A horizontal atmospheric temperature sounder: Applications to remote sensing of atmospheric hazards

Several atmospheric hazards, including wind shear, clear-air turbulence, and wake vortices cause special problems for aircraft. These phenomena are usually characterized by a change in temperature relative to ambient, which may be detected by a millimeter wave radiometer operating on an absorption line in the atmosphere. Because of available componentry with excellent performance and relative freedom from interference by water vapor, the family of oxygen absorptions centered near 60 GHz is considered the best atmospheric feature on which the design of such an instrument could be based. This paper describes a multi-channel radiometer operating near 60 GHz which should be capable of detecting the hazards mentioned above as well as other potential dangers such as the passage of strong fronts and other severe weather. It is shown that a carefully designed instrument will be capable of measuring range to a hazard to an accuracy of about 5 percent and temperature difference to an accuracy of approximately half the actual measured difference, depending on range and temperature. An actual design is proposed, and graphs of expected performance are included.