LALINET

(Rainproof, Remote operation: yes)

The lidar is operated at the Bariloche International Airport by the Argentinean Meteorological Sevice assisted remotely by CEILAP (Centro de Investigaciones en Láseres y Aplicaciones). Other operators may be needed to perform 20/24 measurements. This lidar was conceived to monitor range-resolved (100 m to 13 km AGL) aerosol optical properties from the IR to the near UV spectral region in the whole troposphere. Its emission system is a 20 Hz – 150 mJ (1064 nm) solid state Nd:YAG laser (Brilliant – Quantel). The fundamental laser line is doubled and tripled to obtain 532 nm and 355 nm respectively. The backscattered radiation is collected by an f/10, 2 m focal length Cassegrainian telescope, focused into a 1 mm diameter optical fiber to achieve a field of view of 0.5 mrad. The detection unit is a dichroic/interference filter-based polychromator unit that separates the elastic and Raman-shifted backscattered radiation. The detection units are photomultiplier modules (Hamamatsu H6780-03) for the ultraviolet and H6780-20 visible wavelengths and a detector module (LICEL) based on an NIR enhanced Si-avalanche photodiode set (EG&G) for the infrared wavelength.

Rayleigh detection: 1064, 532 and 355 nm Raman detection: 607, 408 and 387 nm (nocturnal measurement only)