SPALINET: The Spanish and Portuguese Aerosol Lidar Network ,

In Spain, the Department of Signal and Communications Theory (TSC) of the Technical University of Catalonia (UPC) has been developing pulsed elastic lidar systems since 1993 (Rocadenbosch, 1996; Rocadenbosch et al., 1997; 2002) within the projects of the National Research and Development Plan TIC93-0431, AMB96-1144-C02, TIC99-1050-C03-01 and REN2000-1754-C02, and the project EVR1-CT-1999-40003 (EARLINET) of the European Union’s Fifth Framework Programme of Research and Technological Development. The current lidar station of the Lidar Group of the UPC’s TSC Department has been able to consolidate itself in the European lidar network EARLINET (European Aerosol Research Lidar Network to Establish an Aerosol Climatology) since its establishment in February 2000 (Bösenberg et al., 2001; Matthias and Bösenberg, 2002) as a project of the European Union’s Fifth Framework Programme of Research and Technological Development (contract nº EVR1-CT-1999-40003). EARLINET pools the efforts of more than twenty lidar stations and its goal is to establish, on the basis of regular, coordinated operation, statistical databases on a continental scale to quantify the biogenic and anthropogenic emissions of aerosols and their climatic and environmental impact.

In order to give continuity to the activities initiated within the Fifth Framework Programme project, in July 2004 EARLINET was founded as a voluntary association of research institutions with a specific interest in research into atmospheric aerosols. The EARLINET association is currently composed of the majority of teams and institutions that participated in the Fifth Framework Programme project, plus other institutions that have joined since it was founded. The teams of three member groups of SPALINET (the lidar groups of the UPC’s TSC Dept, of the Energy, Environmental and Technological Research Centre of Madrid and of the Applied Physics Dept. of the University of Granada) are members of the association.

In order to extend and reinforce the action of the EARLINET association as an leading instrument of observation in the worldwide field in the determination of the spatio-temporal distribution of aerosols on a continental scale, the association proposed the project “European Aerosol Research Lidar Network: Advanced Sustainable Observation System (EARLINET-ASOS)” in the form of a Co-ordination Action within the European Union’s VI Framework Programme of Research and Technological Development. This Co-ordination Action, with a duration of five years, was evaluated favourably and formally commenced on 1 March, 2006 (contract nº 025991 (RICA) EARLINETASOS).

The detailed goals of EARLINET-ASOS comprise:

• Improved operation of the lidar instruments to stimulate the study of processes relating to aerosols.
• Validation of satellite data.
• Development of models and their validations.
• Assimilation of data on aerosols in operative models.
• Construction of an exhaustive climatology of the distribution of aerosols.
• Promoting the development of global observation networks of the vertical distribution of aerosols.
• Fixing standards for instruments, methodology and organisation between groups.

To achieve these goals, the following actions have been defined:

• Exchange of knowledge
• Quality control
• Optimisation of instruments
• Optimisation of data processing
• Construction and handling of the database

SPALINET proposes to achieve the scientific goals described below in the section Scientific goals.

References:

• Bösenberg, J., Ansmann, A., Baldasano, J. M., Balis, D., Böckmann, C., Calpini, B., Chaikovsky, A., Flamant, P., Hagard, A., Mitev, V., Papayannis, A., Pelon, J., Resendes, D., Schneider, J., Spinelli, N., Trickl, T., Vaughan, G., Visconti, G., and Wiegner, M.: 2001, EARLINET: A European aerosol research lidar network, in Advances in Laser Remote Sensing, Ecole Polytechnique, Palaiseau, pp. 155-158.
• Matthias, V., and Bösenberg, J.: 2002, Aerosol climatology for the planetary boundary layer derived from regular lidar measurements, Atmos. Res. 63, 221-245.
• Rocadenbosch, F.: 1996, Lidar Sensing of the Atmosphere: Receiver Design and Inversion Algorithms for an Elastic System. Tesis doctoral. Dep. Teoría de la Señal y Comunicaciones, Universidad Politècnica de Catalunya, UPC.
• Rocadenbosch, F.; Puente, C., Comerón, A., Lansac. A, Fábregas, X., and Rodríguez, A.: 1997, Sistema lidar elástico incoherente elástico para sondeo de la atmósfera, Actas del XII Symposium Nacional de la URSI, Bilbao, 15-17 Septiembre 1997, 597-600. Vol. 2.
• Rocadenbosch, F., Sicard, M., Comerón, A., Baldasano, J. M., Rodríguez, A., Agishev, R., Muñoz, C., López, M. A., and García-Vizcaino, D.: 2002, The UPC scanning Raman lidar: an engineering overview, in Proceedings of 21st International Laser Radar Conference, Defence R& D – Valcartier, Val-Bélair, pp. 69-70.