SMOS Soil Moisture validation with U.S. in situ networks

Soil moisture products provided by the Soil Moisture and Ocean Salinity (SMOS) satellite were evaluated using in situ observations. The sites are located in different regions of the U.S. and provide replicate sampling of surface soil moisture at the SMOS footprint scale. Data from a sparse network were also considered. Soil moisture products from the Advanced Microwave Scanning Radiometer were also used for validation. Results based upon a preliminary version of the retrieval algorithm indicate promising performance. It is anticipated that the accuracy and reliability of the retrievals will improve as validation information is evaluated.