SPECTRAL SCIENCES, INC — Department of Defense SBIR Phase I: N231-066

Description

There is an urgent need for a radiative transfer testbed that can accurately synthesize hyperspectral imagery to support the design of remote sensing instruments, development of new retrieval algorithms, and quantification of uncertainties.  Remote sensing of the ground, ocean, and atmosphere requires RT models that predict the signatures sensors measure given a known atmospheric state, including land topography, temperature, the oceanic state, sea constituent profiles, underwater surface bathymetry, and spectral spectral bidirectional reflectance distribution functions (BRDFs). The accurate modeling of 3D scene signatures which include cloud fields, structured backgrounds, weather, sea state, coastal influences, and/or embedded targets, remains a challenge due to the difficulty of solving of the RT equations in a cluttered environment as well as the difficulty of embedding measured or numerical weather prediction (NWP) environmental data.  Spectral Sciences, Inc. (SSI) proposes to leverage its existing high-fidelity fully 3D synthetic hyperspectral imagery tool (MCScene) specifically enhanced for oceanographic applications.  This effort will add spatial resolutions required to model the marine surface boundary layer, a fully resolved sea-state-dependent air-sea interface, and underwater propagation for calculation of water leaving radiances.