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- 1. A13E-0372: Field deployment and initial results from micro-pulse lidar systems during NASA's DISCOVER AQ campaign Timothy Berkoff1,10 , Raymond M Hoff1 , Ruben Delgado1 , John Sullivan1 , Andrea Thomas2 , William Lawrence2 , Taylor Jones3 , Phil Decola3 , Savyasachee Mathur3 , Yunhui Zheng3 , Gail Wyant4 , Raymond Blucher4 , Renee Piatt4 , Mustafa Abderrahman4 , Douglas Martins5 , Ryan Auvil6 , Michael Woodman6 , Rasheen Connell7 , Michael Hicks7 , Demetrius Venable7 , Belay Demoz7 , Maria Tzortziou8,10 , Pasquale De Rosa9 , Kenneth Pickering10 , David Starr10 , Ellsworth Welton10 , Brent Holben10 , Richard Ferrare11 , Chris Hostetler11 , James Crawford11 1. Univ of Maryland Baltimore Co., Baltimore, MD, United States. 2. Bowie State University, Bowie, MD, United States. 3. Sigma Space, Lanham, MD, United States., 4. Cecil College, Elkton, MD, United States. 5. Pennsylvania State Univ., University Park, PA, United States. 6. Maryland Dept. of the Environment, Baltimore, MD, United States. 7. Howard University, Beltsville, MD, United States. 8. Univ of Maryland, College Park, MD, United States. 9. Cardinal Point Captains llc., Long Beach, CA, United States. 10. NASA -GSFC, Greenbelt, MD, United States. 11. NASA -LARC, Hampton, VA, United States. Acknowledgments Micropulse Lidar Sites Example Measurements Currently, processed MPL data products (HDF5 format) are available in the DISCOVER-AQ archive include the following: Co-polarized Attenuated Backscatter (AB) in units of km-1 sr-1 , at 30 meter vertical resolution and 1 minute time intervals Boundary layer height (km) as a function of time determined from wavelet-based analysis of the AB signal The AB magnitude contains both the backscatter and extinction loss of aerosol and molecular scattering. In the future, Fernald-Klett inversion could be applied to the data to obtain a layer-average aerosol extinction-to-backscatter ratio, which can be used to generate aerosol specific data products, similar to what is done by MPLNET. Future data products could include results such as: Depolarization ratio (cross/co-polarization) Aerosol Backscatter Coefficient and Extinction Cloud and layer heights Statistical uncertainties and absolute error Data Products Background To further improve satellite analysis of surface pollution and related atmospheric and air quality forecast models, NASA conducted the DISCOVER-AQ mission in the Baltimore- Washington region during July 2011. Data were collected from a combination of surface sites and research aircraft to provide a comprehensive assessment of the conditions leading up to and during air pollution events. UMBC participation The UMBC Monitoring of Atmospheric Pollution (UMAP) site, located just west of Baltimore, provided a unique resource to DISCOVER-AQ measurements. This site is designed to provide a three-dimensional evaluation of the aerosol pollution environment over Baltimore. By combining ground based sampling with lidar profile measurements operating at a number of wavelengths, provides the ability to understand the radiative aerosol properties that are seen by satellite sensors passing over the region. UMBC calibration & validation “Real-time” web display MPL transceiver Wide-FOV receiver MPL system with Wide-FOV receiver attached to the top of the transceiver Top view (looking down) of MPL transceiver with Wide-FOV receiver http://discover-aq.larc.nasa.gov/ Sigma Space participation In addition to the lidars at the UMBC-UMAP site, four Micro-Pulse Lidars (MPLs) were loaned by Sigma Space (Lanham, MD) for use during the campaign that were deployed to various locations in the region. Three of these systems were the new “MiniMPL” model, a smaller more portable version of the original MPL. This campaign is the first use of multiple “MiniMPL” systems simultaneously at different locations for a regional-scale pollution study of this type. The Sigma Space MPLs provided elastic optical backscattering profiles of the atmosphere at 532 nm, and obtained both the co and cross polarized measurements. http://alg.umbc.edu/umap/ Photograph of MPL systems manufactured by Sigma Space. The “MiniMPL” is shown on the left and the traditional style MPL is on the right. http://www.sigmaspace.com/ Site setup photos In addition to standard UMBC and GSFC MPL sites participating in MPLNET in the region, additional sites (not part of MPLNET) included four Sigma Space loaned lidars that enabled measurements to obtained from Fairhill, Edgewood, Essex, and Beltsville locations. One of these systems was deployed on the NOAA research vessel R- 8501 SRVX from July 14-20, to enable atmospheric profiling on the Chesapeake Bay. MPLs operated at 30 meter vertical and 1 minute time resolutions. To assist with flight planning and enable remote monitoring of lidar performance, a web-link was provided to campaign participants that provided near real-time (7 minute update cycle) of the MPL uncalibrated backscatter signal levels from the various sites. Files were remote synchronized to UMBC where data quick-look processing was accomplished using customized software using Python programming language. One of the key calibrations for use of MPL generated data is the accurate determination the non-linear overlap shape of the near-field (low altitude) range signals. The MiniMPLs have a shorter overlap range (1-2 km) when compared to a traditional MPL (6 km). MPLs used in DISCOVER-AQ were cross-calibrated at UMBC with a wide-FOV receiver system to independently determine the overlap functions for each of the MPLs. Each of the MPLs also has a unique calibration constant that represents the optical efficiency of the system. Level 2 AERONET co-located column AOD data was used in conjunction with a standard atmospheric model to determine the calibration constant from free-troposphere data for each for the systems. In cases where the constant varied over time (due to window or instrumental issues), a fitting function was used to determine the appropriate scaling factor to be applied to the data. Baseline processing included this correction so that attenuated backscatter data were normalized to each other in units of 1/(km*sr). Edgewood Ground Lidar LARC HSRL Airborne Lidar smoke cirrus cirrus Smoke and Cirrus Example 20 July 2011 Canadian Smoke Plume Over Region UMBC smog blog/NOAA HYSPLIT/NOAA HMS AERONET Column Size Distribution smoke Processed data for each of the sites were generated for the duration of the campaign, and are available in HDF5 format in the DISCOVER-AQ data archive. The MPLs operated continuously day and night during the month of July 2011, enabling the study of how the vertical structure of aerosols and clouds evolved during and outside of the aircraft flight segments. MPL data can be useful to examine the influence of aerosol transport on air quality and help identify how elevated layers and/or thin cirrus may impact column measurements from space. In the example below, backtrajectory analysis suggests possible impact of smoke from Canadian forest fires on July 20 during the campaign. Lidar data on this day revealed elevated aerosol at or above the airborne lidar. Ground MPL also shows the presence of intermittent cirrus. By providing continuous profiling during the campaign, the MPL systems provide a useful link to help relate in-situ surface, airborne, and space-based column- integrated measurements, and enable a more detailed study of a variety of conditions such as aerosol transport, diurnal cycle characteristics, and planetary boundary layer heights and dynamics. This work is the result of a collaborative effort between UMBC, Sigma Space, NASA, and the various site hosts. Funding for this work was provided by two NASA cooperative agreements: NNX10AR38G (DISCOVER-AQ) and NNX10AT36A(JCET Task 336) for this work. The free and open source software used in this work included Python programming language (Enthought Python Distribution (http://www.enthought.com/) – academic version) for data processing and display, and Open Office productivity suite ( http://www.openoffice.org/) for the preparation of figures and text. Data Scaling Determination Example profile comparison between MiniMPL and WFOV receiver Prelim. Overlap shapes for the MPLs Fairhill Essex NOAA ship Table of Sites MPL locations P3 aircraft King Air Flight paths of the two NASA research aircraft during the campaign Near-surface pollution is one of the most challenging problems for Earth observations from space Range, km WFOV signal MiniMPL signal