First results: ERIM elastic backscatter lidar

The Environmental Research Institute of Michigan (ERIM) has developed a simple elastic backscatter lidar system using multiple aperture incoherent detection to study radiative properties of clouds and aerosols. The capabilities of the system are elastic backscatter measurement of cloud height, aerosol spatial density distribution, atmospheric mixed layer height and optical thickness of thin aerosol and cloud layers. The ERIM lidar system utilizes an Nd:YAG laser and collects return signal using a several aperture telescope array to demonstrate the concept of multiple aperture incoherent detection. Initial tropospheric measurements of clouds and aerosols made with the system are presented.© (1996) COPYRIGHT SPIE--The International Society for Optical Engineering. Downloading of the abstract is permitted for personal use only.