Mie-Raman lidar for fine-detection of atmospheric aerosol profiles

The Raman lidar technique has the capability of accurately profiling the extinction coefficient of aerosol. A Mie-Raman lidar was developed for measuring the optical properties of atmospheric aerosol, such as extinction coefficient, volume backscatter coefficient and lidar ratio. The vibrational Raman signal of nitrogen and Mie-Rayleigh scattering signal are separated spatially by use of the high-resolution grating and narrow bandpass filters, and then detected by two photomultiplier tubes with a pre-amplifier. Preliminary experiments show that the Mie-Raman lidar system operated in analog detection mode has the capability of measuring aerosol profiles up to a height of 3km with 250mJ of laser energy and 8 minute integration time.