| We explore the potential aerosol impact on cloud optical properties which is a strong modifier of climate forcing. Previous studies have shown that increased aerosol loading can affect the cloud optical properties such as cloud optical depth and cloud droplet effective radius in rural areas, particularly at the Atmospheric Radiation Measurement, Southern Great Plain site. In this study, we attempt to observe and quantify aerosol-cloud interaction over New York City, using a combination of passive and active radiometric sensors. In particular, we look for signatures of the Twomey indirect effect which states that the droplet size of water phase clouds will decrease with increasing aerosols.;We find that under certain conditions, a strong signature is found between the cloud drop effective radius and extinction and this effect is in part due to vertical wind uptake. In demonstrating the Aerosol Cloud Interaction, we use multiple approaches. For example, we derive the integrated liquid water path using both a multiband neural network and dual channel approach and show general agreement between two methods while the DC approach seems more robust.;We also find that these measurements are difficult and sensitive to the position of the aerosols relative to the cloud base. As a corollary, we explore whether near surface aerosol loading can effecting the cloud by using particulate matter (PM2.5) and find that the effects are too variable to be given any statistical weight. Finally, we explore the potential of modifying our approach to remove the noisy and difficult measurement of Raman LIDAR derived extinction with calibrated LIDAR backscatter. The results seem to show a general improvement in correlation and offer the possibility of increasing the number of cases observed. |
