Development of a routine to reduce sidelobe clutter in GPM/KUPR-L2 algorithm

Abstract

After the launch of the Global Precipitation Measurement (GPM) Core Observatory on February 2014, significant efforts have been made in order to reduce the sidelobe clutter contamination in Ku-band precipitation radar (KuPR) of Dual-frequency Precipitation Radar (DPR). This work describes a development of a software routine to reduce the sidelobe clutter in the KuPR Level-2 algorithm for the product version V03B. The routine estimate sidelobe echoes based on the correlation between the surface echo and sidelobe clutter, and subtract sidelobe estimates from the received power at corresponding range bins. Performances of the routine were evaluated with reference to high-sensitivity beams of the KaPR.