Title: PBL Profiling Capabilities from the HiPPO Radio Occultation Concept
Presenting Author: Alex Akins
Organization: NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory
Co-Author(s): Kuo-Nung Wang, George Hajj

Abstract:
We present a new instrument concept for profiling temperature and water vapor at high vertical resolution in the troposphere and planetary boundary layer (PBL). This concept, dubbed HiPPO (High resolution PBL Profiling with Occultation), is based on crosslink radio occultation (RO) measurements between two low Earth orbiters transmitting and receiving inatmultiple frequencies between 1-35 GHz that provide greater sensitivity to water vapor absorption than conventional GNSS-RO. This approach preserves the many advantages of GNSS-RO while potentially providing more accurate temperature and water vapor retrievals. To assess the accuracy of this technique and derive key instrument requirements, high-fidelity end-to-end simulations are performed under a wide range of PBL conditions and measurement errors. We will present the latest experiment simulation results, along with estimates of system design parameters, such as transmit power and antenna gains, needed to achieve the desired accuracy and resolution of temperature and water vapor in the PBL.