Skip to main content
ARS Home » Research » Publications at this Location » Publication #203897

Title: Effect of Remote Sensing Spatial Resolution on Interpreting Tower Based Flux Observations

Author
item Li, Fuqin
item Kustas, William - Bill
item Anderson, Martha
item Prueger, John
item Scott, Russell - Russ

Submitted to: American Geophysical Union
Publication Type: Abstract Only
Publication Acceptance Date: 4/1/2006
Publication Date: 5/25/2006
Citation: Li, F., Kustas, W.P., Anderson, M.C., Prueger, J.H., Scott, R.L. 2006. Effect of remote sensing spatial resolution on interpreting tower based flux observations [abstract]. EOS Transactions, American Geophysical Union, Joint Assembly Supplements. 87(36):H31A-03.

Interpretive Summary:

Technical Abstract: Output of fluxes from land surface models is often validated with tower-based observations. However, often there is a mismatch in the resolution of the model output (1-10 km) and the upwind source area contributing to the tower-based flux observations, which is typically made with sensor several meters above the canopy (~100 m). With appropriate high resolution remote sensing data combined with a robust land surface model, flux output can be used to interpret the source area contributing to tower-based flux observations. In this investigation, a two-source energy balance model and a two dimensional flux-footprint algorithm are applied to satellite data collected during the 2004 Soil Moisture Experiment (SMEX04) conducted in southern Arizona. Two Landsat scenes were selected, one representing the dry season and the other representing relatively wet monsoon season. High resolution (30 m) Normalized Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI) and land surface temperature derived Landsat 5 TM were re-sampled to 960 m resolution, close to MODIS land surface temperature resolution. This is also commonly the highest or finest resolution or grid size (~ 1 km) used when running land-atmosphere models. The effect of resolution scales on interpretation of the model-observation flux comparisons will be discussed.