Go to Okinawa Electromagnetic Technology Center top page

Page 1 Wind Profile Radar (WPR) at the Ogimi Wind Profiler Facility (128° 09' 32" E, 26° 40' 41" N, 225 m MSL)Principles of Wind Profile Radar (WPR) Page 2 Time Domain Integration (Coherent Integration) Page 3 Frequency Domain Integration (Incoherent Integration) Page 4 Typhoon Nari, 2001 (09/07/2001, 11:22, 2.00 ms, 8 bits) Page 5 Typhoon Nari, 2001 (09/07/2001, 14:45, 2.00 ms, 8 bits) Page 6 Path of Typhoon Nari, 2001 Page 7 Time-Altitude Cross-section of Horizontal Wind Velocity Near Typhoon Nari, 2001 Page 8 Principles of RASS (Radio Acoustic Sounding System) Page 9 Altitude-Velocity Doppler-Spectrum Distribution in RASS Observation. Page 10 Virtual-Temperature Profile by RASS Observation (09/04/2001, 15:43-15:54) Page 11 Data Flow

Wind Profiler Radar (WPR) at the Ogimi Wind Profiler Facility

(128°09'32" E, 26°40'41" N, 225 m MSL)

400MHz-WPR-1.3GHz-WPR
400MHz-WPR

Principles of Wind Profiler Radar (WPR)

A WPR is a ground-based radar that measurers the vertical profiles of wind velocity, clear air turbulence, and rainfall rate; these measures are derived from signal intensity and Doppler frequency shift of the radio waves returned from radio scatterers (such as atmospheric turbulence and precipitation particles).

The WPR can continue automated observations within time intervals as short as several minutes, surpassing the performance of conventional balloon (radiosonde) observations.

Atmospheric turbulence and precipitation particles act as scatterers.

Scattering mechanism

  • Atmospheric turbulence: Bragg scattering
  • Precipitating particles: Rayleigh scattering

The intensity of scattering depends on the frequency of the transmitted radio wave.

Measurement of radial wind velocity aligned with the antenna beam

Vertical profile of three wind-velocity components

  • Composite radial wind velocity determined using three to five radar beams
  • Vertical wind velocity can be determined only when atmospheric turbulence is assumed to be the scatterer.

High temporal resolution

Continuous, automated observations at 2-3 min. intervals are possible.

 Principles of Wind Profile Radar (WPR)


Site MapUpdatesInformationHistoryOutline of Organization - Introduction to Researchers - PublicationsOkinawa Electromagnetic Technology Center Virtual MuseumFacility MapIonospheric ObservationGround-based Meteorological Observation SystemThe Computer Network System for Subtropical Environment Monitoring RainNICT Okinawa Bistatic Polarimetric Radar (COBRA) Nago Precipitation Radar Facility and Bistatic Receiver StationWinds 400-MHz/1.3-GHz Wind Profiler Ogimi Wind Profiler Facility OceanLong-Range Ocean Radar Ishigaki/Yonaguni Ocean Radar Facility