CATS-ISS: Lidar Profiles of Clouds and Aerosols, 2015-2017

NASA's Cloud-Aerosol Transport System (CATS) instrument on the International Space Station collected vertical profile measurements of atmospheric aerosols and clouds from March 25, 2015 to October 29, 2017. The Level 2 Operational Night Mode product provides geophysical parameters derived from lidar data at 60m vertical and 5km horizontal resolution. CATS operated at three wavelengths, orbiting between approximately 230 and 270 miles above Earth's surface at a 51-degree inclination.

Use Cases

• Analyze vertical profiles of cloud and aerosol layers based on lidar-derived geophysical parameters
• Study diurnal changes in atmospheric effects based on observations of the same Earth location at different times
• Model aerosol transport and cloud properties based on range-resolved profile measurements
• Validate climate models using high-resolution (60m vertical, 5km horizontal) atmospheric data

Strengths

• Provides vertical profiles at three wavelengths, offering multi-spectral atmospheric data
• Data spans from March 25, 2015 to October 29, 2017, covering over two years of observations
• Offers 60m vertical and 5km horizontal resolution for detailed atmospheric profiling

Limitations

• Column-level documentation is absent; field semantics must be inferred after download
• Row count is unknown, which may limit suitability assessment
• Data collection ended in 2017; freshness should be verified for current research

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

March 25, 2015 to October 29, 2017

Freshness

Last updated 2026-03-13 08:50:29.075189; freshness should be verified

Geography

Global coverage from ISS orbit between approximately 230 and 270 miles above Earth's surface.