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Rome-Tor Vergata

General

The Raman lidar in Rome-Tor Vergata (15 km SE of Rome) is designed and operated by ISAC/CNR. The system is located in two containers and can be utilized for routinely in situ observations or transported for measurement campaigns in remote sites. The Raman lidar is currently utilized to study the water vapor (WV) vertical distribution and its seasonal climatology.

For measurements at night, altitudes up to close to the tropopause are covered with a vertical (acquisition) resolution of 75 m. During day time, a maximum altitude of 3 to 5 km can be reached.The lidar can simultaneously retrieve temperature profiles in an aerosol-free atmosphere (upper stratosphere and mesosphere) through the Rayleigh lidar technique. Additionally, it can provide aerosol profiles from the boundary layer up to the uppermost aerosols layers in stratosphere. Currently at least one 4-5 hours session of measurement is scheduled for each calendar week. Extra sessions are performed in case of occurrence of interesting cases. The system uses two beams at 532 nm and 355 nm, which correspond to the second and third harmonics of a Nd:YAG laser. The green (532 nm) radiation is used to retrieve aerosol and temperature by using the elastic backscattering signal. The UV (355 nm) is used to produce and detect Raman-shifted backscattering signals, originated both by nitrogen (387 nm) and by water vapor (407 nm). The lidar receiver is a multi-channel system, each channel having the proper sensitivity for sounding a different altitude sub-range.

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