Atmospheric transport of smoke and dust particulates and their interaction with the Planetary Boundary Layer as observed by multi-wavelength lidar and supporting instrumentation

Leona Charles; Barry Gross; Yonghua Wu; Viviana Vladutescu; Fred Moshary; Sam Ahmed

doi:10.1117/12.731943

26 September 2007 Atmospheric transport of smoke and dust particulates and their interaction with the Planetary Boundary Layer as observed by multi-wavelength lidar and supporting instrumentation

Leona Charles, Barry Gross, Yonghua Wu, Viviana Vladutescu, Fred Moshary, Sam Ahmed

Author Affiliations +

Proceedings Volume 6681, Lidar Remote Sensing for Environmental Monitoring VIII; 66810K (2007) https://doi.org/10.1117/12.731943
Event: Optical Engineering + Applications, 2007, San Diego, California, United States

Abstract

In this paper, we present results showing the usefulness of multi-wavelength lidar measurements to study the interaction of aerosols in the PBL with long range advected aerosol plumes. In particular, our measurements are used to determine the plume angstrom exponent, which allows us to differentiate smoke events from dust events, as well as partitioning the total aerosol optical depth obtained from a CIMEL sky radiometer between the PBL and the high altitude plumes. Furthermore, we show that only if the optical depth from the upper level plumes is taken into account, the correlation between the lidar derived PBL aerosol optical depth and surface PM2.5 is high. In addition, we also observe the dynamic interaction of high altitude plumes interacting with the PBL, resulting in a dramatic rise in surface PM10 concentrations without a corresponding dramatic rise in PM2.5 concentrations. These observations strongly suggest the deposition of large particulates into the PBL which is consistent with both lidar angstrom coefficient measurements and back-trajectory analysis. Finally, we investigate the correspondence between surface PM2.5 concentrations and optical backscatter coefficients as a function of altitude. To perform this study, our lidar system is replaced by a ceilometer (Vaisala CL-31) which can determine backscatter to near surface level. In particular, we confirm that near surface backscatter within the first 100 meters is a good proxy for PM2.5 but as altitude increases beyond 500 meters, the correlations degrades dramatically. These studies are useful in identifying the vertical length scales in which spaced based lidars such as Calipso can be used to probe surface PM2.5.

Citation Download Citation

Leona Charles, Barry Gross, Yonghua Wu, Viviana Vladutescu, Fred Moshary, and Sam Ahmed "Atmospheric transport of smoke and dust particulates and their interaction with the Planetary Boundary Layer as observed by multi-wavelength lidar and supporting instrumentation", Proc. SPIE 6681, Lidar Remote Sensing for Environmental Monitoring VIII, 66810K (26 September 2007); https://doi.org/10.1117/12.731943

ACCESS THE FULL ARTICLE

INSTITUTIONAL
Select your institution to access the SPIE Digital Library.

SELECT YOUR INSTITUTION

PERSONAL
Sign in with your SPIE account to access your personal subscriptions or to use specific features such as save to my library, sign up for alerts, save searches, etc.

PERSONAL SIGN IN

No SPIE Account? Create one

PURCHASE THIS CONTENT

SUBSCRIBE TO DIGITAL LIBRARY

50 downloads per 1-year subscription

Members: $195

Non-members: $335 ADD TO CART

25 downloads per 1 - year subscription

Members: $145

Non-members: $250 ADD TO CART

PURCHASE SINGLE ARTICLE

Includes PDF, HTML & Video, when available

Members: $17.00

Non-members: $21.00 ADD TO CART

PROCEEDINGS
11 PAGES

DOWNLOAD PAPER SAVE TO MY LIBRARY

GET CITATION

RIGHTS & PERMISSIONS

Get copyright permission Get copyright permission on Copyright Marketplace

KEYWORDS

Aerosols

LIDAR

Backscatter

Atmospheric particles

Atmospheric modeling

Clouds

Radio optics

Show All Keywords

Keywords/Phrases

Search In:

Publication Years