Abstract
The Advanced Microwave Sounding Unit, AMSU-B, is a five channel microwave radiometer to be flown later this decade on the series of polar orbiting spacecraft NOAA-K, L and M. It will provide global data in support of synoptic weather forecasting by sounding the water vapour content of the atmosphere from the ‘window’ channels at 89 and 150 GHz to the strong resonance line at 183.3 GHz. It has a scan period of 2 2 3 seconds and provides 90 earth view pixels each of nominal beam width 1.1 degrees during earth scan. The key radiometric requirements of the instrument are to provide a temperature sensitivity of 1 to 1.2K depending on channel, a linearity within 0.3 of the temperature sensitivity and a beam efficiency of 95%. This paper describes the design of the AMSU-B, the ground based buy-off tests and results obtained for the Proto-Flight Model (PFM), Flight 2 (FM2) and Flight 3 (FM3) Models in the context of these requirements. The Engineering Model testing is described in reference /1/.
Talk to us
Join us for a 30 min session where you can share your feedback and ask us any queries you have
Disclaimer: All third-party content on this website/platform is and will remain the property of their respective owners and is provided on "as is" basis without any warranties, express or implied. Use of third-party content does not indicate any affiliation, sponsorship with or endorsement by them. Any references to third-party content is to identify the corresponding services and shall be considered fair use under The CopyrightLaw.