Comparison of ILAS and MkIV profiles of atmospheric trace gases measured above Alaska in May 1997 : Improved limb atmospheric spectrometer (ILAS)

[i] Vertical profiles of the gases O 3 , HNO 3 , NO 2 , N 2 O, H 2 O, and CH 4 , measured above Fairbanks, Alaska, during a May 1997 balloon flight of the JPL MkIV interferometer are compared with version 5.20 profiles measured by the ILAS instrument on board the ADEOS satellite. Both the ILAS and MkIV instruments employ the solar occultation technique, and for many of these gases, use the same absorption bands in their analyses. The results show good agreement for nearly all of these gases, after taking into account the slight differences in the potential vorticities of the sampled air masses and considering the error bars on the measurements.