An airborne Conical Scanning Millimeter-wave Imaging Radiometer (CoSMIR)

An airborne Conical Scanning Millimeter-wave Imaging Radiometer (CoSMIR) for high-altitude observations from the NASA ER-2 is discussed. The primary application of the CoSMIR is water vapor profile remote sensing. Four radiometers operating at 50 (3 channels), 92, 150, and 183 (3 channels) GHz provide spectral coverage identical to nine of the SSMIS high-frequency channels. Constant polarization-basis conical and cross-track scanning capabilities are achieved using an elevation-under-azimuth two-axis gimbals.