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GEOPHYSICAL RESEARCH LETTERS, VOL. 34, L19803, doi:10.1029/2007GL030135, 2007

Initial performance assessment of CALIOP

David M. Winker

NASA Langley Research Center, Hampton, Virginia, USA

William H. Hunt

Science Systems and Applications, Inc., Hampton, Virginia, USA

Matthew J. McGill

NASA Goddard Spaceflight Center, Greenbelt, Maryland, USA

Abstract

The Cloud-Aerosol Lidar with Orthogonal Polarization (CALIOP, pronounced the same as “calliope”) is a spaceborne two-wavelength polarization lidar that has been acquiring global data since June 2006. CALIOP provides high resolution vertical profiles of clouds and aerosols, and has been designed with a very large linear dynamic range to encompass the full range of signal returns from aerosols and clouds. CALIOP is the primary instrument carried by the Cloud-Aerosol Lidar and Infrared Pathfinder Satellite Observations (CALIPSO) satellite, which was launched on April 28, 2006. CALIPSO was developed within the framework of a collaboration between NASA and the French space agency, CNES. Initial data analysis and validation intercomparisons indicate the quality of data from CALIOP meets or exceeds expectations. This paper presents a description of the CALIPSO mission, the CALIOP instrument, and an initial assessment of on-orbit measurement performance.

Received 25 March 2007; accepted 29 August 2007; published 3 October 2007.

Keywords: lidar; clouds; aerosols.

Index Terms: 0394 Atmospheric Composition and Structure: Instruments and techniques; 0305 Atmospheric Composition and Structure: Aerosols and particles (0345, 4801, 4906); 0321 Atmospheric Composition and Structure: Cloud/radiation interaction.

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Citation: Winker, D. M., W. H. Hunt, and M. J. McGill (2007), Initial performance assessment of CALIOP, Geophys. Res. Lett., 34, L19803, doi:10.1029/2007GL030135.

Copyright 2007 by the American Geophysical Union.