Validation of aircraft-measured land surface emissivity

This paper evaluates the performance of two techniques currently under development for use in the future validation of AIRS surface emissivity measurements over the Southern Great Plains Atmospheric Radiation Measurement site in Oklahoma, USA. The first technique involves a simultaneous retrieval of atmospheric temperature and water vapor, sruface skin temperature, and surface emissivity using a statistical approach; the second, a relative retrieval of the relative surface emissivity from spectral radiance observations between gaseous absorption lines. High spectral resolution upwelling radiance measurements from the aircraft-based NPOESS Atmospheric Sounder Testbed-Interferometer (NAST-I) obtained during the ARM/FIRE Water Vapor Experiment 2000 and Chesapeake Lighthouse and Aircraft Measurements for Satellites 2001 were used to compare each method. Surface truth was provided by ground-based Atmospheric Emitted Radiance Interferometer measurements.