CATS-ISS: Night Mode Lidar Profiles of Clouds and Aerosols

NASA's Cloud-Aerosol Transport System (CATS) instrument on the International Space Station collected calibrated lidar profile data from February 10, 2015 to March 21, 2015. The instrument orbited between approximately 230 and 270 miles above Earth's surface, providing vertical profiles at three wavelengths. This Level 1B data product enabled the first study of diurnal changes in cloud and aerosol effects from space.

Use Cases

• Analyzing diurnal changes in cloud properties based on the instrument's ability to observe the same spot at different times.
• Studying vertical profiles of aerosol backscatter based on the lidar's three wavelength measurements.
• Modeling atmospheric transport phenomena based on the calibrated, range-resolved profile data.
• Investigating cloud-aerosol interactions based on the annotated meteorological data.

Strengths

• Data collection spans a specific period from February 10, 2015 to March 21, 2015.
• Provides vertical profiles at three wavelengths, a feature mentioned in the description.
• Calibrated and annotated with ancillary meteorological data.

Limitations

• Row count is unknown, which may limit suitability assessment.
• Column-level documentation is absent; field semantics must be inferred after download.
• The temporal coverage is limited to approximately 40 days in 2015.

Provenance

Source

National Aeronautics and Space Administration

Collection Method

Data gathered by the Cloud-Aerosol Transport System (CATS) lidar instrument on the International Space Station.

Time Range

February 10, 2015 through March 21, 2015

Freshness

Last updated 2026-03-13 08:57:11.675530; freshness should be verified.

Geography

Global coverage from the ISS orbit between ~230 and ~270 miles above Earth's surface at a 51-degree inclination.