Polarimetric Doppler Weather Radar: Principles and Applications

Skolnik, Merrill I

Zhang, Qun

Mayhan, Joseph T

Bertoni, Henry L

The papers published in this volume were presented at the Second International Conference on Ultra-WidebandiShort-Pulse (UWB/SP) Electromagnetics, ApriIS-7, 1994. To place this second international conference in proper perspective with respect to the first conference held during October 8-10, 1992, at Polytechnic University, some background information is necessary. As we had hoped, the first conference struck a responsive cord, both in timeliness and relevance, among the electromagnetic community 1. Participants at the first conference already inquired whether and when a follow-up meeting was under consideration. The first concrete proposal in this direction was made a few months after the first conference by Prof. A. Terzuoli of the Air Force Institute of Technology (AFIT), Dayton, Ohio, who has been a strong advocate of time-domain methods and technologies. He initially proposed a follow-up time-domain workshop under AFIT auspices. Realizing that interest in this subject is lodged also at other Air Force installations, we suggested to enlarge the scope, and received in this endeavor the support of Dr. A. Nachman of AFOSR (Air Force Office of Scientific Research), Bolling Air Force Base, Washington, D.C.

The first two international conferences on Ultra-Wideband (UWB), Short-Pulse (SP) Electromagnetics were held at Polytechnic University, Brooklyn, New York in 1992 and 1994. Their purpose was to focus on advanced technologies for generating, radiating, and detecting UWB, SP signals, on mathematical methods, their propagation and scattering, and on current as well as potential future applications. The success of these two conferences led to the desirability of scheduling a third conference. Impetus was provided by the electromagnetics community and discussions led by Carl Baum and Larry Carin resulted in the suggestion that the UWB conferences be moved around, say to government laboratories such as Phillips Laboratory. Consequently the decision was made by the Permanent HPEM Committee to expand AMEREM '96 to include the Third Ultra-Wide Band, Short-Pulse (UWB, SP 3) with the Third Unexploded Ordnance Detec- tion and Range Remediation Conference (UXO) and the HPEMINEM Conference in Albuquerque, New Mexico during the period May 27-31, 1996. Planning is now underway for EUROEM '98 in June, 1998 in Tel Aviv, Israel. Joseph Shiloh is the conference chairman. A fourth UWB, SP meeting is planned as a part of this conference and Ehud Heyman will coordinate this part of the meeting. The papers which appear in this volume, the third in the UWB, SP series, update subject areas from the earlier UWB, SP conferences. These topics include pulse generation and detection, antennas, pulse propagation, scattering theory, signal processing, broadband electronic systems, and buried targets.