The Special Sensor Microwave/Imager (SSM/I) is a microwave radiometer. Unlike scatterometers
it is a passive, recieve-only sensor. Like scatteromters, it has a wide swath and flies in a polar orbit. Due to the
low sidelobes of the antenna pattern resolution enhancement is more limited for a radiometer compared to a
scatterometer. However, scatterometer and radiometer data complement each other. To aid users, we have produced
some sample enhanced resolution radiometer images. Using raw SSM/I data from the Marshal Space Flight Center (MSFC),
enhanced resolution images of the polar regions (Ant and Arc) have been generated for SSM/I F13 on the same projection
used for scatterometer data.
Images for each SSM/I frequency and polarization are processed separately. Sample results
for 1996-2004 are provided for the Ant and Arc regions.
Note: the SCP only archives a small sample of data. A much more extensive enhanced resolution SSM/I dataset has been produced for, and is available from, the National Snow and Ice Data Center (NSIDC).
The SSM/I enhanced resolution image file naming scheme is
FXXY-T-REG-YR-DY1-DY2.sir
where XX is the SSM/I platform (only 13 is currently
available) and Y is the channel (1=19H, 2=19V, 3=21,
4=37H, 5=37V, 6=85H, and 7=85V), T is the image type
(only A = enhanced resolution Tb is available for SSM/I), and the
other parameters are the same as for scatterometer images.
Channels 1-5 are produced on 25 km resolution grids, while channels 6 and 7 are produced on 12.5 km resolution grids.
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