MISR, MODIS, and POLDER2 Reflectance and Aerosol Product Comparisons

MISR, MODIS and POLDER2 are all space-based instruments dedicated to studying Earth's atmosphere and surface. Due to different calibration methods, the reflectances these instruments generate can differ slightly. These differences affect the interpretation of satellite observations in terms of geophysical products, including aerosol amount and type. In a first part of this study, the reflectances from these three instruments have been compared when the geometrical and temporal conditions have sufficient similarities. All kinds of targets have been considered, from dark water to bright clouds. For almost all the bands, MISR reflectances are at the high end of the reflectance envelope, whereas POLDER2 tends to be at the low end. However, the absolute differences rarely exceed 5% for any of the three instruments. The last part of the presentation will show the comparison of the aerosol amount and properties retrieved by the three sensors for a variety of different aerosol types and atmospheric loadings. Comparisons have been made for retrievals over land and ocean for 60 orbits with good temporal coincidence and which cover a large geographical sampling. This work was funded by the Centre National d"Etudes Spatiales and performed at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, California Institute of Technology, under contract with the National Aeronautics and Space Administration.