POLDER (POLarization and Directionality of the Earth's Reflectance) is a Fr
ench instrument, launched in August 1996 onboard the Japanese sun-synchrono
us ADvanced Earth Satellite System (ADEOS). Data were acquired until the lo
ss of the platform June 30th 1997. This paper describes information on the
global distribution of tropospheric aerosol over the ocean derived from the
POLDER instrument. The aerosol remote sensing algorithm yields the aerosol
optical thickness at 0.865 mu m, tau and the Angstrom exponent, alpha, whi
ch allows the retrieval the aerosol sizes. Monthly synthesis of the global
aerosol characteristics over the ocean are presented and described here for
three months: November 1996, February, and May 1997. The major and most pe
rsistent feature is the Saharan dust outbreaks off West Africa. Biomass bur
ning aerosols are observed during May off the western Mexican Coast and dur
ing November in Madagascar, Asian, Indonesian and eastern US pollution are
also observed. For some of these areas; statistical distributions of tau an
d alpha and their spatial variability are discussed.