Summary
International Symposium on Antennas and Propagation
2006
Session Number:3B1a
Session:
Number:3B1a-4
Observations of Clouds in the Pacific Ocean with the Millimeter-wave FM-CW Radar
TAKANO Toshiak, AKITA Ken-ichi, FUTABA Ken-ichi, ABE Hideji, YAMAGUCHI Jun, HIRAI Akihito, KAWAMURA Youhei, KUMAGAI Hiroshi, OHNO Yuichi, TAKAMURA Tamio, NAKANISHI Yuji, SUGIMOTO Nobuo, MATSUI Ichiro, FUJIYOSHI Yasushi, OKAMOTO Hajime, NAKAJIMA Teruyuki,
pp.1-4
Publication Date:2006/11/2
Online ISSN:2188-5079
Summary:
In order to investigate thin, high latitude clouds, which influence gobal energy balance, we developed a low-power and high-sensitivity cloud profiling radar transmitting frequency modulated continuous wave (FM-CW) at 95 GHz for ground-based observations. Millimeter wave at 95 GHz is used to realize much higher sensitivity than lower frequencies to small cloud particles. An FM-CW type radar realizes similar sensitivity with much smaller instantaneous output power to a pulse type radar. Two 1m-diameter parabolic antennas separated by 1.4m each other are used for transmitting and receiving the wave. The direction of the antennas is fixed at the zenith. The radar is designed to observe clouds between 0.3 and 20 km in height with a resolution of 15 m. Using the developed millimeter-wave FM-CW radar at 95 GHz, we have observed clouds in various areas in the Pacific Ocean and the Arctic Ocean on the Japanese scientific research vessel MIRAI since 2004. The radar provided good and sensitive data in these long-term observations. Comparison of cloud profiles in the Arctic Ocean and in the south-west Pacific Ocean clearly shows difference of cloud distribution and characteristics