Active Raman sounding of the earth's water vapor field.

The typically weak cross-sections characteristic of Raman processes has historically limited their use in atmospheric remote sensing to nighttime application. However, with advances in instrumentation and techniques, it is now possible to apply Raman lidar to the monitoring of atmospheric water vapor, aerosols and clouds throughout the diurnal cycle. Upper tropospheric and lower stratospheric measurements of water vapor using Raman lidar are also possible but are limited to nighttime and require long integration times. However, boundary layer studies of water vapor variability can now be performed with high temporal and spatial resolution. This paper will review the current state-of-the-art of Raman lidar for high-resolution measurements of the atmospheric water vapor, aerosol and cloud fields. In particular, we describe the use of Raman lidar for mapping the vertical distribution and variability of atmospheric water vapor, aerosols and clouds throughout the evolution of dynamic meteorological events. The ability of Raman lidar to detect and characterize water in the region of the tropopause and the importance of high-altitude water vapor for climate-related studies and meteorological satellite performance are discussed.

GLITTER: new lidar technique for cloud-base altimetry. Description and initial aircraft measurements.

Knowledge of cloud-base heights is important for climate studies, weather, and military operations. Conventional lidar methods monitor cloud depths by direct transmission of the beam through the cloud and sensing the backscattered returns. These techniques are limited by severe optical scattering by cloud particles to thickness <0.5 km. We have conceived of a novel lidar method measurement for thick-cloud-base altimetry from above that is not restricted by cloud scattering. The new method, known as GLITTER (an acronym for glimpses of the lidar images through the empty regions), relies on cloud porosity and diffuse reflection from land features to sense cloud bottoms. An aircraft GLITTER lidar measured cloud bases at 3.7- and 4.5-km altitudes. These initial results represent a proof-of-principle demonstration of the new lidar method.