Example Studies using NDACC Data

Tropospheric Composition:

An example use of NDACC data of relevance to both the troposphere and stratosphere is shown in Figure 1. This shows ship-based FTIR profile observations of COS and CO. These cruise data are also part of the NDSC database. The observations revealed large COS mixing ratios near the tropical tropopause, which correlated with, for example, high CO (Notholt et al, 2003).

Fig. 1. Latitude cross sections of retrieved volume mixing ratios of COS and CO from cruises using ship-borne FTIR solar absorption spectrometry. The FTIR retrievals allow observations of the trace gas profiles with a vertical resolution of ~4 km. See Notholt et al., (2003) for details.

References

Notholt, J., et al., Enhanced upper tropical tropospheric COS: Impact on the stratospheric aerosol layer, Science, 300, 307-310, 2003.