Retrieval of aerosol size distribution from multi-angle polarized measurements assisted by intensity measurements over East China

Integrating multi-angle, multi-spectral, and polarized measurements can improve the accuracy of retrieved aerosol microphysical properties, such as aerosol size distribution and complex refractive index. Using polarized measurements assisted by intensity measurements, a new algorithm to retrieve aerosol size distribution is developed. Constrained by fine-mode aerosol optical depth (AOD) extracted from polarization and anisotropy of reflectances for atmospheric science coupled with observations from a LIDAR (PARASOL) intensity measurements, aerosol size distribution is retrieved from multi-angle polarized measurements of PARASOL. The retrieved results of our algorithm are compared with ground-based measurements from Beijing, Xianghe, and Hong Kong Polytechnic University (PolyU) sites in the PHOtométrie pour le Traitement Opérational de Normalisation Satellitaire (PHOTONS) network included in the worldwide Aerosol Robotic Network (AERONET), and the correlation coefficient of AOD is greater than 0.7, whereas the modal radii is greater than AERONET/PHOTONS. The discussions of complex refractive index, fixed surface reflectance in the blue, fixed parameters for the coarse‐mode size distribution, and restricted range for fine/coarse fraction show the potential for algorithm improvement in the future.

► Aerosol size distribution is retrieved from polarized and intensity measurements. ► Comparison with AERONET shows that the algorithm improves retrieval accuracy. ► Averaged size distributions from the algorithm are close to that from AERONET.