Disk-averaged Spectra Simulation of Earth-like Exoplanets with Ray-tracing Method

The understanding spectral characterization of possible earth-like extra solar planets has generated wide interested in astronomy and space science. The technical central issue in observation of exoplanet is deconvolution of the temporally and disk-averaged spectra of the exoplanets. The earth model based on atmospheric radiative transfer method has been studied in recent years for solutions of characterization of earthlike exoplanet. In this study, we report on the current progress of the new method of 3D earth model as a habitable exoplanet. The computational model has 3 components 1) the sun model, 2) an integrated earth BRDF (Bi-directional Reflectance Distribution Function) model (Atmosphere, Land and Ocean) and 3) instrument model combined in ray tracing computation. The ray characteristics such as radiative power and direction are altered as they experience reflection, refraction, transmission, absorption and scattering from encountering with each all of optical surfaces. The Land BRDF characteristics are defined by the semi-empirical "parametric-kernel-method" from POLDER missions from CNES. The ocean BRDF is defined for sea-ice cap structure and for the sea water optical model, considering sun-glint scattering. The input cloud-free atmosphere model consists of 1 layers with vertical profiles of absorption and aerosol scattering combined Rayleigh scattering and its input characteristics using the NEWS product in NASA data and spectral SMARTS from NREL and 6SV from Vermote E. The trial simulation runs result in phase dependent disk-averaged spectra and light-curves of a virtual exoplanet using 3D earth model.