Maritime Aerosol Network as a component of AERONET – first results and comparison with global aerosol models and satellite retrievals

Abstract

Abstract. The Maritime Aerosol Network (MAN) has been collecting data over the oceans since November 2006. Over 80 cruises were completed through early 2010 with deployments continuing. Measurements areas included various parts of the Atlantic Ocean, the Northern and Southern Pacific Ocean, the South Indian Ocean, the Southern Ocean, the Arctic Ocean and inland seas. MAN deploys Microtops hand-held sunphotometers and utilizes a calibration procedure and data processing traceable to AERONET. Data collection included areas that previously had no aerosol optical depth (AOD) coverage at all, particularly vast areas of the Southern Ocean. The MAN data archive provides a valuable resource for aerosol studies in maritime environments. In the current paper we present results of AOD measurements over the oceans, and make a comparison with satellite AOD retrievals and model simulations.

Russian National Report: Meteorology and Atmospheric Sciences

“…According to [184] model simulations show a general increase in the blocking frequency for the Euro-Atlantic region in winter, summer and for the entire year during the 21 st century for analyzed RCP scenarios (RCP 2.6 and RCP 8.5), while changes of the opposite sign are characteristic for the Northern Hemisphere as a whole. It was also noted that there is a tendency for an increase in the blocking intensity in the Euro-Atlantic region during the winter from model simulations with both analyzed RCP scenarios for the 21 st century.…”

“…At the same time, with extreme АОТ values, the downward long-wave radiation increase was estimated to be from 20 to 50 W/m 2 , according to different estimates [181,194]. The thermal aerosol effect (surface air temperature decrease) was estimated to be 4-6 degrees [184,194]. The chemical composition of aerosol is thoroughly analyzed in [185]; an abnormally intensive condensation activity (Henel parameter) of the 2010 smoke (0.2-0.4) is pointed out, which proved to be significantly higher than that for the 2002 smoke (0.1-0.15) [195].…”

“…A comprehensive study of aerosol characteristics during the 2010 severe smoke blanketing in the European part of Russia has been carried out based on the data of ground-based monitoring [181][182][183][184][185], satellite-borne sounding [186,187], and numerical simulation [188].…”

Evaluation of sun photometer capabilities for retrievals of aerosol optical depth at high latitudes: The POLAR-AOD intercomparison campaigns

“…Different radiometer models were used by the participating institutions: (i) CIMEL CE318 sun/sky-radiometer, the standard instrument of the AERONET network (Holben et al, 1998) and its sub-networks AEROCAN, PHOTONS and RIMA; (ii) PREDE POM02 sun/sky-radiometer, adopted by the SKYNET network (Kim et al, 2004); (iii) Precision Filter Radiometer (PFR), designed by the Swiss PhysikalischMeteorologisches Observatorium Davos World Radiation Center (PMOD/WRC) and used in the World Meteorological Organization Global Atmospheric Watch (WMO/GAW) network (Wehrli, 2000); (iv) CartereScott SP01A and SP02 models, used by the Australian Bureau of Meteorology in its national network (Mitchell and Forgan, 2003) and by the National Oceanic & Atmospheric Administration/Global Monitoring Division (NOAA/GMD); (v) SP1A sun photometer, manufactured by Dr. Schulz & Partner GmbH and operated by the Alfred Wegener Institute for Polar and Marine Research (AWI) at their Antarctic and Arctic stations (Herber et al, 2002); (vi) ASP-15WL, designed at the Institute of Atmospheric Sciences and Climate (ISAC) of the Italian National Research Council (CNR), and deployed at the Italian Terra Nova Bay station (Antarctica) during summer campaigns (Tomasi et al, 2007). Alongside the above fully automated instruments, some hand-held MICROTOPS II sun photometers of Solar Light Company Inc. were operated during the two campaigns, this instrument being particularly suitable for itinerant campaigns or harsh environmental conditions, since it does not require the use of solar trackers and data acquisition systems (Smirnov et al, 2011). Their results were evaluated separately from that of the sun-tracking instruments, and were not utilized in the final evaluations of uncertainty parameters, because, as will be shown, precision achievable with this kind of instruments is not sufficiently high for AOD retrievals in polar regions.…”

Initial Assessment of the Spectrometer for Sky-Scanning, Sun-Tracking Atmospheric Research (4STAR)-Based Aerosol Retrieval: Sensitivity Study

“…Consequently, accurate assessment of the DARF requires reliable estimations of aerosol optical properties on both the regional and global scales with high temporal resolution [4,5]. The corresponding uncertainties of the DARF assessment stem mostly from the well-known fact that aerosol properties exhibit high temporal and spatial variability compared to the greenhouse gases, and understanding this variability is an ongoing focus of many observational and model studies [6,7].…”