
2010/09/26            

Descending mode

UTC Date Flight Patch
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10
2010/09/08      
2010/09/09              
2010/09/10                      
2010/09/11  
2010/09/12                      
2010/09/13          
2010/09/14          
2010/09/15                      
2010/09/16  
2010/09/17                      
2010/09/18                
2010/09/19    
2010/09/20                      
2010/09/21  
2010/09/22                  
2010/09/23                    
2010/09/24  
2010/09/25                      
2010/09/26      
Created: September 2010
Last Modified: September 2010
Maintainer: YE Nan, Ye.Nan@monash.edu