HR: 0800h
AN: C21A-0065    [Abstracts]
TI: Temperate Ice Depth Sounding Radar (TIDSoR)
AU: * Jara, V
EM: vjarao@cresis.ku.edu
AF: Center for remote sensing of ice Sheets, The University of Kansas 2335 Irving Hill Rd, Lawrence, KS 66045, United States
AU: Player, K
EM: playerk@cresis.ku.edu
AF: Center for remote sensing of ice Sheets, The University of Kansas 2335 Irving Hill Rd, Lawrence, KS 66045, United States
AU: Gogineni, S
EM: gogineni@cresis.ku.edu
AF: Center for remote sensing of ice Sheets, The University of Kansas 2335 Irving Hill Rd, Lawrence, KS 66045, United States
AU: Rodriguez, F
EM: frodriguez@cresis.ku.edu
AF: Center for remote sensing of ice Sheets, The University of Kansas 2335 Irving Hill Rd, Lawrence, KS 66045, United States
AU: Thompson, L
EM: thompson.3@osu.edu
AF: Byrd Polar Research Center, The Ohio State University, Columbus, OH 43210, United States
AB: Glaciers in several parts of the world are reported to be retreating and thinning rapidly over the last few years. A key variable in the study of glacier dynamics is ice thickness. A few attempts have been made to develop airborne sounding radars for temperate-ice thickness measurements [Arcone et al., 2000]. There is an urgent need for compact radar for routine ice thickness measurements from ground-based and airborne platforms. Radars (Radio Detection and Ranging) have been widely used to measure ice thickness in Greenland and Antarctica. However, the radars used in these areas operate in the VHF and UHF part of the electromagnetic spectrum. Due to the composition of temperate ice, the attenuation and back-scatter from large pockets of water makes UHF and VHF ineffective in sounding of its thickness. Radars operating in lower part of the HF spectrum are required for sounding temperate ice. We are designing and developing a Temperate Ice Depth-Sounding Radar (TIDSoR) that can penetrate through the water pockets and provide a more accurate measurement of the ice thickness. TIDSoR is a light-weight system for ground-based operations in mountainous terrain or aerial surveys in which weight is an important factor, such as in an UAV. TIDSoR operates on two channels in the HF spectrum using two-linear, frequency-modulated chirp waveforms. The two chirp frequency ranges are 7 to 8 MHz and 13.5 to 14.5 MHz. The radar will operate from a 12-V battery and is designed to weigh less than 2 kg, excluding the battery. The radar consists of three main sections: Digital, RF and antenna. The digital-section generates the transmitter waveforms, timing and control signals, and digitizes processes and stores the received signal. The RF-section consists of a transmitter with a 20-W peak-power amplifier, band-pass filters, and a switching system for a shared antenna. The receiver consists of a blanking switch, a limiter, a low-noise amplifier, a band-pass filter and a data acquisition system to store the acquired data. At HF, a physically large-antenna is needed. TIDSoR takes advantage of the helix antenna concept to minimize its physical dimensions and weight. Moreover, the ability to achieve different polarizations (linear, circular and elliptical) was considered to maximize the performance of the radar system. Arcone, S. A., Lawson, D. E., Moran, M. and Delaney, A. J., 2000, 12-100-MHz profiles of ice depth and stratigraphy of three temperate glaciers. In: Proc. GPR 2000, Eighth Intl. Conf. Ground-Penetrating Radar, Gold Coast, Austral., 23-26 May, 2000.
DE: 0720 Glaciers
DE: 0726 Ice sheets
DE: 0758 Remote sensing
DE: 0760 Engineering
DE: 0776 Glaciology (1621, 1827, 1863)
SC: Cryosphere [C]
MN: 2007 Fall Meeting