ROSE-L and Sentinel-1 soil moisture retrieval: a simulated study

In the frame of the Copernicus Expansion Program, it is foreseen the launch of two L-band SAR satellites flying in constellation with Sentinel-1. This will offer an unprecedent opportunity of collecting data at L-band and C-band in a systematic and coordinated way. This study focuses on soil moisture retrieval applications and investigates the performances of a dual frequency multiplatform retrieval approach based on a simulated study. The objective is to assess the pros and cons of a coincident acquisition of C and L-band data, which is expected to improve the retrieval accuracy, with respect to an alternate acquisition of the two platforms that, on the contrary, would drastically reduce the revisit time of the System of Systems from 6 to 3 days or less. It was found that, if a multitemporal retrieval approach is exploited, the alternate acquisitions can provide retrieval accuracy better than individual acquisitions at each frequency, and close to that of coincident acquisitions, while keeping a much better temporal resolution of the soil moisture products.