Sensitivity analysis for air temperature profile estimation methods around the tropopause using simulated Aqua/AIRS data

A sensitivity analysis is performed to investigate potential improvements to the accuracy of air temperature profile retrievals near the tropopause. A simple inversion method is employed to identify and remove redundant spectral channels from the retrievals using simulated data for the high-spectral resolution sounder AIRS (Atmospheric Infrared Sounder) on the Aqua satellite. Bayesian optimal theory and inverse technique are applied for the atmospheric temperature profile retrievals, and the 15 μm CO2 absorption bands (620–750 cm−1) are chosen for this study. Sequentially elimination of redundant channels is directly integrated into the inverse scheme for the temperature profile, in order to accurately retain the valuable channels and remove all the redundant channels, for accurate retrieval of the temperature profile. Also, the tropopause and troposphere are treated differently in the inverse scheme to improve the retrieval accuracy in the tropopause. Results of a sensitivity analysis based on this method, for the Tropical and Middle-Latitude Summer models simulated by MODTRAN4.0, show that the estimated accuracies are improved by 2 K around the tropopause, and are only changed by less than 0.2 K in the troposphere.