2015

'Airborne in situ vertical profiling of HDO / H216O in the subtropical troposphere during the MUSICA remote sensing validation campaign'

Publication by Dyroff et al. in AMT about airborne measurements of the 2013 campaign.

'Using XCO2 retrievals for assessing the long-term consistency of NDACC/FTIR data sets'

Publication by Barthlott et al. in AMT about assessing the quality of NDACC/FTIR data sets by means of measured and modelled XCO2 data.

'Empirical validation and proof of added value of MUSICA's tropospheric δD remote sensing products'

Publication by Schneider et al. in AMT about first results of the 2013 measurement campaign. 

Emanuel Christner successfully finishes his Phd.

The title of Emanuels thesis is: 'Messungen von Wasserisotopologen von der planetaren Grenzschicht bis zur oberen Troposphäre zur Untersuchung des hydrologischen Kreislaufs' (only available in german, abstract in english on p. 5).

2014

First global δD-maps of MUSICA MetOp/IASI data (morning overpass)

'The MUSICA MetOp/IASI H2O and δD products: characterisation and long-term comparison to NDACC/FTIR data'

Publication of Wiegele et al. in AMT about the MetOp/IASI products of MUSICA

Fig. 1: H2O-versus- δD plots for coincident FTIR and IASI measurements for the three locations. Plotted are (from the top to the bottom) the FTIR data, the IASI data, and FTIR data smoothed with the IASI averaging kernels. The colour code displays the upper 10 % and lower 10 % of δD values as identified in the FTIR data. The yellow stars mark the a priori values that are the same for FTIR and IASI.

 

2013 

Measurement Campaign around Tenerife July 2013

During a campaign above the sea near the Canary Island of Tenerife, six measurement flights have been conducted to determine the isotope composition of water vapor up to 7 km height. For this purpose, the ISOWAT diode laser spectrometer specially developed by IMK for use on aircraft has been used. This spectrometer ensures a high accuracy and temporal resolution under dry as well as under humid conditions. In parallel, measurements were carried out at 2370 and 3550 m height on Tenerife in cooperation with the Spanish weather service (AEMET). Two commercial in-situ instruments and an infrared instrument of the worldwide measurement network NDACC (Network for the Detection of Atmospheric Composition Change) were applied for this purpose. In addition, the data of the infrared instrument IASI (Infrared Atmospheric Sounding Interferometer) operated on board of the METOP European weather satellite were used. The flights of the research aircraft were coordinated with the ground-based and satellite measurements.

For details see press release.

ANR Project CONV-ISO starts (1.2.13-30.1.17) PI: Camille Risi

CONV-ISO (Studying convective and cloud processes during the MJO and evaluating their representation in climate models by combining humidity, clouds and water isotopic measurements) aims to understand why some models capture the MJO (Madden-Julian Oscillation) better than others. What processes are key to simulate the MJO? Although these questions are not new, the novelty of this proposal is to address these questions by combining humidity and cloud measurements with water vapor isotopic measurements (HDO/H2O ratio). Several studies have shown the added value of water isotopic measurements to study convective processes. More specifically for the MJO, a recent study has shown that the water stable isotopic evolution during the MJO provides a complementary information compared to the evolution of meteorological variables.

 

Projects VALIASI and NOVIA start, PI: Omaira García

VALIASI (VALidation of IASI level 2 products, supported by EUMETSAT, 1.1.13-21.12.2015) and NOVIA (towards a Near Operational Validation of IASI level 2 trace gas products, supported by Spanish Government) both will validate the IASI operational atmospheric trace gas products (Level 2): H2O and O3 profiles as well as total column amounts of H2O, O3, CH4, N2O, CO2 and CO. For this purpose trace gas data measured by the ground-based FTS (Fourier Transform Spectrometer) technique are used as reference.

2012

'Ground-based remote sensing of tropospheric water vapour isotopologues within the project MUSICA'

new publication by Schneider et al. in AMT, presenting a new method for characterising the H2O and deltaD remote sensing datasets. This method is applied for extensively characterising the water vapour isotopologue dataset produced by the ground-based remote sensing component of MUSICA.

2011

 

First optimal estimation of tropospheric H2O and δD with IASI / METOP:

Measurements of δD – a normalized expression for the ratio between two water isotopologues: HD¹⁶O/H2¹⁶O – are very promising for water cycle research but they are not trivial. In a new ACP publication it is documented that IASI aboard EUMETSAT’s polar orbiter METOP can observe tropospheric H2O profiles between the lower and upper troposphere as well as middle tropospheric δD values. This new water isotopologue retrieval is very interesting for climate research applications since IASI is an operational meteorological instrument, that offers high temporal and spatial resolution, and its operation is guaranteed between 2006 and 2020 on a series of three METOP satellites.

The new IASI products are validated by a comparison to a large number of coincident radiosonde in-situ and FTS (Fourier Transform Spectrometer) remote sensing measurements. Figure 1 shows the validation area south of Tenerife, Canary Islands, in the northern subtropical Atlantic. Figure 2 depicts the correlations between middle tropospheric H2O and δD obtained by IASI and by the Izaña ground-based FTS system on Tenerife during IASI overpasses, respectively. It is found that both data sets are rather consistent. There are no significant systematic differences between the IASI and the FTS data. Our results allow for combining both remote sensing techniques. Such combination would take benefit from both the long-term characteristics of the historic ground-based FTS observations (FTS activities date back to the 1990s at about 15 globally distributed stations) and the wide geographical coverage of the space-based IASI observations.

 
 

Figure 1: The area south of the Island of Tenerife that has been selected for the validation exercise. The cyan circles depict the individual IASI measurement pixels used in the study. The red arrows indicate the airmass detected by Izaña's ground-based FTS system and the yellow arrows the airmass typically detected by the Vaisala RS92 during the IASI morning overpasses.

Figure 2: Correlation plots between middle tropospheric H2O and δD obtained by IASI and Izaña’s ground-based FTS system, respectively. The magenta star indicates the applied a priori value.

  

April 2011:
A Picarro L2120-i water isotopologue analyzer has been purchased and is shipped to the Izaña Observatory where it will be installed and operated continuously.

February 2011:
The MUSICA project starts

January 2011:
The MUSICA grant agreement is signed by all parties