AIRS Water Vapor and Temperature Products

Abstract:

The Atmospheric Infrared Sounder (AIRS) was launched on the NASA Aqua spacecraft in May 2014. AIRS has subsequently provided over a decade of observations of the vertical structure of temperature, water vapor, trace gases and clouds. This talk describes some of the important scientific results obtained from the AIRS water vapor and temperature record, including unexpected physical processes, atmospheric variability over the past decade, and checks on the performance of climate models. This talk also describes some areas where AIRS could provide new insights, and the challenges of assembling a complete record of temperature and water vapor observations from satellites.