Field Campaigns and related validation activities:
Current field campaigns
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Rain In Cumulus over the Ocean (RICO):
Antigua and Barbuda, November 1, 2004 - February 1, 2005 |
The scientific objectives of the RICO campaign include measurements of precipitation in trade wind cumulus, microphysics of the transition to a mature rainshaft, organization of trade wind cumulus, and hte wind cloud environment. MISR's mission objectives involve providing information on cloud cover, cloud-tracked winds, stereo-derived cloud-top altitude, and cloud geometric thickness.
MISR is supporting the campaign through daily aquisitions including Local Mode aquisitions, and special subsets for the campaign region. |
MISR's RICO Overview Page
RICO Web page |
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Unified Aerosol Experiment (UAE2):
United Arab Emirates, August 9 - September 30, 2004 |
NASA, the United Arab Emirates (UAE) Department of Water Resources Studies, and 20 other US and foreign research laboratories have embarked on a measurement campaign, Unified Aerosol Experiment United Arab Emirates, (UAE2), to gain insight on the properties and concentrations of aerosols in the gulf region and understand how these aerosols might affect climate change. Objectives of the campaign include:
1. Evaluate and improve satellite aerosol optical depth and ocean products commonly used by the scientific community;
2. Determine the fundamental microphysical, optical and transport properties of aerosol particles in this mostly un-sampled region, and;
3. Increase understanding of aerosol particle interaction with the regional radiation budget in bright-surfaced locations.
MISR is supporting the campaign through daily aquisitions including Local Mode aquisitions, subsets for the campaign region, and the production of new regional aerosol retrievals and dust optical models. |
MISR's UAE2 Overview Page
Link to the UAE2 Home Page
Link to MISR UAE2 Local Mode and Coverage information |
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International Consortium for Atmospheric Research on Transport and Transformation (ICARTT 2004):
North Atlantic, Summer 2004 |
The International Consortium for Atmospheric Research on Transport and Transformation (ICARTT) utilizes the synergy between several coordinated experiments to study the emissions of aerosols and ozone precursors, their chemical transformations and removal during transport to and over the North Atlantic. The capabilities represented by the consortium allow for unprecedented characterization of key atmospheric processes. The combined research conducted in the programs that make up ICARTT focus on three main areas: regional air quality, intercontinental transport, and radiation balance in the atmosphere.
MISR is supporting the campaign through daily aquisitions including Local Mode aquisitions. |
MISR's ICARTT Overview Page
ICARTT 2004 Web Page
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2003 Field campaigns
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| 2003 Eastern US AirMISR Deployments |
| Co-incident MISR and AirMISR data sets were acquired over the Howland Forest Study Site on August 28 (as part of a suite of airborne and ground-based measurements), over the Harvard Forest Study Site on August 24, over the Bartlett Experimental Forest on August 24, over the Chesapeake Bay/Smithsonian site on August 20, and over the Morgan Monroe State Forest on August 19. |
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Link to Campaign PDF file for coincident MISR-AirMISR data (current to 12-2003).
Link to AirMISR data sets at the NASA-Langley Atmospheric Sciences Data Center.
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Field campaigns 2002 - 1999
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| AirMISR Deployments 2000 - 2002 |
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There were approximately 5 AirMISR deployments per year between 2000 and 2002.
