Second International Conference on Opportunistic Sensing of Precipitation - OpenSense 2026

Session

Oral session #4 @ Buys Ballotzaal

Jun 24, 2026, 10:45 AM

Building A (Royal Netherlands Meteorological Institute)

Conveners

Oral session #4 @ Buys Ballotzaal: Processing methods

• Filippo Giannetti (University of Pisa)

51. TelcoTemp: opportunistic air temperature monitoring from operational microwave link networks

Matej Istvanek (Brno University of Technology), Petr Musil (Brno University of Technology, Department of Telecommunications), Štěpán Miklánek (Brno University of Technology)

6/24/26, 10:45 AM

Dense observations of near-surface air temperature are essential for studying local climate variability, yet conventional meteorological station networks remain spatially sparse. We present TelcoTemp, a system that derives air temperature observations from operational telemetry of telecommunication microwave link networks.

Microwave link units continuously record internal device...

14. Opportunistic rainfall estimation from satellite microwave link attenuation using a hybrid CNN-LSTM network

Gil Rafalovich (Tel Aviv University)

6/24/26, 11:00 AM

Processing methods

Opportunistic climate monitoring has emerged as a critical frontier in meteorological research, leveraging existing telecommunication infrastructures to sense environmental phenomena. Analysing the attenuation of Satellite Microwave Links (SML) offers a highly promising avenue for high-resolution, global rainfall measurement. In an era of escalating climate volatility, the ability to rapidly...

48. Adaptive K–R relationships based on cloud phase classification using SEVIRI observation

Taoufiq Shit (CTU university ,Prague)

6/24/26, 11:15 AM

Processing methods

Errors in the representation of the drop size distribution are a major source of uncertainty in rainfall estimation, since both radar reflectivity and microwave attenuation depend nonlinearly on precipitation microphysics. These uncertainties propagate directly into the specific attenuation–rain rate (k–R) relationship through the interaction between electromagnetic waves and hydrometeors,...

10. Microwave link attenuation under rain and hail: insights into hail effects

Liora Mazangia

6/24/26, 11:30 AM

Comparative performance analysis and uncertainty assessment

Wireless Commercial Microwave Links (CMLs) can serve as opportunistic environmental sensors, as signal attenuation along links can be exploited to infer precipitation intensity with high spatial resolution and low implementation cost. While rain-induced attenuation has been extensively modeled, the impact of hail on signal propagation remains largely unexplored, despite the significant...

44. Restoring missing commercial microwave link measurements using graph signal processing

Yaara Peled

6/24/26, 11:45 AM

Processing methods

Commercial Microwave Links (CMLs) are increasingly used as an opportunistic sensing modality for near-ground two-dimensional rainfall mapping. In this work, we apply graph signal processing (GSP) to address missing attenuation measurements caused by link failures in operational CML networks. Instead of assuming that measurements originate from link midpoints, we identify an optimal...

33. Opportunistic uplink rain sensing with FGM transponders using a dry-weather baseline

Emanuele Maria Sciortino (University of Pisa)

6/24/26, 12:00 PM

Processing methods

Exploiting Satellite Microwave Links (SMLs) as opportunistic rain sensors is a widely adopted approach, particularly when using Ku-band (10–13 GHz) television broadcasting signals compliant with DVB standards. Most broadcast satellites employ transponders operating with an automatic level control mode (ALCM), which mitigates uplink (UL) power variations and renders almost impossible the...