The Joint Aeolus Tropical Atlantic Campaign (JATAC) (AMT/ACP inter-journal SI)(AMT/ACP inter-journal SI)
The Joint Aeolus Tropical Atlantic Campaign (JATAC) (AMT/ACP inter-journal SI)(AMT/ACP inter-journal SI)
Editor(s): Thorsten Fehr (European Space Agency, France), Vassilis Amiridis (National Observatory of Athens, Greece), Cyrille Flamant (French National Centre for Scientific Research, France), Eleni Marinou (National Observatory of Athens, Greece), Harri Kokkola (Finnish Meteorological Institute, Finland), Marco Gaetani (Istituto Universitario di Studi Superiori di Pavia, Italy), and Oleg Dubovik (French National Centre for Scientific Research, France) Special issue jointly organized between Atmospheric Measurement Techniques and Atmospheric Chemistry and Physics

The Joint Aeolus Tropical Atlantic Campaign (JATAC) used ground-based, aircraft, and balloon measurements to validate data provided by ESA's Aeolus satellite and support related science activities on the interaction of wind, dust, and clouds. ESA’s Aeolus satellite observations are expected to have the biggest impact on the improvement of numerical weather prediction in the tropics. An important case relating to the predictability of tropical weather systems is the outflow of Saharan dust, its interaction with cloud microphysics, and its impact on the development of tropical storms over the Atlantic Ocean. JATAC, deployed over Cabo Verde (2021–2022) and the US Virgin Islands (2021), supported the validation and preparation of the ESA Aeolus, EarthCARE, and WIVERN missions. It also addressed science objectives regarding the Saharan aerosol layer, the African easterly waves and jet, the tropical easterly jet, and the Intertropical Convergence Zone (including their relation to the formation of convective systems) as well as the long-range transport of dust and its impact on air quality.

This special issue (SI) collects the studies that utilized the synergy of remote sensing, surface-based, and airborne observations to address the satellite validation objectives and spatio-temporal representativeness of the different atmospheric measurement techniques. The SI studies bring together different observations from the individual ground-based and airborne campaign activities that have taken place in the frame of JATAC, to demonstrate the added value of the synergistic use of different measurements and platforms to address open science questions related to dynamics and the interactions of aerosols with clouds and radiation.

Review process: This inter-journal special issue co-lists papers of different journals. Thereby, each paper was submitted to 1 particular journal and underwent the regular interactive peer-review process of that journal. Depending on the journal, the peer review was handled by regular members of the editorial board and/or by guest editors designated by the journal’s chief/executive editors.

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30 Apr 2024
Tropospheric sulfate from Cumbre Vieja (La Palma) observed over Cabo Verde contrasted with background conditions: a lidar case study of aerosol extinction, backscatter, depolarization and lidar ratio profiles at 355, 532 and 1064 nm
Henriette Gebauer, Athena Augusta Floutsi, Moritz Haarig, Martin Radenz, Ronny Engelmann, Dietrich Althausen, Annett Skupin, Albert Ansmann, Cordula Zenk, and Holger Baars
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 24, 5047–5067, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-24-5047-2024,https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-24-5047-2024, 2024
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26 Jan 2024
Validation of Aeolus L2B products over the tropical Atlantic using radiosondes
Maurus Borne, Peter Knippertz, Martin Weissmann, Benjamin Witschas, Cyrille Flamant, Rosimar Rios-Berrios, and Peter Veals
Atmos. Meas. Tech., 17, 561–581, https://doi.org/10.5194/amt-17-561-2024,https://doi.org/10.5194/amt-17-561-2024, 2024
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08 Dec 2022
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Validation of the Aeolus L2B wind product with airborne wind lidar measurements in the polar North Atlantic region and in the tropics
Benjamin Witschas, Christian Lemmerz, Alexander Geiß, Oliver Lux, Uwe Marksteiner, Stephan Rahm, Oliver Reitebuch, Andreas Schäfler, and Fabian Weiler
Atmos. Meas. Tech., 15, 7049–7070, https://doi.org/10.5194/amt-15-7049-2022,https://doi.org/10.5194/amt-15-7049-2022, 2022
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11 Nov 2022
Quality control and error assessment of the Aeolus L2B wind results from the Joint Aeolus Tropical Atlantic Campaign
Oliver Lux, Benjamin Witschas, Alexander Geiß, Christian Lemmerz, Fabian Weiler, Uwe Marksteiner, Stephan Rahm, Andreas Schäfler, and Oliver Reitebuch
Atmos. Meas. Tech., 15, 6467–6488, https://doi.org/10.5194/amt-15-6467-2022,https://doi.org/10.5194/amt-15-6467-2022, 2022
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