Brent N. Holben

TL;DR: In this article, the authors compared the performance of airborne in situ and ground-based remote sensing methods to measure the properties of urban/industrial aerosols during the Sulfate Clouds and Radiation Atlantic (SCAR-A) experiment in 1993.

Abstract: Abstract. Over the past 24 years, the AErosol RObotic NETwork (AERONET) program has provided highly accurate remote-sensing characterization of aerosol optical and physical properties for an increasingly extensive geographic distribution including all continents and many oceanic island and coastal sites. The measurements and retrievals from the AERONET global network have addressed satellite and model validation needs very well, but there have been challenges in making comparisons to similar parameters from in situ surface and airborne measurements. Additionally, with improved spatial and temporal satellite remote sensing of aerosols, there is a need for higher spatial-resolution ground-based remote-sensing networks. An effort to address these needs resulted in a number of field campaign networks called Distributed Regional Aerosol Gridded Observation Networks (DRAGONs) that were designed to provide a database for in situ and remote-sensing comparison and analysis of local to mesoscale variability in aerosol properties. This paper describes the DRAGON deployments that will continue to contribute to the growing body of research related to meso- and microscale aerosol features and processes. The research presented in this special issue illustrates the diversity of topics that has resulted from the application of data from these networks.

TL;DR: In this paper, the authors evaluate the accuracy of the near-UV method of aerosol absorption sensing by means of a comparison of retrieved aerosol single scattering albedo and extinction optical depth to ground-based measurements of the same parameters by the Aerosol Robotic Network (AERONET) for a 2-month period during the SAFARI 2000 campaign.

Abstract: The spring 2015 deployment of a suite of instrumentation at Doi Ang Khang (DAK) in northwestern Thailand enabled the characterization of air masses containing smoke aerosols from burning predominantly in Myanmar. Aerosol Robotic Network (AERONET) Sun photometer data were used to validate Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) Collection 6 'Deep Blue' aerosol optical depth (AOD) retrievals; MODIS Terra and Aqua provided results of similar quality, with correlation coefficients of 0.93–0.94 and similar agreement within expected uncertainties to global-average performance. Scattering and absorption measurements were used to compare surface and total column aerosol single scatter albedo (SSA); while the two were well-correlated, and showed consistent positive relationships with moisture (increasing SSA through the season as surface relative humidity and total columnar water vapor increased), in-situ surface-level SSA was nevertheless significantly lower by 0.12–0.17. This could be related to vertical heterogeneity and/or instrumental issues. DAK is at ~1,500 m above sea level in heterogeneous terrain, and the resulting strong diurnal variability in planetary boundary layer depth above the site leads to high temporal variability in both surface and column measurements, and acts as a controlling factor to the ratio between surface particulate matter (PM) levels and column AOD. In contrast, while some hygroscopic effects were observed relating to aerosol particle size and Ångström exponent, relative humidity variations appear to be less important for the PM:AOD ratio here.