MIPclouds near real time service for RECONCILE : access to preliminary data
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ESA declares end of mission for Envisat
Just weeks after celebrating its tenth year in orbit, communication with the Envisat satellite was suddenly lost on 8 April 2012. Following rigorous attempts to re-establish contact and the investigation of failure scenarios, the end of the mission is being declared.
(more informations at: http://www.esa.int/esaCP/SEM1SXSWT1H_index_0.html)
Forschungszentrum Jülich

Cloud Information Retrieval
from MIPAS Measurements


The Forschungszentrum Jülich, Institut für Chemie und Dynamik der Geosphäre was successful with its proposal in respond to the ESA Invitation to Tender (ITT) no: AO/1-5255/06/I-OL, entitled Cloud Information Retrieval from MIPAS Measurements (Acronym: MIPclouds). As highlighted in the ITT, this study focuses on the retrieval of cloud information for MIPAS infrared limb measurements with the aims:

  1. to reveal the observational capabilities of MIPAS with respect to clouds and the retrievability of cloud parameters. For example:
    • cloud detection, coverage and occurrence frequency
    • cloud top height, temperature and extinction (CTH, CTT, CEX)
    • cloud type classification like Polar Stratospheric Cloud types (STS, NAT, Ice) and tropospheric clouds (cirrus/liquid)
    • estimates of microphysical parameters like limb ice water path and content (IWP, IWC) as well as particle radius
  2. to deliver to ESA a fast and documented prototype processor for implementation in an operational software system with near real time (NRT) capability
  3. to perform a geophysical validation of the proposed processor product parameters

In order to ensure that the objectives of the study will be fulfilled to the satisfaction of ESA, a consortium has been formed, which comprises five of Europe's leading research institutes working in the field of atmospheric remote-sensing:

  1. Forschungszentrum Jülich, IEK-7
  2. University of Karlsruhe, IMK
  3. CCLRC Rutherford Appleton Laboratory, RAL
  4. University of Oxford, OXF
  5. University of Leicester, ULE
For details on the scientific background, algorithms, and first results your are invited to download the recently published overview paper of the MIPclouds study: "Fast cloud parameter retrievals of MIPAS/Envisat" by R. Spang et al., in Atmos. Chem. Phys., 12, 7135-7164, doi:10.5194/acp-12-7135-2012, 2012.

Data access:
On the following page the prototype processor developed for the MIPAS l1b data with full spectral resolution (0.025 cm-1) has been adopted for actual NRT data of the instrument with reduced resolution (0.0625 cm-1). For the RECONCILE NRT service only a limited number of MIPclouds parameters is visualized.

Access to the preliminary data products is not restricted. However, if you like to use MIPclouds data for publications you should contact Reinhold Spang (r.spang@fz-juelich.de).

Due to the end of the Envisat mission a reprocessing of the full MIPAS data record is currently ongoing (2012/13). Access to the consolidated MIPclouds data products will be announced on this web-site in the near future.

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