Abstract

An airborne range-gated CO₂ lidar is being developed at JPL to measure vertical profiles of aerosol backscatter throughout the vertical extent of the troposphere and lower stratosphere, with emphasis on coverage of a wide range of latitudes, including the equatorial region and portions of the southern hemisphere. The acquisition and interpretation of aerosol backscatter data over large geographical regions, using a direct measurement technique as exemplified by the range-gated CO₂ lidar approach, is key to the evaluation of coherent Doppler lidar techniques for the measurement of global wind fields from an Earth-orbiting platform. The lidar studies, when combined with studies of aerosol sampler data both from the aircraft platform and from various ground-based stations in the Pacific Ocean basin, will elucidate the effects of transport and various aerosol sinks on global-scale aerosol distributions in the troposphere. These studies comprise a major part of the NASA GLOBE (GLobal Backscatter Experiment) program, which is being coordinated by the NASA Marshall Space Flight Center.

© 1987 Optical Society of America