Snow Optics

This book is the first book of its kind, focusing exclusively on the optical properties of snow. As a complex and turbid medium, snow is approached as a strongly light-scattering (in the visible spectrum) medium with large, nonspherical ice grains. The book discusses both experimental and theoretical results, as well as the remote sensing of snow using ground-based, airborne and satellite optical instrumentation. The book will be of particular importance for researchers studying snow characteristics (the size of grains, snow pollution and albedo) using various remote-sensing techniques.

Preface.- Chapter 1.  Microphysics and geometry of snow surfaces.- Chapter 2.  Local optical properties of snow layers.- Chapter 3. Properties of solar light reflected from snow.- Chapter 4. Snow remote sensing.

Alexander Kokhanovsky graduated in theoretical physics from the Department of Physics, Belarussian State University, Minsk, Belarus, in 1983.   In December 1991 he has been awarded the Ph. D. degree in Optics with the thesis “Optical properties of atmospheric aerosols and foams” (Institute of Physics, Minsk, Belarus). In 1994 Dr Kokhanovsky has been awarded the Science and Technology Agency of Japan Fellowship to work at the National Space Development Agency (NASDA) of Japan on cloud remote sensing from space. Afterwards he has been awarded the Alexander von Humboldt Fellowship (Clausthal University, Clausthal-Zellerfeld, Germany, 1998) and Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council Fellowship (Imperial College, London, UK, 1999), where he has developed novel techniques to derive various properties (e.g., particle size distributions) of turbid media  using small-angle and polarimetric optical measurements. In March 2001 he joined the Institute of Environmental Physics (Bremen University, Bremen, Germany), where he has been responsible for the development of cloud, snow and aerosol retrieval algorithms for MERIS, AATSR, and SCIAMACHY on board ENVISAT. From October 2013 Dr Kokhanovsky carried out his research work at VITROCISET Belgium (working also as a consultant for EUMETSAT (Darmstadt, Germany)). Currently he is employed by Telespazio Belgium, A Leonardo and Thales Company.  He is involved in  the  development of satellite aerosol, cloud, and snow products for multiple satellite  missions. Dr. Alexander Kokhanovsky published 7 books and more than 250 papers related to environmental optics, satellite and ground – based optical remote sensing, polarimetry, spectroscopy of turbid media, light scattering and radiative transfer.