AERI
Point of Contact:
- Robert Knuteson
- University of Wisconsin - Madison
- Space Science and Engineering Center
- 1225 W. Dayton Street
- Madison, Wisconsin 53706
- Office Telephone: (608) 263-7974
- Fax: (608)262-5974
- E-mail: bob.knuteson@ssec.wisc.edu
- AERI Home Page: http://cimss.ssec.wisc.edu
Brief Instrument Description of the
Atmospheric Emitted Radiance Interferometer (AERI)
INSTRUMENT DESCRIPTION
The Atmospheric Emitted Radiance Interferometer (AERI) is a two band BOMEM-100 Michelson interferometer consisting of two detectors (5-20 um and 3-5 um), scene imaging scan mirror, and a two point calibration system. Every ten minutes a spectrum at one wavenumber resolution is produced from 3-20 um with an absolute accuracy of 1% of ambient radiance determined by intercomparisons between other AERI instrument and a NIST blackbody reference. The AERI instrument is a fully operational system and has produced calibrated spectra since 1993 for the DOE ARM program at the Southern Great Plains (SGP) central facility near Lamont, Oklahoma. AERI has provided high-resolution spectra of atmospheric emission at numerous other field experiments including CAMEX I and CAMEX II since 1990.
DATA DESCRIPTION
AERI radiances have several useful scientific purposes for the study of the atmosphere. Firstly AERI provides absolutely calibrated radiances which can be used for forward calculation comparisons of radiosonde and LIDAR profiles. This provides a reference to the airborne and ground based remote sensing instruments, which profile atmospheric state. Secondly AERI radiances contain valuable temperature and water vapor information which can be used to retrieve planetary boundary layer thermodynamics. This algorithm has been automated for the DOE ARM program and will soon be applied to radiances measured at the North Slope of Alaska (NSA) and the Tropical Western Pacific (TWP). A synergistic AERI and GOES retrieval algorithm has been developed since CAMEX II allowing full tropospheric retrieval of temperature and water vapor vertical profiles. Other quantities retrieved from AERI spectra include: cloud properties, water and land emissivities, aerosol properties, and trace gas amounts.
CAMEX-3 GOALS
The AERI system will provide radiances and AERI+GOES temperature and water vapor retrievals for validation and calibration of the airborne instrumentation in CAMEX III. We will combine the AERI+GOES temperature retrievals with the GSFC Scanning Raman Lidar (SRL) to provide tropospheric relative humidity fields at high temporal resolution to study aerosol property tendencies in the Tropics. A Global Positioning System receiver has been purchased to measure total column water vapor. A NCAR CLASS radiosonde system and Vaisala cloud base lidar will also be deployed. The synergistic use of all these remote sensing and in situ instrumentation should provide an excellent reference point for the NAST-I, scanning HIS, and LASE airborne instrumentation.
