CLOUD TOP EVALUATIONS AND CLOUD MOTION RETRIEVALS FROM STEREOSCOPIC SATELLITE IMAGERY

THE ABILITY TO INFER CLOUD TOP ELEVATIONS AND CLOUD MOTION FROM SATELLITE OBSERVATIONS IS CRUCIAL FOR THE DEVELOPMENT OF ATMOSPHERIC MONITORING SYSTEMS. THE IMPROVED ACCURACY AND SENSITIVITY OF THE NEW GENERATION OF GOES-NEXT SATELLITES WILL ENABLE ROUTINE THREEDIMENSIONAL CLOUD COVER ANALYSIS OVER MUCH OF THE WESTERN HEMISPHERE. AS A RESULT, THE DEVELOPMENT OF AUTOMATIC SYSTEMS FOR DETERMINING THREE-DIMENSIONAL INFORMATION FROM THESE DATA SOURCES IS AN ACTIVE TOPIC OF RESEARCH. THE PROPOSED RESEARCH WILL DEVELOP AN AUTOMATIC RETRIEVAL SYSTEM THAT WILL ENABLE ROUTINE THREE-DIMENSIONAL ANALYSIS OF CLOUD TOPOGRAPHY AND CLOUD MOTION. BECAUSE OF THE EXPECTED HIGH DATA VOLUME, LARGE NUMBER OF POTENTIAL USERS, AND WIDE VARIETY OF APPLICATIONS, THE SYSTEM WILL BE SIGNIFICANTLY MORE ACCURATE AND COMPUTATIONALLY EFFICIENT THAN CURRENT STEREOSCOPIC ANALYSIS SYSTEMS, AND CAPABLE OF OPERATING IN A WIDE VARIETY OF COMPUTER ENVIRONMENTS. THE PROPOSED CLOUD MONITORING SYSTEM WILL BE BASED ON A HIGHLY EFFICIENT AND FLEXIBLE PROPRIETARY AUTOMATIC STEREO IMAGE PROCESSING (ASIP) SYSTEM THAT REPRESENTS A SIGNIFICANT IMPROVEMENT OVER CURRENTLY AVAILABLE SYSTEMS.