MISR Aerosol Air Mass Type Mapping over Mega-City Environments: Validation and Applications

Most aerosol air-quality monitoring in mega-city environments is done from scattered ground stations having detailed chemical and optical sampling capabilities. The Multi-angle Imaging SpectroRadiometer (MISR) can retrieve total-column Aerosol Optical Depth (AOD), along with some information about particle microphysical properties. Although the particle property information from MISR is much less detailed than that obtained from the ground sampling stations, the coverage is extensive, making it possible to put individual surface observations into the context of regional aerosol air mass types. This study presents an analysis of MISR aerosol observations made coincident with aircraft and ground-based instruments during the INTEX-B and DISCOVER-AQ field campaigns. These detailed comparisons of satellite aerosol property retrievals against dedicated field measurements provide the opportunity to validate the retrievals quantitatively at a regional level, to help improve aerosol representation in retrieval algorithms, and to demonstrate the relationships among suborbital measurements through MISR-derived regional aerosol air mass types maps. Validation of MISR retrieved AOD and aerosol properties over the INTEX-B and DISCOVER-AQ study regions will be presented. MISR's ability to distinguish among aerosol air mass types will also be presented, based on high-resolution MISR research retrieval results. The goal of this effort is to use the MISR aerosol property retrievals for mapping both aerosol air mass type and AOD gradients in mega-city environments over the decade-plus that MISR has made global observations.