Metamaterial-based Super Spectral Filter Radiometers for Atmospheric Sounding of Temperature and Water Vapor

Through metamaterial filter development, building and testing of a benchtop prototype sensor, and atmospheric retrieval studies, the concept of an ultra-compact IR sensor for measurements of temperature and water vapor in boundary layer will be built and its capabilities demonstrated. Metamaterial-based spectral filtering offers narrow passband spectral channels in a fast-optical system to provide performance matching that of a much larger spectrometer or interferometer-based systems. Retrieval studies using measured prototype sensor characteristics and a sensor model determined from benchtop analysis offer a way to test the application of this technology to sounding of the boundary layer and free troposphere. Optical tests on a fabricated filter array with scores of spectral bands will quantify its spectral characteristics, stray light levels, and spectral sampling performance when paired with an appropriate focal plane array. Use of the device measurements in a sensor performance model then give high-fidelity predictions of a space-based sensor using a metamaterial based super spectral sensor. Development of retrievals for sounding with a super spectral sensor and sensitivity studies using the measured prototype sensor optical characteristics produce a verification of the measurement approach for atmospheric sounding and a quantitative picture of its capabilities.

Enabling lower cost innovative remote sensing instrument development from concept through breadboard and demonstration

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