Payra, Swagata; Soni, Manish; Kumar, Anikender; Prakash, Divya; Verma, Sunita (2015). Intercomparison of Aerosol Optical Thickness Derived from MODIS and in Situ Ground Datasets over Jaipur, a Semi-arid Zone in India. ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY, 49(15), 9237-9246.

Abstract
The first detailed seasonal validation has been carried out for the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) Terra and Aqua satellites Level 2.0 Collection Version 5.1 AOT (tau(MODIS)) with Aerosol Robotic Network (AERONET) Level 2.0 AOT (tau(AERONET)) for the years 2009-2012 over semi-arid region Jaipur, northwestern India. The correlation between tau(MODIS) versus tau(AERONET) at 550 nm is determined with different spatial and temporal size windows. The tau(MODIS) overestimates tau(AERONET) within a range of +0.06 +/- 0.24 during the pre-monsoon (April-June) season, while it underestimates the tau(AERONET) with -0.04 +/- 0.12 and -0.05 +/- 0.18 during dry (December-March) and post-monsoon (October-November) seasons, respectively. Correlation without (with) error envelope has been found for pre-monsoon at 0.71 (0.89), post-monsoon at 0.76 (0.94), and dry season at 0.78 (0.95). tau(MODIS) is compared to tau(AERONET) at three more ground AERONET stations in India, i.e., Kanpur, Gual Pahari, and Pune. Furthermore, the performance of MODIS Deep Blue and Aqua AOT(550) (nm) (tau(DB550) nm and tau(Aqua550 nm)) with tau(AERONET) is also evaluated for all considered sites over India along with a U.S. desert site at White Sand, Tularosa Basin, NM. The statistical results reveal that tau(Aqua550) nm performs better over Kanpur and Pune, whereas tau(DB550 nm) performs better over Jaipur, Gual Pahari, and White Sand High Energy Laser Systems Test Facility (HELSTF) (U.S. site).

DOI:
10.1021/acs.est.5b02225

ISSN:
0013-936X