Skip to main content
U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government

Characterization of tropospheric desert aerosols at solar wavelengths by multispectral radiometry from Landsat

January 1, 1982

Characteristics of tropospheric desert aerosols are derived by comparing nadir spectral reflectivities computed from the radiative transfer models with reflectivities measured from Landsat. Over the ocean, reflectivities are compared, but over land the comparison is carried out by determining the ratios of the nadir reflectivity of the surface-atmosphere system over heavy aerosol concentration to the reflectivity of the underlying surface. This remote sensing technique is found to be a sensitive approach for measuring n2, the imaginary part of the refractive index. The desert aerosols under study, in the Iran and Pakistan area, are essentially pure scatterers, inasmuch as an n2 value of 0.001±0.001 was determined for each of the four Landsat spectral bands, that is, for a spectral interval from 0.5 to 1.1 μm.

Publication Year 1982
Title Characterization of tropospheric desert aerosols at solar wavelengths by multispectral radiometry from Landsat
DOI 10.1029/JC087iC02p01270
Authors Joseph Otterman, R. S. Fraser, O. P. Bahethi
Publication Type Article
Publication Subtype Journal Article
Series Title Journal of Geophysical Research C: Oceans
Index ID 70140558
Record Source USGS Publications Warehouse
USGS Organization Earth Resources Observation and Science (EROS) Center