Precipitating clouds monitoring over Antarctica: interpretation of satellite-based microwave signatures

Brightness temperatures acquired by the Advanced Microwave Sounding Unit-A/B (AMSU-A/B) sensors aboard NOAA-15, -16, and -18 satellites are here used together the outputs of Polar MM5, a mesoscale model optimized to run over extensive ice sheets, to point up precipitating clouds occurrences. As a matter of fact, satellite-based microwave measurements are able to offer new information about the microphysical properties of clouds and precipitation also over Antarctica, but they need the help of a physical support to correctly interpret the measure- ments. The ultimate aim is actually to organize an algorithm able to provide quantitative, reliable, operational estimates of precipitation over Antarctica. In this work some coincident model-satellite depictions of precipitating clouds distribution over Antarctica, coupled with sensitivity studies concerning the potential of different microwave frequency channels, will be shown and discussed in order to introduce a possible synergic AMSU-MM5 approach to the precipitation retrieval at high latitudes.