Volume emission rate tomography from a satellite platform

Abstract

The possibility of retrieving horizontal atmospheric structure from a series of limb images taken aboard a satellite is discussed and a maximum likelihood expectation maximization algorithm is developed. Examples of the retrieval of horizontal structure with this algorithm, for different S/N (signal-to-noise) ratios and different structures, are presented. It is shown that with this algorithm and even in the presence of substantial observational noise, a S/N equal to 10 for a single observation, it is possible to retrieve both horizontal and vertical atmospheric structure.

Validation of Odin/OSIRIS stratospheric NO2 profiles

“…The OS is a grating spectrometer that measures limb-scattered sunlight spectra in the spectral range 280 nm to 800 nm at a resolution of about 1 nm at tangent height intervals of roughly 2 km. The IRI is a three channel camera, imaging the atmospheric airglow emissions near 1.27 mm and 1.53 mm in a limb-viewing tomographic mode [Degenstein et al, 2002]. The OS scattered sunlight measurements are used to provide vertical profiles of minor stratospheric constituents including O 3 , NO 2 , BrO, OClO, and aerosol, and are the focus of this study.…”

Comparison of high-latitude line-of-sight ozone column density with derived ozone fields and the effects of horizontal inhomogeneity

“…Livesey and Read (2000) developed a general 2-D retrieval for the Aura/MLS instrument, with similar applicability to the Aura/Tropospheric Emission Spectrometer (TES) and Aura/High Resolution Dynamics Limb Sounder (HIRDLS). Two-dimensional tomography has also been applied to the Odin/OSIRIS infrared imager (Degenstein et al, 2004(Degenstein et al, , 2003. Similar developments are ongoing in the context of Envisat (e.g., Ridolfi et al, 2000;Stiller et al, 2002).…”

Suomi satellite brings to light a unique frontier of nighttime environmental sensing capabilities

“…The Orbiting Geophysical Observatory (OGO-4) provided the first global maps of the time-varying airglow distribution and intensity (19 (30), and the Thermosphere Ionosphere Mesosphere Energetics and Dynamics (TIMED) instrument (25). These sensors were designed to characterize upper atmospheric properties that influence high frequency communications and near-field sources of light contamination that impact astronomy, as opposed to meteorological applications.…”