Refinement of calipso aerosol retrieval models through analysis of airborne high spectral resolution lidar data

The deepening of scientific understanding of atmospheric aerosols figures substantially into stated goals for climate change research and a variety of internationally collaborative earth observation missions. One such mission is the joint NASA/Centre National d'Etudes Spatiales (CNES) Cloud-Aerosol Lidar and Infrared Pathfinder Satellite Observations (CALIPSO) mission, whose primary instrument is the Cloud-Aerosol LIdar with Orthogonal Polarization (CALIOP), a spaceborne two-wavelength, elastic-scatter lidar, which has been making continuous, global observations of atmospheric aerosols and clouds since June of 2006, shortly after its launch in April of the same year.;The work presented in this dissertation consists of the development of an aerosol retrieval strategy to improve aerosol retrievals from lidar data from the CALIPSO mission, as well as a comprehensive formulation of accompanying aerosol models based on a thorough analysis of data from an airborne High Spectral Resolution Lidar (HSRL) instrument. The retrieval methodology, known as the Constrained Ratio Aerosol Model-fit (CRAM) technique, is a means of exploiting the available dual-wavelength information from CALIOP to constrain the possible solutions to the problem of aerosol retrieval from elastic-scatter lidar so as to be consistent with theoretically or empirically known aerosol models. Constraints applied via CRAM are manifested in spectral ratios of scattering parameters corresponding to observationally-based aerosol models. Consequently, accurate and representative models incorporating various spectral scattering parameters are instrumental to the successful implementation of a methodology like CRAM.;The aerosol models arising from this work are derived from measurements made by the NASA Langley Research Center (LaRC) airborne HSRL instrument, which has the capability to measure both aerosol scattering parameters (i.e., backscatter and extinction) independently at 532 nm. The instrument also incorporates an elastic-scatter channel at 1064 nm, facilitating the incorporation of dual-wavelength information by way of particular constraints. The intent in developing these new models is to furnish as satisfactory a basis as possible for retrieval techniques such as CRAM, whose approach to the problem of aerosol retrieval attempts to make optimal use of the available spectral information from multi-wavelength lidar, thus providing a framework for improving aerosol retrievals from CALIPSO and furthering the scientific goals related to atmospheric aerosols.