Seasonal and optical characterisation of cirrus clouds over Indian sub-continent using LIDAR

Abstract

Light Detection and Ranging (LIDAR) is an important remote sensing technique to study about the cirrus clouds. The subject of cirrus clouds and related climate is challenging one. The received scattered signal from Lidar contains information on the physical and optical properties of cirrus clouds. The Lidar profile of the cirrus cloud provides information on the optical characteristics like depolarisation ratio, lidar ratio and optical depth, which give knowledge about possible phase, structure and orientation of cloud particle that affect the radiative budgeting of cirrus clouds. The findings from the study are subjected to generate inputs for better climatic modelling