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Completed TRL 3 (started at 3, targeting 3)
An aircraft instrument built at NASA Goddard Space Flight Center (GSFC) has the capabilities to measure lidar profiles of clouds and aerosols that are critical to NASA’s Earth Science focus areas. This IRAD funds the efforts required to complete modifications to this instrument, perform a trade study comparing a single multi-angle lidar and multiple SmallSat lidars, and explore cameras that can complement a SmallSat lidar.
The 2017 Earth Science Decadal Survey has outlined several missions critical to improving our understanding of the Earth’s climate system. Two of these missions are Aerosol, which includes a lidar and polarimeter, and Cloud-Convection-Precipitation (CCP), which includes a radar and potentially a lidar. NASA Science Mission Directorate has specifically called for innovative instrument designs and mission implementations. GSFC has two lidar concepts that meet these categories. The first is an airborne instrument that is scalable to a free-flyer satellite. Engineering flights aboard the ER-2 have demonstrated poor performance due to issues with the telescope primary mirror. The second lidar concept is a simple backscatter lidar design for a SmallSat. To meet the lidar and polarimeter requirements of the designated Aerosol mission, compact cameras could be added to the SmallSat lidar design to potentially provide polarimeter or polarized imager data. The goals of this project are to achieve science quality data from the airborne lidar instrument and explore options for a SmallSat lidar and polarized imager/polarimeter concept for the designated Aerosol and CCP missions.
Clouds and aerosols can have numerous effects on the atmospheric radiation budget. Ice clouds cause a warming effect, while water clouds can result in a cooling effect. During cloud-free conditions, aerosols such as desert dust and smoke from biomass burning can induce a change in radiative forcing at a magnitude comparable to that of greenhouse gases but opposite the sign. Additionally, aerosol can interact with clouds, changing the radiative effects on the atmosphere. These cloud and aerosol effects on the atmospheric radiation budget remain a major uncertainty in understanding and predicting the climate system. Aerosols can also be harmful to human health (poor air quality) and volcanic aerosols can impact the economy through airline delays and cancellations. Combined lidar and polarimeter measurements from space will provide data to reduce the uncertainties in our understanding of the Earth's climate system and improve forecasts for air quality and hazardous aerosol plumes.
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