Spatial and Temporal Characteristics of Aerosols from Collection 6 Aqua and Terra MODIS e-Deep Blue Products

Abstract:

Aerosols continue to attract a significant amount of attention from researchers worldwide due to their extensive effects on Earth’s climate, ecology, public health, and even energy production. In order to truly understand these effects, a long, stable, and well-calibrated data record is required. Since 2000 and 2002, the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) instruments aboard the Terra and Aqua satellites together with the e-Deep Blue aerosol retrieval algorithm have been providing such a data record.

After a multi-year development effort, the production of both Aqua and Terra MODIS Collection 6 (C6) atmosphere products successfully completed earlier this year and the data was released to the public shortly thereafter. The C6 Deep Blue products (now enhanced Deep Blue or e-Deep Blue) have been significantly improved over the previous Collection 5.1 version.

In this poster we provide an overview of the latest C6 e-Deep Blue products and the improvements implemented since the previous collection including coverage over dark surfaces and updates to the Terra calibration. Validation results utilizing Aerosol Robotic Network (AERONET) data are also summarized. We then use the C6 e-Deep Blue products from both Aqua and Terra to explore the spatial characteristics in addition to the seasonal and inter-annual variability of aerosols on both regional and global scales. We also use this as an opportunity to compare these results and investigate any differences found between the two instruments.