Mineral dust aerosols concentrations data

Global 3D distributions of dust particles

Desert dust particles are uplifted from bare area by strong winds. They may travel up to thousands of kilometers, for example from North Africa across the Mediterranean Sea to Europe.

Dust particles influence the climate

• directly by modifying the energy balance (cooling or heating, depending on the conditions)
• indirectly through an effect on wind patterns, clouds and rain.

These effects still bear large uncertainties and depend on the 3D distribution of the particles in the air.

At BIRA-IASB we use satellite data to obtain, for the first time, global 3D distributions of dust particles.

We use the data gathered by the Infrared Atmospheric Sounding Interferometer (IASI) onboard the EUMETSAT Metop satellite series since end 2006. IASI provides a high-resolution spectrum of the Earth-emitted (surface and atmosphere) radiations and reflected solar radiations from 3.62µm to 15.5µm.

To obtain dust 3D distributions we use the Thermal Infrared (TIR) part of that spectrum, with only Earth-emitted radiations. We even only use a part of the TIR where the atmospheric gases have a very low impact: around 9µm and 11µm. There, only clouds and certain types of particles (dust and ash) have a significant impact on the outgoing radiation.

Aerosols retrieval algorithm (MAPIR) and data

Our dust aerosols retrieval algorithm is called Mineral Aerosol Profiling from Infrared Radiation (MAPIR).

It provides the vertical profile of the dust aerosols concentration for each cloud-free IASI spectrum / pixel. The product also contains the integrated Aerosol Optical Depth (AOD) at 10µm and the value converted at 550nm. Finally, averaging kernels and uncertainty are available. Please read the user document before using the data (see in the table below).

The last version currently available is MAPIR v4.1. A full reprocessing was undertaken with a new algorithm version 5.1 and the data will be soon available here.

We are also working with EUMETSAT and the Atmospheric Composition Satellite Application Facility (AC-SAF) on a Near Real Time delivery, but it will take time.

Contact: Sophie Vandenbussche
E-mail: sophie (at) vandenbussche (at) aeronomie (dot) be

For use of the data, please cite both the algorithm paper and the data set, corresponding to the chosen data version:

• Paper version 4.1: Callewaert, S., Vandenbussche, S., Kumps, N., Kylling, A., Shang, X., Komppula, M., Goloub, P., and De Mazière, M.: The Mineral Aerosol Profiling from Infrared Radiances (MAPIR) algorithm: version 4.1 description and evaluation, Atmos. Meas. Tech., https://doi.org/10.5194/amt-12-3673-2019, 2019.
• Data version 4.1: Vandenbussche, S., Callewaert, S., & De Mazière, M. (2020). Vertical Profiles of Mineral Dust Aerosols from IASI (MAPIR algorithm version 4.1) [Data set]. Royal Belgian Institute for Space Aeronomy (BIRA-IASB), Brussels, Belgium. https://doi.org/10.18758/71021068

Additional data

The IASI dust aerosol product is also available through the Copernicus Climate Data Store, in a limited version containing the dust AOD and the dust mean altitude as daily and monthly averages (level 3 data).

 To access that product:

• go to the "download data" section,
• find the algorithm subsection,
• select "MAPIR (Mineral Aerosol Profiling from thermal Infrared Radiances)"
• only then the other selections compatible with that choice will be available.

Important notes:

• in the "orbit" tag: "ascending" means the local evening (21h30 local solar time), while "descending" means the local morning (9h30 local solar time)
• in the "version" tag: all old versions are still available. However, we advise users to only use version 4.1 or version 5.1.

 The interested user will also see other dust aerosols products in the Climate Data Store.

References

Algorithm and validation

• Callewaert, S., Vandenbussche, S., Kumps, N., Kylling, A., Shang, X., Komppula, M., Goloub, P., and De Mazière, M.: The Mineral Aerosol Profiling from Infrared Radiances (MAPIR) algorithm: version 4.1 description and evaluation, Atmos. Meas. Tech.,https://doi.org/10.5194/amt-12-3673-2019, 2019.
  
  
• Kylling, A., Vandenbussche, S., Capelle, V., Cuesta, J., Klüser, L., Lelli, L., Popp, T., Stebel, K., and Veefkind, P.: Comparison of dust-layer heights from active and passive satellite sensors, Atmos. Meas., 11, 2911-2936, https://doi.org/10.5194/amt-11-2911-2018, 2018.
  
  
• Popp, T.; De Leeuw, G.; Bingen, C.; Brühl, C.; Capelle, V.; Chedin, A.; Clarisse, L.; Dubovik, O.; Grainger, R.; Griesfeller, J.; Heckel, A.; Kinne, S.; Klüser, L.; Kosmale, M.; Kolmonen, P.; Lelli, L.; Litvinov, P.; Mei, L.; North, P.; Pinnock, S.; Povey, A.; Robert, C.; Schulz, M.; Sogacheva, L.; Stebel, K.; Stein Zweers, D.; Thomas, G.; Tilstra, L.G.; Vandenbussche, S.; Veefkind, P.; Vountas, M.; Xue, Y.: Development, Production and Evaluation of Aerosol Climate Data Records from European Satellite Observations (Aerosol_cci). Remote Sens., 8, 421, https://www.mdpi.com/2072-4292/8/5/421, 2016.
  
  
• Vandenbussche, S., Kochenova, S., Vandaele, A. C., Kumps, N., and De Mazière, M.: Retrieval of desert dust aerosol vertical profiles from IASI measurements in the TIR atmospheric window, Atmos. Meas. Tech., 6, 2577-2591, https://doi.org/10.5194/amt-6-2577-2013, 2013.
  
  

Data exploitation

• Vandenbussche, S. and De Mazière, M.: African mineral dust sources: a combined analysis based on 3D dust aerosols distributions, winds and surface parameters, Atmos. Chem. Phys. Discuss., https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-2017-809, 2017.

Funding acknowledgements

For the algorithm developments

• Belgian Science Policy (Belspo) Supplementary Researcher's Program
• European Space Agency (ESA) Climate Change Initiative (CCI) phase 2 aerosols project
• Belgian Science Policy (Belspo) / European Space Agency (ESA) PRODEX program under the IASI.flow project phases 2 and 3, and HIRS project
• European Commission (EC) Horizon 2020 (H2020) European Natural Airborne Disaster Information and Coordination System for Aviation (EUNADICS-AV)

For the data processing

• European Center for Medium-Range Weather Forecast (ECMWF) Copernicus Climate Change Services (C3S) 312a Lot5 Aerosols
• European Center for Medium-Range Weather Forecast (ECMWF) Copernicus Climate Change Services (C3S) 312b Lot2 Atmospheric Composition
• European Center for Medium-Range Weather Forecast (ECMWF) Copernicus Climate Change Services 2 (C3S2) 312a Lot2 Atmospheric Composition

For the data exploitation

• European Space Agency (ESA) Living Planet Fellowship (LPF) project called "A new method for assessing mineral dust sources using vertical profile information retrieved from IASI radiances" (MIDUSO)