Student: Patrick Karanja, Undergraduate Student in Civil and Environmental Engr, University of Iowa
Faculty Mentor: Dr. Witold Krajewski
Utility of Satellite Remote Sensing Estimates of Soil Moisture to Improve Real-Time Forecasting of Streamflow and Flooding Over the State of Iowa
NASA’s SMAP satellite (for Soil Moisture Active Passive) provides global, soil moisture maps on a frequent basis, but the growing cycle of crops here in Iowa affects the maps’ quality. Furthermore, soil moisture is directly related to the amount of water that evaporates from land surfaces into the atmosphere; which influences weather and climate patterns. This creates a necessity to test the reliability of the soil moisture data from SMAP as well as a basis to improve the predictive potential of weather and climate models. To support the ongoing investigations, I organize, visualize, and analyze data collected by the soil moisture measuring networks operated by the Iowa Flood Center, Iowa State University and the Agricultural Research Service. I utilize programs such as MATLAB, C++ and other various software for plotting data and calculating various statistics. To further enhance my understanding in this subject, I intend on learning how to use a Geographic Information System software for mapping.