Aerosol Sounding of the Troposphere and Stratosphere by Lidar and Aerological Technologies

Abstract

Weather conditions are a natural limitation of the use of remote lidar sensing methods of the atmosphere, while the direct method based on an aerological aerosol backscattersonde has no such limitations, and these methods are close in physical principles of measurement. The creation of an all-weather stratospheric aerosol monitoring system can be based on the combination of direct and remote observation methods; however, their consistency should be experimentally confirmed. The results of a lidar-aerological experiment on atmospheric sounding at altitudes of 7–50 and 0–30 km using a ground-based lidar and an aerosol backscattersonde (AZOR), respectively, are presented. The experiment was conducted in Tomsk on March 15–16, 2023. Vertical profiles of backscattering coefficients of radiation from sources with close wavelengths were measured: ground-based 532 nm (in lidar) and balloon-based 528 nm (in AZOR). The obtained consistency of lidar and balloon measurements indicates the possibility of using AZOR as a mobile tool to complement lidar measurements in the case of clouds. The combination of direct and remote sensing of the atmosphere with the aim of improving the quality of measurements in studies of the aerosol composition of the atmosphere is discussed. The possibility of extending two wave (355 and 532 nm) lidar observations by direct measurements of AZOR with an additional set of wavelengths (470, 528, 850, and 940 nm) is shown.