Hydrodynamic parameters of a sandy soil determined by ground-penetrating radar inside a single ring infiltrometer

Abstract : This study shows how Mualem-van Genuchten (M-vG) parameters can be obtained from GPR data acquired during water infiltration from a single ring infiltrometer in the case of a sandy soil. Water content profiles were generated at various time steps using HYDRUS-1D, based on particular values of the M-vG parameters and were converted to dielectric permittivity profiles using the Complex Refractive Index Method. The GprMax suite of programs was used to generate radargrams and to follow the wetting front progression in depth using the arrival time of the electromagnetic waves recorded by a ground-penetrating radar (GPR). Theoretically, the 1-D time convolution between reflectivity and GPR signal at any infiltration time step is related to the peak of the reflected signal recorded in the corresponding trace in the radargram. We used this relationship to invert the M-vG parameters for constant and falling head infiltrations using the Shuffled Complex Evolution (SCE-UA) algorithm. The method is presented on synthetic examples and on experiments carried out for a sandy soil. The parameters inverted are compared with values obtained in laboratory on soil samples and with disk infiltrometer measurements.