Using a CCD Camera Based Imaging Lidar to Profile Boundary Layer Aerosols and Determine Cloud Thickness

Aerosols play a key role in climate change by affecting earth's radiation budget, and by influencing cloud properties and precipitation patterns in the atmosphere [1]. Additionally, local and regional air quality is affected by natural and anthropogenic aerosols. Lidar systems are capable of measuring altitude dependent aerosol properties over continuous time spans, and thus are widely used optical remote sensing tools for atmospheric monitoring. In this study, we have utilized a CCD camera-based bistatic imaging Lidar (CLidar) to monitor spatial and temporal distributions of boundary layer aerosols in Nassau, Bahamas.