Current Advances in Radiative Transfer Modeling for Satellite Optical Remote Sensing Applications

Dear Colleagues,

Most remote sensing applications are based on the interpretation of electromagnetic radiation, either naturally reflected solar radiation, emitted thermal radiation from atmosphere and surface or man-made radiation (Lidar, Radar). The polarimetric, spectral, spatial, angular and temporal signature of the received signals are interpreted with respect to the particular targets. It is obvious, that the quantitative knowledge about the radiative transfer, describing the emergence, propagation and modification of the electromagnetic signal by terrestrial atmosphere is crucial for any remote sensing application, either to extract the desired information or to remove perturbing signals. This special issue will focus on current advances in  radiative transfer models (RTMs) and their implementation and usage for spaceborne optical remote sensing applications. Several approaches to relate the measured signals to geophysical properties have evolved in the last decades. They depend on the complexity of the remote sensing problems, on time and computational constrains, on accuracy and precision requirements, on the availability of prior knowledge and last but not least on traditions in a particular research field. The different applications range from simple empirical regressions to more complex non-linear multidimensional optimizations, using RTMs and their Jacobians directly, or indirectly with look up tables or other approximations. Furthermore,  it is critical how shortcomings and assumptions of the RTMs are included into the estimation of the retrieved parameter uncertainty and how they are included into a comprehensive validation strategy.

The very broad range of bandwidths of different remote sensing instruments, types and applications leads to a high number of different radiative transfer models(RTMs) dedicated to specific tasks and we would like to compile a description and a status of the current most used and state-of-the-art satellite applications. A number of new satellites and instruments are on the road with higher resolutions and accuracies. We will aim on recent results and descriptions on how RTMs are used to derive specific parameters in satellite remote sensing applications and their validation. The presentation of current radiative transfer models, their extensions and  new approaches which will lead to faster results and/or higher accuracies is highly relevant to this special issue.

Dr. Rene Preusker
Dr. Ruhtz Thomas
Dr. Alexander Kokhanovsky
Guest Editors

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