Vertical Distribution of Air-quality Gases and Aerosols
Abstract
The advent of satellite instruments (AIRS, TES, OMI, GOME, GOME-2, SCIAMACHY, MODIS, MISR) designed to measure tropospheric gases and aerosols in conjunction with mesoscale chemical models (WRF- CHEM, xCMAQ) and global CTMs (GEOS-CHEM, MOZART, et al.) presents rich opportunities to significantly advance the science of air quality observation and forecasting. One of the most significant challenges in improving air quality forecasting is understanding the processes controlling the vertical distribution of gases and aerosols and how those vertical distributions affect satellite-based observations. The ultimate accuracy of surface air quality forecasts is highly dependent on understanding these vertical distributions and processes. We are developing the following three closely related research areas: 1) Enhancing our ground-based instruments (tropospheric ozone lidar, Doppler wind lidar, aerosol elastic lidar, and balloon borne ozonesonde) to measure the vertical distributions of ozone, winds, and aerosols at the surface and aloft over the Huntsville AL urban area. These measurements will be obtained in conjunction with Doppler radar measurements of winds, and satellite-based observations of gases, aerosols, clouds, and surface energetics over the surrounding region of northern Alabama. 2) These measurements will be retrieved by an intelligent sensor web; combined in an intelligent data assimilation system; and used to initialize, evaluate, and improve existing air- quality models. These activities will be focused in an existing laboratory, the Regional Atmospheric Profiling Center for Discovery (RAPCD, pronounced rhapsody), in the National Space Science and Technology Center (NSSTC) on the UAH campus. 3) An intrinsic aspect of this research will be the evaluation of satellite retrievals of gases (ozone, HCHO, NO2, et al.) and aerosols, particularly with regard to the vertical averaging kernels of those instruments and the theoretical scattering and absorption properties of aerosols and gases. Potential research interactions include the following: REALM lidar network of regional observations of vertical distributions, satellite algorithm teams for tropospheric gas and aerosol retrievals, mesoscale forecasting groups, and focused campaigns.
- Publication:
-
AGU Spring Meeting Abstracts
- Pub Date:
- May 2006
- Bibcode:
- 2006AGUSM.A31A..01N
- Keywords:
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- 0305 Aerosols and particles (0345;
- 4801;
- 4906);
- 0345 Pollution: urban and regional (0305;
- 0478;
- 4251)