Distributed Feedback Interband Cascade Laser Based Laser Heterodyne Radiometer for Column Density of HDO and CH4 Measurements at Dunhuang, Northwest of China

Abstract

Remote sensing of HDO and CH4 could provide valuable information on environmental and climatological studies. In a recent contribution, we reported a 3.53 μm distributed feedback (DFB) inter-band cascade laser (ICL)-based heterodyne radiometer. In the present work, we present the details of measurements and inversions of HDO and CH4 at Dunhuang, Northwest of China. The instrument line shape (ILS) of laser heterodyne radiometer (LHR) is discussed firstly, and the spectral resolution is about 0.004 cm−1 theoretically according to the ILS. Furthermore, the retrieval algorithm, optimal estimation method (OEM), combined with LBLRTM (Line-by-line Radiative Transfer Model) for retrieving the densities of atmospheric HDO and CH4 are investigated. The HDO densities were retrieved to be less than 1.0 ppmv, while the CH4 densities were around 1.79 ppmv from 20 to 24 July 2018. The correlation coefficient of water vapor densities retrieved by LHR and EM27/SUN is around 0.6, the potential reasons for the differences were discussed. Finally, in order to better understand the retrieval procedure, the Jacobian value and the Averaging Kernels are also discussed.