title: Relationships between water attenuation coefficients derived from active and passive remote sensing: a case study from two coastal environments.
abstract: Relationships between the satellite-derived diffuse attenuation coefficient of downwelling irradiance (K(d)) and airborne-based vertical attenuation of lidar volume backscattering (α) were examined in two coastal environments. At 1.1 km resolution and a wavelength of 532 nm, we found a greater connection between α and K(d) when α was computed below 2 m depth (Spearman rank correlation coefficient up to 0.96), and a larger contribution of K(d) to α with respect to the beam attenuation coefficient as estimated from lidar measurements and K(d) models. Our results suggest that concurrent passive and active optical measurements can be used to estimate total scattering coefficient and backscattering efficiency in waters without optical vertical structure.
authors.affiliation: Geosystems Research Institute, Mississippi State University, Mississippi 39529, USA. mmontes@gri.msstate.edu
authors.forename: Martin A
authors.initials: MA
authors.lastname: Montes
authors.forename: James
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Churnside
authors.forename: Zhongping
authors.initials: Z
authors.lastname: Lee
authors.forename: Richard
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Gould
authors.forename: Robert
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Arnone
authors.forename: Alan
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Weidemann