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Experimental investigation of dielectric properties of seasonal snow at field observatories in the northwest Himalaya

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  03 March 2016

Kamal K. Singh ,
Ashavani Kumar ,
Anil V. Kulkarni ,
Prem Datt ,
Sanjay K. Dewali  and
Manoj Kumar
Kamal K. Singh*
Affiliation:
Snow and Avalanche Study Establishment (SASE), Chandigarh, India
Ashavani Kumar
Affiliation:
National Institute of Technology (NIT), Kurukshetra, India
Anil V. Kulkarni
Affiliation:
Divecha Center for Climate Change, Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore, India
Prem Datt
Affiliation:
Snow and Avalanche Study Establishment (SASE), Chandigarh, India
Sanjay K. Dewali
Affiliation:
Snow and Avalanche Study Establishment (SASE), Chandigarh, India
Manoj Kumar
Affiliation:
Snow and Avalanche Study Establishment (SASE), Chandigarh, India
*
Correspondence: Kamal K. Singh <kamal.kant@sase.drdo.in>
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Abstract.

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Radio-echo sounding techniques are very useful for fast profiling of seasonal snowpack. Ground-penetrating radar (GPR) is used widely for various cryospheric applications, such as snow/glacier depth estimation, snow layer identification and snow water equivalent assessment. The dielectric constant of snow is an important input parameter for the acquisition and interpretation of GPR data from the snowpack. In this study, snow dielectric constant was measured along with physical properties of snow using a snow fork operating at 1 GHz frequency. Experiments were conducted at field observatories of the Snow and Avalanche Study Establishment located in different Himalayan ranges: Patseo (Greater Himalayan range), Dhundhi and Solang (Pir Panjal range). Interseasonal spatial and temporal variations in snow dielectric constant and associated snowpack properties were analysed for five winter seasons (2010-14). The mean seasonal snow dielectric constant is higher at Dhundhi (1.82 ±0.02) than at Patseo (1.69 ±0.02). The measured snow dielectric constant was used to derive snow density and liquid-water content (LWC). A better correlation between snow dielectric constant and LWC is observed for high-density snow (>300kgm-3; R2 = 0.95) than for low-density snow (<200kgm-3; R2 = 0.73). Snow-fork-derived snow density was in good agreement with manually measured values. The snow dielectric constant database generated during this study can be used as a reference for various field applications of GPR in snow-related studies.

Keywords

dielectric constantground-penetrating radarliquid-water contentsnowsnow fork
Type
Paper
Information
Annals of Glaciology , Volume 57 , Issue 71 , March 2016 , pp. 319 - 327
Creative Commons
Creative Common License - CCCreative Common License - BY
This is an Open Access article, distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution licence (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted re-use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
Copyright
Copyright © The Author(s) 2016

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