Present status of the global change observation mission 1st - water 'SHIZUKU' (GCOM-W1) and the advanced microwave scanning radiometer 2 (AMSR2)

The Global Change Observation Mission 1st – Water (CGOM-W1) or “SHIZUKU” was launched on May 18, 2012 (JST) from the JAXA’s Tanegashima Space Center. Subsequently, the GCOM-W1 satellite was joined to the NASA’s A-train orbit since June 29, 2012 to succeed observation by the Advanced Microwave Scanning Radiometer for EOS (AMSR-E) and to provide combined utilization with other A-train satellites. The Advanced Microwave Scanning Radiometer 2 (AMSR2), which is a successor of AMSR-E, onboard GCOM-W1 has started its scientific observation since July 3, 2012. AMSR-E was halted its scientific observation on October 4, 2011, but has restarted observation in slow antenna rotation rate since December 4, 2012 for cross-calibration with AMSR2. AMSR2 has multi-frequency, total-power microwave radiometer systems with dual polarization channels for all frequency bands, and continues AMSR-E observations: 1) Water vapor, 2) Cloud liquid water, 3) Precipitation, 4) SST, 5) Sea surface wind speed, 6) Sea ice concentration, 7) Snow depth, 8) Soil moisture. JAXA opened the AMSR2’s brightness temperature products to the public since January 2013 after initial calibration/validation period by the GCOM-W1 Data Providing Service (https://gcomwl.jaxa.jp/). Thereafter, the retrieval algorithms of standard geophysical products for water vapor, cloud liquid water, precipitation, sea surface temperature, sea surface wind speed, sea ice concentration, snow depth and soil moisture were modified, and JAXA opened these standard geophysical products to the public since May 2013. In this paper, we present the present operation status of AMSR2.