CONSTRAINING THE MODELING OF DUST AEROSOL AND CLIMATE IMPACTS USING CALIPSO, CLOUDSAT, AND OTHER A-TRAIN SATELLITE MEASUREMENTS

Abstract

1. Abstract As the science community seeks to get a better handle on the energy budget of Earth’s atmosphere, ice clouds continue to be a source of significant uncertainty. Ice cloud microphysical and optical properties (i.e. effective radius and optical depth) are among the most uncertain components in our understanding of cloud-climate forcings and feedbacks. Reduction in cloud feedback uncertainty was recommended as a most important endeavor by the decadal survey (National Academy of Sciences, 2017). The Climate Absolute Radiance and Reflectivity Observatory Pathfinder (CLARREO-PF), while not specifically designed for cloud research, will provide hyperspectral measurements of the solar reflected radiance over the range of 320 – 2300 nm. Such a complete measurement of the reflected solar spectrum provides an impressive platform to study microphysical and optical properties of ice clouds in an effort to increase information, reduce noise, and analyze spectral consistency of the retrievals. With this proposal, we seek to leverage recent advancements in ice particle radiative modeling and CLARREO-Pathfinder’s unique accuracy, spectrally resolved reflectances, and Shannon information content for retrieval of ice cloud optical depth and effective radius in order to reduce uncertainty in global distributions of cloud optical properties. Finally, using NASA’s proposed CLARREO-Infrared (CLARREO-IR) and Polar Radiant Energy in the Far-Infared Experiment (PREFIRE) as inspiration, we will investigate the expansion of our study into the far-infrared.