Welcome to the Microwave Limb Sounder (MLS) Web Site
The Microwave Limb Sounder (MLS) experiments measure naturally-occurring microwave thermal emission from the limb (edge) of Earth's atmosphere to remotely sense vertical profiles of atmospheric gases, temperature, pressure, and cloud ice. The overall objective of these experiments is to provide information that will help improve our understanding of Earth's atmosphere and global change.
The first MLS experiment in space (UARS MLS) was on NASA's Upper Atmosphere Research Satellite (UARS) launched 12 Sept 1991. After March 1994, the UARS MLS measurements became increasingly intermittent due to conserving satellite power and the MLS scan mechanism lifetime. The last data were obtained on 25 August 2001 (for more information go to UARS MLS data). The second (EOS MLS) is on the NASA Earth Observing System (EOS) Aura mission launched 15 July 2004. EOS MLS began full-up atmospheric science observations on 13 August 2004, with excellent performance to date in all portions of the instrument. Provisional and Stage I validated data are now publicly available (for information go to EOS MLS data).
MLS upper tropospheric cloud observations at 2.5 THz and 240 GHz (average of December 2005, 2006 and 2007). The 2.5 THz measurements are sensitive to thinner, smaller particle size, clouds than the longer-wavelength 240 GHz observations. MLS shows these thinner clouds are more widespread than those seen at 240 GHz, consistent with our expectations. These observations were measured at an altitude of ~15km.
See a reprint of the publication this figure was adapted from
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