ALTHOUGH TERRESTRIAL SNOWCOVERS CONTRIBUTE TO THE GLOBAL WATER SUPPLY OF NEARLY ONE-SIXTH OF THE WORLDS POPULATION MOST OF THE WORLDS SNOW COVER IS LOCATED IN REMOTE AND ISOLATED TERRAIN. TO MONITOR THE STATE OF BOTH SEASONAL AND PERENNIAL SNOW COVERS SEVERAL SNOW MONITORING SYSTEMS BASED ON MICROWAVE REMOTE SENSING TECHNIQUES HAVE BEEN DEPLOYED BUT A REMOTE SENSING PRODUCT THAT DERIVES THE SNOW WATER EQUIVALENT OVER VARIOUS TYPES OF TERRAIN AND ON A GLOBAL SCALE HAS YET TO BE DEVELOPED. CURRENTLY THERE ARE SEVERAL INTERNATIONAL SPACE-BORNE AERIAL AND GROUND-BASED REMOTE SENSING MISSIONS TAKING PLACE THAT OFFER SNOW MONITORING PRODUCTS FROM BOTH PASSIVE AND ACTIVE MICROWAVE REMOTE SENSORS BUT MANY OPPORTUNITIES STILL EXIST FOR FURTHER EXPLORING AND BETTER INTERPRETING THESE DATASETS. FOR INSTANCE IT IS KNOWN THAT SHIFTS IN THE MICROSTRUCTURAL PROPERTIES OF A SNOWPACK CAN DIRECTLY IMPACT RADAR AMPLITUDE COHERENCE AND THE MICROWAVE BRIGHTNESS TEMPERATURE WHEN MEASURED REMOTELY. MANY OF THESE APPROACHES REQUIRE A PRIORI INFORMATION ABOUT SNOW MICROSTRUCTURE WHICH IS MEASURED EXTREMELY SPARSELY IN SPACE AND TIME AND FOR WHICH MODEL UNCERTAINTIES ARE VERY LARGE. SIMILARLY IF ANALYZING POLARIMETRIC RADAR DATA OBSERVED SHIFTS IN THE POLARIZATION STATE OF A SNOWPACK ARE CLEARLY INDICATIVE OF A SHIFT IN THE DOMINANT SNOW GRAIN SHAPE PROFILE ISOTROPY AND/OR PREFERENTIAL CRYSTALLOGRAPHIC ORIENTATION OF THE SNOW GRAINS BUT LITTLE IS KNOWN ABOUT HOW THESE PHYSICAL PROPERTIES ARE CORRELATED TO THE RAW RADAR DATA. FURTHERMORE AND PERHAPS MOST IMPORTANTLY VERY LITTLE FIELD RESEARCH AND VIRTUALLY NO LABORATORY RESEARCH HAS BEEN CONDUCTED TO LINK THESE AND OTHER REMOTE SENSING OBSERVABLES WITH NOT ONLY THE MICROSTRUCTURAL STATE OF THE SNOWPACK BUT ALSO THE DRIVING MICRO-SCALE PHYSICS RESPONSIBLE FOR THESE CHANGES. IF THE MICROSCALE PHYSICS OF SNOW CAN BE CORRELATED WITH ITS MACRO-SCALE REMOTE SENSING OBSERVABLES HOWEVER A MUCH CLEARER UNDERSTANDING OF THE EARTH'S GLOBAL WATER CYCLE AND ENERGY BUDGET WILL BE ACHIEVED. IN THE RESEARCH PROPOSED HERE THE MICROSTRUCTURAL PROPERTIES OF SNOW THAT MODIFY THE RADAR REFLECTIVITY POLARIMETRIC SIGNATURE AND IMAGE COHERENCE OF MULTI-FREQUENCY AND SYNTHETIC APERTURE RADAR SYSTEMS WILL BE INVESTIGATED. FROM WITHIN THE SUB-ZERO SCIENCE AND ENGINEERING RESEARCH FACILITY AT MONTANA STATE UNIVERSITY A SERIES OF CONTROLLED LABORATORY EXPERIMENTS WILL BE PERFORMED IN WHICH ARTIFICIALLY CREATED SNOWPACKS ARE PERTURBED TO MIMIC NATURAL-LIKE CONDITIONS WHILE BEING MONITORED WITH A FULL SUITE OF REMOTE SENSING INSTRUMENTATION INCLUDING MULTI-FREQUENCY POLARIMETRIC RADAR AND BROADBAND RADIOMETRY SYSTEMS. TO COMPLIMENT THESE OBSERVATIONS ADVANCED MATERIALS CHARACTERIZATION TECHNIQUES WILL ALSO BE EMPLOYED WHERE X-RAY COMPUTED MICROTOMOGRAPHY SCANNING ELECTRON MICROSCOPY AND ELECTRON BACKSCATTER DIFFRACTION WILL BE USED TO ELUCIDATE MICRON AND SUB-MICRON SCALE SNOW PROPERTIES SUCH AS THE CRYSTALLOGRAPHIC ORIENTATION AND THE DEGREE OF ANISOTROPY OF THE SNOW GRAINS. WITH THIS UNIQUE COMBINATION OF REMOTE SENSING AND IN-SITU OBSERVATIONS FROM WITHIN A CONTROLLED LABORATORY ENVIRONMENT NEW INSIGHT INTO THE MICRO-SCALE PHYSICS OF SNOW THAT DRIVE MACRO-SCALE RADAR- AND RADIOMETRIC-OBSERVABLES WILL BE DERIVED MICROWAVE REMOTE SENSING RETRIEVAL ALGORITHMS WILL BE IMPROVED AND SEVERAL NOVEL APPROACHES TO THE REMOTE SENSING OF SNOW WILL BE APPLIED AND TESTED INCLUDING CIRCULAR SYNTHETIC APERTURE RADAR AND DIFFERENTIAL SYNTHETIC APERTURE RADAR INTERFEROMETRY. GIVEN NASAS ONGOING FIELD CAMPAIGNS FOCUSED ON THE CRYOSPHERE SUCH AS SNOWEX AND ICEBRIDGE COMBINED WITH NASAS PLANNED SPACEBORNE MISSIONS OF NISAR AND ICESAT-2 A REMARKABLE OPPORTUNITY NOW EXISTS TO LINK MANY OF THE DESIRED YET STILL FUNDAMENTALLY UNKNOWN CHARACTERISTICS OF SNOW WITH THESE AND OTHER REMOTE SENSING PLATFORMS THROUGH THIS DETAILED LABORATORY STUDY. LASTLY NO FIELD WORK WILL BE REQUIRED FOR THIS RESEARCH.