Evaluation and utilization of MODIS and CALIPSO aerosol retrievals over a complex terrain in Himalaya

The study elucidate upon the evaluation of satellite retrievals with ground based aerosol optical depth (AOD) measurements, their utilization in LiDAR ratio (LR) estimation, boundary layer (BL) height determination and the case studies on aerosol transport over Himalayan region. The AOD retrievals from the latest level-2 data collections (C5.1 and C6.0) of MODerate resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) onboard Aqua and Terra satellites and Cloud-Aerosol LiDAR and Infrared Pathfinder Satellite Observations (CALIPSO) versions (4.10 and 3) are subjected for quantitative analysis to assess the level of agreement with the quality assured level-2 ground based AErosol RObotic NETwork (AERONET) measurements over Manora peak (29.36° N, 79.46°E), a high altitude site in the Himalayas. Analysis revealed that the AOD from the latest MODIS Terra C6.0 deep blue (DB) 30 km × 30 km and CALIPSO ver. 4.10 (overpass within ~ 100 km distance) are in a very good agreement (R ≥ 0.9) with that from coincident AERONET measurements averaged over the span of ± 30 min. About 77% of the AOD retrieved using MODIS and ~ 87% from CALIPSO were found to be within the expected error (EE) limits. The AOD comparison between MODIS Terra C6.0 DB and CALIPSO ver. 4.10, suggested their synergic use for aerosol characterization over Himalayas. In comparison to the ver. 3, CALIPSO ver. 4.10 is found to have undergone substantial changes, and their long term inter-comparison in the grid 28.86°-29.86° N and 78.96°-79.96° E revealed that their vertical feature and aerosol sub-types are in agreement of ~ 94.6% and ~ 68.6%, respectively. Utilizing the AOD retrievals from AERONET and MODIS collections, the iteratively computed LR for three LiDAR systems was found to be lower (< 16) during winter and higher (> 43) during summer. Study on the BL height estimations suggested that the wavelet covariance transform (WCT) method for CALIPSO could be the best choice as compared to the threshold method, and complements well with the specific humidity gradient method used with the radiosonde observation. Case studies on the continental transport of smoke plumes emanating from crop-residue burning in post-monsoon, and long range transport of aerosols and dust over the region in summer are also discussed using the collocated measurements from ground-based AERONET and LiDAR, in conjunction with MODIS, CALIPSO, reanalysis data and trajectory modeling.