The studies on planetary radiative transfer computation have become important elements to disk-averaged spectral characterization of potential exoplanets. In this paper, we report an improved ray-tracing based atmospheric simulation model as a part of 3-D earth-like planet model with 3 principle sub-components i.e. land, sea and atmosphere. Any changes in ray paths and their characteristics such as radiative power and direction are computed as they experience reflection, refraction, transmission, absorption and scattering. Improved atmospheric BSDF algorithms uses Q.Liu's combined Rayleigh and aerosol Henrey-Greenstein scattering phase function. The input cloud-free atmosphere model consists of 48 layers with vertical absorption profiles and a scattering layer with their input characteristics using the GIOVANNI database. Total Solar Irradiance data are obtained from Solar Radiation and Climate Experiment (SORCE) mission. Using aerosol scattering computation, we first tested the atmospheric scattering effects with imaging simulation with HRIV, EPOXI. Then we examined the computational validity of atmospheric model with the measurements of global, direct and diffuse radiation taken from NREL(National Renewable Energy Laboratory)s pyranometers and pyrheliometers on a ground station for cases of single incident angle and for simultaneous multiple incident angles of the solar beam.

Date Published: 15 October 2012
PDF: 9 pages
Proc. SPIE 8521, Instruments, Methods, and Missions for Astrobiology XV, 85210F (15 October 2012); doi: 10.1117/12.930260

Published in SPIE Proceedings Vol. 8521:
Instruments, Methods, and Missions for Astrobiology XV
Richard B. Hoover; Gilbert V. Levin; Alexei Yu. Rozanov; Paul C. W. Davies, Editor(s)