Retrieval snow depth by artificial neural network methodology from integrated AMSR-E and in-situ data-A case study in Qinghai-Tibet Plateau

On the basis of artificial neural network (ANN) model, this paper presents an algorithm for inversing snow depth with use of AMSR-E (Advanced Microwave Scanning Radiometer-Earth Observing System (EOS)) dataset, i.e., brightness temperature at 18.7 and 36.5GHz in Qinghai-Tibet Plateau during the snow season of 2002-2003. In order to overcome the overfitting problem in ANN modeling, this methodology adopts a Bayesian regularization approach. The experiments are performed to compare the results obtained from the ANN-based algorithm with those obtained from other existing algorithms, i.e., Chang algorithm, spectral polarization difference (SPD) algorithm, and temperature gradient (TG) algorithm. The experimental results show that the presented algorithm has the highest accuracy in estimating snow depth. In addition, the effects of the noises in datasets on model fitting can be decreased due to adopting the Bayesian regularization approach.