Snow

A deeper understanding of snow microphysics is crucial in developing observing systems, remote sensing methods, and snowfall data products because microphysical properties of snow profoundly influence both bulk snow properties and the relationship between these properties and measurements made by remote sensing instruments like radars and radiometers. For snow, these relationships are complex because of the extreme variability of snow particle shapes and size distributions.

Recent advances in spaceborne precipitation radars have broadened our viewing area and increased the number of observations in any given area. However, these radars still struggle to reconcile the light snowfall that comes from shallow clouds. While the accumulation may not be substantial compared to a midlatitude blizzard, in places like Barrow, AK, much of the falling snow comes from clouds less than 1km deep and with reflectivities of less than 0 dBZ. Those limits place important requirements on future spaceborne radars if they are to reliably detect frozen precipitation.