Observation of tropospheric NO2 by airborne multi-axis differential optical absorption spectroscopy in the Pearl River Delta region, south China

• Published in: 中国物理B：英文版 2014-09 (9), p.247-251
• Main Author: 徐晋 谢品华 司福祺 李昂 吴丰成 王杨 刘建国 刘文清 Andreas Hartl Chan Ka Lok
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: NO2; 中国南部; 多轴; 对流层; 差分吸收光谱法; 珠三角地区; 珠江三角洲地区; 空气传播
• ISSN: 1674-1056; 2058-3834
• DOI: 10.1088/1674-1056/23/9/094210

An airborne multi-axis differential optical absorption spectroscopic （AMAX-DOAS） instrument was developed and applied to measure tropospheric NO2 in the Pearl River Delta region in the south of China. By combining the measurements in nadir and zenith directions and analyzing the UV and visible spectral region using the DOAS method, information about tropospheric NO2 vertical columns was obtained. Strong tropospheric NO2 signals were detected when flying over heavilly polluted regions and point sources like plants. The AMAX-DOAS results were compared with ground-based MAX-DOAS observations in the southwest of Zhuhai city using the same parameters for radiative transport calculations. The difference in vertical column data between the two instruments is about 8%. Our data were also compared with those from OMI and fair agreement was obtained with a correlation coefficient R of 0.61. The difference between the two instruments can be attributed to the different spatial resolution and the temporal mismatch during the measurements.