ATMOSPHERIC AEROSOL-CLOUD-STABILITY RELATIONSHIP AS OBSERVED WITH OPTICAL AND RADIO REMOTE-SENSING TECHNIQUES

Atmospheric aerosol characteristics are being monitored, on a routine basis, with lidars and spectroradiometer since 1985 and 1992, respecti vely, at the Indian Institute of Tropical Meteorology, Pune (18 degree s 32'N, 73 degrees 51'E, 559 m AMSL), a tropical Indian urban station. The lidar-derived nocturnal atmospheric structures, transport of surf ace-generated aerosols (pollutants) and their participation in the for mation of clouds and their time evolution in the planetary boundary la yer (PBL) are studied in relation to the local diabatic conditions and height-integrated relative humidity (RH) inferred from radiometersond e and pilot balloon (pibal) observations. This paper mainly addresses (i) how the integrated Lidar, spectroradiometer and coincident aeromet ric data can be used to delineate the atmospheric structure and transp ort mechanisms, and (ii) the extent to which the lidar observations du ring different atmospheric conditions can be useful to explain the phe nomenon of cloud scavenging of aerosols over the experimental station. (C) 1998 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.