The flights were spread throughout the year, and included a mix
of experimental objectives. The experiment locations were chosen to support
studies on vicarious calibration (uniform desert targets), aerosol studies
over dark water, and non-homogeneous urban areas, vegetation sites, and
clouds. Schedule changes took place as weather
conditions and coordination dictated. |
| Link to Campaign PDF File |
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| Chesapeake Lighthouse & Aircraft Measurements for Satellites (CLAMS), July 10 - August 2, 2001 |
The collection of simultaneous satellite, aircraft and surface instrument observations during this campaign provided one opportunity to meet one of MISR's key validation goals. MISR participated in the CLAMS field campaign for the purpose of testing multi-angle aerosol retrieval approaches over dark water. |
| Link to CLAMS Home Page |
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| Harvard Forest Field Validation Campaign, 1- 8 August, 2001 |
Collection of simultaneous satellite, aircraft, and surface instrument observations provided an opportunity to meet one of MISR's key validation goals. |
Link to NASA-GSFC Press Release on this validation campaign |
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| Safari 2000: South Africa, August/September 2000 |
| The Safari 2000 field campaign objectives were to understand between the surface and the atmosphere over southern Africa, to characterize natural and manmade emissions and to trace the flow of polluting emissions. MISR provided support for these objectives with a field base station and simultaneous MISR-AirMISR measurements. These instruments complement each other through their varying spatial resolution, length-of-stay at a given location, and time between observations. The field operations measured two areas in great detail, on a continuous basis for several weeks. Two distinct environments -- a large salt playa in the desert at Sua Pan, Botswana, and the Skukuza savannah area near Kruger National Park, South Africa. The desert environment allows aerosol particules to be measured over a relatively homogeneous surface (useful when attempting to decouple the surface and atmospheric signals), and a savannah environment helps to verify MISR observations over a complex surface. |
MISR's Safari Overview Page
Link to Safari 2000 Home Page |
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| Cloud and radiation study over ARM site: Oklahoma, Feb/ Mar 2000 |
| The Department of Energy Atmospheric Radiation Measurement (ARM) program observes the vertical profile of clouds as they advect over a ground site. ARM radars and lidars are used in validating MISR cloud retrievals. Such radars and lidars provide a time-height picture of cloud events, whereas MISR produces an essentially instantaneous (horizontal) view of clouds over a larger area around the study site.
In order to learn how to extrapolate the ARM time-height data to larger regions, the ARM program deployed a fleet of vertically pointing and scanning lidars and millimeter radars within a mesoscale region around the ARM Central Facility (CF) during February and March 2000. The measured data permitted analysis of the correlation of cloud properties on various spatial scales.
Instrumentation included:
- Scanning millimeter radar at the CF.
- Scanning lidar at the CF.
- 3 to 6 vertically-pointing millimeter radars for deployment around the CF.
- AERIs, other NFOV IR radiometers, microwave radiometers, surface met and shadowband radiometers at the additional radar sites.
- In-situ aircraft (UND Citation, UAV?).
- ER-2 with MAS (or MASTER), S-HIS, CLS (lidar) and AirMISR.
MISR objectives for this experiment were to:
1. Evaluate MISR observed radiances, albedo and cloud top height retrievals using AirMISR and ARM data. The evaluation takes direct comparison of observed radiances between MISR and AirMISR and simulations based on combined ground-based and in situ measured cloud properties (similar methods are used in FIRE-ACE).
2. Relate variability in MISR and AirMISR observed cloud fields with properties observed by several radars. |
| Link to ARM Cloud IOP page |
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| Fire & Smoke, Lake Tahoe, California, October 1999 |
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An experiment involving AirMISR and ground observations has been conducted for
Lake Tahoe. Coincident flight and surface data acquisitions were
made on two days: October 19 and 21. The objective was to obtain multiangle
observations of biomass smoke over deep waters of the lake, this in support
of MISR algorithm validation for recovery of aerosols over deep clear water.
Although skies were crystal clear, an otherwise excellent data set was
acquired by AirMISR on Tuesday, October 19th. The second flight imaged the
target through scattered clouds. |
| Link to Experiment Summary Report |
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KONVEX experiment: Konza Prairie, Kansas, July 1999 |
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The MISR validation team participated in
KONVEX (KONza Validation
EXperiment)
during the week of 11-18 July, 1999. The MISR team made continual sunphotometer
observations during the week from its Reagan, Cimel, and MFRSR instruments.
Radiance samples covering both the upwelling and downwelling hemispheres were
acquired using the PARABOLA III. |
| Link to Experiment Summary Report |
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Dark ocean: Marina, California, June 1999 |
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On June 29 and 30, 1999, the ER-2 flew various flight lines, and acquired
AirMISR and MODIS Airborne Simulator (MAS) images. These data will be
used by the MISR science team to validate aerosol retrieval techniques by
comparing results from the AirMISR data with those derived from the
surface-based observations.
The stated purpose of this experiment (for MISR) was to examine variations
in marine stratus cloud structure and their effect on the scattered radiances
and MISR retrievals of cloud albedo. |
| Link to Experiment Summary Report |
