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    Sun photometer retrievals of Saharan dust properties over Barbados during SALTRACE
    (Katlenburg-Lindau : EGU, 2019) Toledano, Carlos; Torres, Benjamín; Velasco-Merino, Cristian; Althausen, Dietrich; Groß, Silke; Wiegner, Matthias; Weinzierl, Bernadett; Gasteiger, Josef; Ansmann, Albert; González, Ramiro; Mateos, David; Farrel, David; Müller, Thomas; Haarig, Moritz; Cachorro, Victoria E.
    The Saharan Aerosol Long-Range Transport and Aerosol-Cloud-Interaction Experiment (SALTRACE) was devoted to the investigation of Saharan dust properties over the Caribbean. The campaign took place in June-July 2013. A wide set of ground-based and airborne aerosol instrumentation was deployed at the island of Barbados for a comprehensive experiment. Several sun photometers performed measurements during this campaign: two AERONET (Aerosol Robotic Network) Cimel sun photometers and the Sun and Sky Automatic Radiometer (SSARA). The sun photometers were co-located with the ground-based multi-wavelength lidars BERTHA (Backscatter Extinction lidar Ratio Temperature Humidity profiling Apparatus) and POLIS (Portable Lidar System). Aerosol properties derived from direct sun and sky radiance observations are analyzed, and a comparison with the co-located lidar and in situ data is provided. The time series of aerosol optical depth (AOD) allows identifying successive dust events with short periods in between in which the marine background conditions were observed. The moderate aerosol optical depth in the range of 0.3 to 0.6 was found during the dust periods. The sun photometer infrared channel at the 1640nm wavelength was used in the retrieval to investigate possible improvements to aerosol size retrievals, and it was expected to have a larger sensitivity to coarse particles. The comparison between column (aerosol optical depth) and surface (dust concentration) data demonstrates the connection between the Saharan Air Layer and the boundary layer in the Caribbean region, as is shown by the synchronized detection of the successive dust events in both datasets. However the differences of size distributions derived from sun photometer data and in situ observations reveal the difficulties in carrying out a column closure study. © 2019 All rights reserved.
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    The potential of elastic and polarization lidars to retrieve extinction profiles
    (Katlenburg-Lindau : Copernicus, 2020) Giannakaki, Elina; Kokkalis, Panos; Marinou, Eleni; Bartsotas, Nikolaos S.; Amiridis, Vassilis; Ansmann, Albert; Komppula, Mika
    A new method, called ElEx (elastic extinction), is proposed for the estimation of extinction coefficient lidar profiles using only the information provided by the elastic and polarization channels of a lidar system. The method is applicable to lidar measurements both during daytime and nighttime under well-defined aerosol mixtures. ElEx uses the particle backscatter profiles at 532 nm and the vertically resolved particle linear depolarization ratio measurements at the same wavelength. The particle linear depolarization ratio and the lidar ratio values of pure aerosol types are also taken from literature. The total extinction profile is then estimated and compared well with Raman retrievals. In this study, ElEx was applied in an aerosol mixture of marine and dust particles at Finokalia station during the CHARADMExp campaign. Any difference between ElEx and Raman extinction profiles indicates that the nondust component could be probably attributed to polluted marine or polluted continental aerosols. Comparison with sun photometer aerosol optical depth observations is performed as well during daytime. Differences in the total aerosol optical depth are varying between 1.2 % and 72 %, and these differences are attributed to the limited ability of the lidar to correctly represent the aerosol optical properties in the near range due to the overlap problem. © 2020 Author(s).
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    Retrieval of ice-nucleating particle concentrations from lidar observations and comparison with UAV in situ measurements
    (Katlenburg-Lindau : EGU, 2019) Marinou, Eleni; Tesche, Matthias; Nenes, Athanasios; Ansmann, Albert; Schrod, Jann; Mamali, Dimitra; Tsekeri, Alexandra; Pikridas, Michael; Baars, Holger; Engelmann, Ronny; Voudouri, Kalliopi-Artemis; Solomos, Stavros; Sciare, Jean; Groß, Silke; Ewald, Florian; Amiridis, Vassilis
    Aerosols that are efficient ice-nucleating particles (INPs) are crucial for the formation of cloud ice via heterogeneous nucleation in the atmosphere. The distribution of INPs on a large spatial scale and as a function of height determines their impact on clouds and climate. However, in situ measurements of INPs provide sparse coverage over space and time. A promising approach to address this gap is to retrieve INP concentration profiles by combining particle concentration profiles derived by lidar measurements with INP efficiency parameterizations for different freezing mechanisms (immersion freezing, deposition nucleation). Here, we assess the feasibility of this new method for both ground-based and spaceborne lidar measurements, using in situ observations collected with unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) and subsequently analyzed with the FRIDGE (FRankfurt Ice nucleation Deposition freezinG Experiment) INP counter from an experimental campaign at Cyprus in April 2016. Analyzing five case studies we calculated the cloud-relevant particle number concentrations using lidar measurements (n250,dry with an uncertainty of 20 % to 40 % and Sdry with an uncertainty of 30 % to 50 %), and we assessed the suitability of the different INP parameterizations with respect to the temperature range and the type of particles considered. Specifically, our analysis suggests that our calculations using the parameterization of Ullrich et al. (2017) (applicable for the temperature range −50 to −33 ∘C) agree within 1 order of magnitude with the in situ observations of nINP; thus, the parameterization of Ullrich et al. (2017) can efficiently address the deposition nucleation pathway in dust-dominated environments. Additionally, our calculations using the combination of the parameterizations of DeMott et al. (2015, 2010) (applicable for the temperature range −35 to −9 ∘C) agree within 2 orders of magnitude with the in situ observations of INP concentrations (nINP) and can thus efficiently address the immersion/condensation pathway of dust and nondust particles. The same conclusion is derived from the compilation of the parameterizations of DeMott et al. (2015) for dust and Ullrich et al. (2017) for soot.