CALIPSO Lidar: Vertical Feature Mask and Atmospheric Profiles

Data collection began on April 28, 2006, and is ongoing, with multiple product versions covering different periods. This dataset comprises multiple lidar data products from the CALIPSO satellite mission, a joint NASA and CNES project, designed to study the impact of clouds and aerosols on Earth's climate. The data includes vertical feature masks, aerosol and cloud layer profiles, and derived monthly gridded products, with measurements from the CALIOP, IIR, and WFC instruments.

Use Cases

• Studying vertical distribution of aerosols and clouds based on the Vertical Feature Mask (VFM) product.
• Analyzing monthly mean profiles of aerosol extinction and optical depth from Level 3 tropospheric aerosol data.
• Investigating blowing snow distribution over polar regions using the Antarctica and Greenland blowing snow products.
• Retrieving cloud emissivity and particle data from co-located IIR instrument measurements.
• Validating climate models with calibrated, geolocated lidar backscatter and depolarization ratio profiles from Level 1B data.

Strengths

• Provides long-term, continuous global observations since the satellite's launch on April 28, 2006.
• Offers high vertical resolution data from active lidar, including single-shot profiles at 532 nm and 1064 nm.
• Includes data from a multi-instrument platform (CALIOP lidar, IIR radiometer, WFC camera) enabling coincident Earth observations.
• Features multiple data processing levels (L1B calibrated profiles, L2 layer products, L3 monthly gridded averages) for varied research needs.

Limitations

• Specific row counts, file sizes, and detailed column schemas are not provided in the source metadata.
• There are version conflicts and temporal gaps; for example, V4.20 product generation ended on July 1, 2020, and V4.21 covers from that date, but coverage end dates for some products are unclear or conflicting.
• The license is generically listed as 'other-license-specified' without explicit terms, requiring users to seek clarification.

Provenance

Source

National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) and the French Centre National d'Études Spatiales (CNES).

Collection Method

Data collected by the CALIPSO satellite's Cloud-Aerosol Lidar with Orthogonal Polarization (CALIOP), Imaging Infrared Radiometer (IIR), and Wide Field Camera (WFC) instruments.

Time Range

2006-04-28 to present (ongoing for some products, while others are complete).

Freshness

The most recent platform update was on 2026-04-10, though this may be a system timestamp rather than data update.

Geography

Global coverage.