Cirrus Clouds and Polarimetric lidar

Cirrus clouds are an important part of the climate system because of their contribution to radiative forcing. The prevalence of cirrus at southern hemisphere locations is being determined to improve the accuracy of radiative forcing calculations.

Our lidar at Buckland Park will have a receiving channel that measures the change in polarisation caused by the scatterer and this is able to distinguish liquid water from ice.

Satellite-based lidar measurements have given anomalously low depolarisation measurements. It is believed that this is due to alignment of plate shaped ice crystals with the zenith-directed backscatter being mainly off the broad crystal faces. We will test this explanation by ground based observation at Buckland Park.

Student Projects available!! Contact A/Prof Murray Hamilton.

Personnel

A/Prof Murray Hamilton
Dr David Ottaway
Mr Simon Curtis