Range in New Mexico, soil These maps will be generated from 20-foot-diameter microwave dishes spinning rapidly on platforms attached to satellites. These dishes capture the natural microwave emissions from soil as a measure of moisture. The rapid spinning is the secret to the complete coverage the dish provides of each area the satellite passes over. A U.S.-European pair of satellites for long-range weather forecasting may be launched by 2008 and will have the dishes. It's all part of a "Soil-Moisture Observing System" envisioned by hydrologist Tom Jackson, who is with ' Hydrology and Remote Sensing Laboratory in Beltsville, Maryland. His soil-moisture remote-sensing work in joint projects with the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration is paving the way for that launch. Already, NASA is set to launch a satellite named "Aqua," which monitors the planetary water cycle with a version of the spinning-dish sensor tested in airplane and satellite flyover campaigns in Arizona, Oklahoma, and soon in Iowa. Aqua is the water-targeted match to Terra, a land-monitoring satellite already in orbit. Range in New Mexico, physical Jackson, his colleagues, and scientists from around the world have developed and tested various sensors in the flyover campaigns. They've looked at small-scale, land- and airplane-based monitoring and global-scale satellite monitoring. From this research, techniques have emerged that will be used to translate Aqua's data into maps. Jackson cites the recent flooding in Mississippi as an example of an event that could have been predicted weeks earlier. His analysis of 2 weeks of satellite data shows the April 12 flood started in the Dakotas. On March 29, it appeared on the map as a small blue area of oversaturated soil. "Knowing the
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Evaporating Dishes
Evaporating dishes are laboratory dishes, usually with a lip for easy pouring, used to hold samples under high heat conditions.
Petri Dishes
Petri dishes are shallow, cylindrical, lidded dishes that are used to culture cells. They are sometimes called Petri plates or cell culture dishes.
Topics of Interest
Tom Jackson has his eye on 2010. That's when the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) will use the Hydros satellite, scheduled for launch that year, exclusively to monitor daily soil...
A tethered weather balloon carrying instruments to measure humidity, temperature, and windspeed is launched. This past summer, two planes flew over Oklahoma into the border between wet and dry weather...
Most of the research takes advantage of remote sensing's ability to view entire regions to monitor, assess, and manage farmland, rangeland, and forests—including effects on the nation's waters.
To obtain views of the soil surface from various angles, soil scientist Susan Moran uses a specially mounted radiometer that turns in many directions. The data she obtains will be used to correlate...
Introduction
The use of satellites in communications systems is very much a fact of everyday life, as is evidenced by the many homes equipped with antennas, or dishes, used for reception of...
