Marine Science Applications Of Satellite Imaging Spectrometers - Potential And Problems

The capabilities of satellite imaging spectrometers, such as ESA's proposed MERIS instrument, are reviewed in the context of how they may be applied in marine science. The increased information content of the spectrally dense measurements promises to be able to discriminate between water constituents having distinct spectral signatures. Evidence of the spectral variability occurring in coastal waters is provided by field spectrometry from Southampton Water. An approach to the analysis of sea-viewing spectral radiance data is outlined. It proposes a function optimisation routine to match the observed spectra with model predicted spectra in order to recover an estimate of the concentration of the optically active water constituents.