CALIPSO Lidar Level 2 5km Aerosol Layer data, Provisional V3-02

CAL_LID_L2_05kmALay-Prov-V3-02 data are Cloud-Aerosol Lidar and Infrared Pathfinder Satellite Observation (CALIPSO) Lidar Level 2 5km aerosol layer data. Within the Lidar Aerosol Layer Product there are two general classes of data:- Column Properties (including position data and viewing geometry)- Layer Properties. The lidar layer products consist of a sequence of column descriptors, each one of which is associated with a variable number of layer descriptors. The column descriptors specify the temporal and geophysical location of the column of the atmosphere through which a given lidar pulse travels. Also included in the column descriptors are indicators of surface lighting conditions, information about the surface type, and the number of features (e.g., aerosol layers) identified within the column. Version 3.02 represents a transition of the Lidar, IIR, and WFC processing and browse code to a new cluster computing system. No algorithm changes were introduced and very minor changes were observed between V3.01 and V3.02 as a result of the compiler and computer architecture differences. Cloud-Aerosol Lidar and Infrared Pathfinder Satellite Observations (CALIPSO) was launched on April 28, 2006 to study the impact of clouds and aerosols on the Earth's radiation budget and climate. It flies in formation in the international A-Train constellation for coincident Earth observations. The CALIPSO satellite comprises three instruments, the Cloud-Aerosol LIdar with Orthogonal Polarization (CALIOP), the Imaging Infrared Radiometer (IIR), and the Wide Field Camera (WFC). CALIPSO is a joint satellite mission between NASA and the French Agency, CNES.