Response to Variations in River Flowrate by a Spaceborne GNSS-R River Width Estimator
by
April Warnock 1,*
and Christopher Ruf 2
April Warnock 1,* and Christopher Ruf 2
1
SRI International, Ann Arbor, MI 48105, USA
2
Climate and Space Dept, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI 48109, USA
*
Author to whom correspondence should be addressed.
Remote Sens. 2019, 11(20), 2450; https://doi.org/10.3390/rs11202450
Received: 27 September 2019 / Revised: 16 October 2019 / Accepted: 18 October 2019 / Published: 22 October 2019
(This article belongs to the Special Issue GPS/GNSS for Earth Science and Applications)
In recent years, the use of Global Navigation Satellite System-Reflectometry (GNSS-R) for remote sensing of the Earth’s surface has gained momentum as a means to exploit existing spaceborne microwave navigation systems for science-related applications. Here, we explore the potential for using measurements made by a spaceborne GNSS-R bistatic radar system (CYGNSS) during river overpasses to estimate its width, and to use that width as a proxy for river flowrate. We present a case study utilizing CYGNSS data collected in the spring of 2019 during multiple overpasses of the Pascagoula River in southern Mississippi over a range of flowrates. Our results demonstrate that a measure of river width derived from CYGNSS is highly correlated with the observed flowrates. We show that an approximately monotonic relationship exists between river flowrate and a measure of river width which we define as the associated GNSS-R width (AGW). These results suggest the potential for GNSS-R systems to be utilized as a means to estimate river flowrates and widths from space.
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Keywords:
bistatic radar; CYGNSS; river flowrate; river discharge
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This is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited
MDPI and ACS Style
Warnock, A.; Ruf, C. Response to Variations in River Flowrate by a Spaceborne GNSS-R River Width Estimator. Remote Sens. 2019, 11, 2450.
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