Characterization and Evaluation of NPP VIIRS Aerosol EDR Performance Based Upon Prelaunch Analysis N. Christina Hsu (NASA/GSFC) Istvan Laszlo (NOAA/STAR) Jingfeng Huang (NASA/GSFC, Morgan State University)* Myeong-Jae Jeong (Gangneung-Wonju National University, Korea) David O. Starr (NASA/GSFC) Heather Q. Cronk (IMSG at NOAA/STAR) Hongqing Liu (Dell Services at NOAA/STAR) Robert Holz (UW/PEATE) Min Oo (UW/PEATE) Acknowledgement to: Sid Jackson (NGAS) and other VIIRS Aerosol/Cloud Cal/Val Team Members for valuable feedbacks and discussions, and Raytheon algorithm conversation team for additional data support * 1

CERES VIIRS CrIS ATMS OMPS Limb OMPS Nadir VIIRS – Visible Infrared Imager Radiometer Suite VIIRS 24 EDRs Land, Ocean, Atmosphere, Snow * Product has a Key Performance attribute NPP Satellite

Outline Part I. Sensor Performance: 1.1 What is optical crosstalk? 1.2 Method to evaluate VIIRS sensor crosstalk 1.3 VIIRS Crosstalk Impact on Aerosol Retrieval 1.4 Crosstalk Summary Part II. Algorithm Performance: 2.1 VIIRS-MODIS Comparison MODIS-Like NOAA/STAR VIIRS Product vs. MODIS MODIS-Like PEATE VIIRS Product vs. MODIS VIIRS-Like IDPS Product vs. MODIS 2.2 VIIRS-AERONET Comparisons Summary 3

Quality of Coatings, Top of IFA From XtalkTim5_Mills.ppt by Steve Mills (NGST); Courtesy: Chris Moeller. Optical : Dominant VISNIR crosstalk. Linear with signal, spectral and spatial component. Believed to be largely due to filter defects. Magnitude primarily depends on number of defects in spectral filters (‘spits’). Defects from coatings of Integrated Filter Assembly cause large angle scattering. Part I: Sensor Performance 1.1 What is Optical Crosstalk? Quality of Coatings, Bottom of IFA

1.2 Crosstalk Impact - Evaluation Method Assess the impact of VIIRS VisNIR xtalk on aerosol EDR using MODIS Deep Blue algorithm and MODIS standard Dark Target algorithm. Investigate how aerosol property statistics changes using VIIRS proxy (MODIS) data with and without xtalk, based upon TV influence coefficients. Effects of out-of-band response and polarization sensitivity are not considered in this analysis. Two scenes are selected to test aerosol EDR for a range of aerosol loadings from low to heavy plumes over both water as well as vegetated and arid land surfaces. 5

Arabian Desert Scene 5% 25% Mean 50% 75% 95% 1.3 Crosstalk Impact on VIIRS AOT (Land, Deep Blue) 6  Crosstalk impact on Deep Blue AOT retrieval (land) is within (a) RGB(b) AOT w/o XTalk (c) AOT with XTalk (d) Difference: (c)- (b)

1.3 Crosstalk Impact on VIIRS AOT (Ocean & Land, Dark Target) China Scene 5% 25% Mea n 50% 75% 95% 7  Crosstalk impact on Dark Target AOT retrieval is within 0.005, for both land and ocean. (a) RGB(b) AOT w/o XTalk (c) AOT with XTalk (d) Difference: (c)- (b)

Without considering out-of-band response and polarization sensitivity, the impact of xtalk is moderate on SDR and aerosol EDR performance over land and ocean for both test granules. In general, the effects of xtalk on SDR are within 0.1% for most of the wavelengths. However, they are larger for 470 nm (mostly contributed by the 443 nm channel) over land and ocean (~0.2%), as well as for 865 nm band over ocean (~ %). The resulting errors in AOT due to xtalk are within 0.01 over land and ocean for both darker surface and bright desert scenes retrieved from Deep Blue and Dark Target algorithms, which meet the NPP requirements of aerosol EDR performance. 1.4 Crosstalk Impact on VIIRS Aerosol - Summary 8

9 Part II: Algorithm Performance 2.1 VIIRS-MODIS Comparison MODIS-Like NOAA/STAR Product (Science code Drop 4.9.3) (Note: MODIS data run through VIIRS algorithm with MODIS LUT at NOAA/STAR; close to final drop of 4.9.4) MODIS-Like PEATE/LEOCAT Product (IDPS build ) (Note: MODIS data run through VIIRS algorithm with MODIS LUT at Atmosphere PEATE; It is a relatively old ops code build from 2009 based on Drop 4.9) VIIRS-Like IDPS Product (Final Drop 4.9.4) (Note: a quick glance of VIIRS-Like granules)

2.1.1 VIIRS(STAR) vs. MODIS: ,LAND , all QA  VIIRS (land) aerosol retrieval (drop 4.9.3) achieves comparable performances to MODIS, except some low biases when AOT is higher than 1.5;  Some high biases when AOT is less than 0.5 is also observed with all QA, but not significant with best QA.

2.1.1 VIIRS(STAR) vs. MODIS: ,OCEAN , all QA  VIIRS (ocean) aerosol retrieval (drop 4.9.3) achieves comparable performances to MODIS overall;  There are some systematic low biases from VIIRS to MODIS with both all QA and best QA.

VIIRS MODIS VIIRS (STAR) vs. MODIS: (08/06)  Top panel: with all QA; bottom panel: with best QA.  131 granules on 08/06/2010 ALL QA QA=3

VIIRS (STAR) vs. MODIS: (08/06)  AOT Difference between VIIRS and MODIS are different for land and ocean;  Significant AOT discrepancy were found for high AOT values over land;

2.1.1 VIIRS (STAR) vs. MODIS: Heavy Aerosol Events Observation of the huge wildfire event over West Russia in August 2010: VIIRS (QA3) is significant lower than MODIS (QA3) when AOT > 1.5. VIIRSMODIS VIIRSMODIS 08/05/10 08/06/10

VIIRS (PEATE) vs. VIIRS (STAR) vs. MODIS VIIRS (STAR) vs. MODIS (Land) VIIRS (PEATE) vs. MODIS (Land) VIIRS (STAR) vs. MODIS (Ocean) VIIRS (PEATE) vs. MODIS (Ocean)  Data from 15 collocated Terra Granules LAND OCEAN 4.9   4.9.3

VIIRS (PEATE) vs. VIIRS (STAR) vs. MODIS MODIS VIIRS(STAR), Drop  There are significant discrepancy between MODIS and both drop versions of VIIRS (with best QA): Heavy aerosol and cloud screening VIIRS(PEATE), Drop 4.9

VIIRS (PEATE): Amazon Smoke, 10/2007 MODIS VIIRS MODIS VIIRS  More challenging heavy aerosol cases: Amazon smoke, 10/2007

VIIRS-Like (IDPS, Drop 4.9.4) vs. MODIS 09/06/2002, DOY249 LandOcean  There is wavelength difference issue in this comparison: MODIS B3 is 470 nm, and VIIRS M3 is 488 nm, resulting in a possible 0.2 AOT difference over land (Sid Jackson, NGAS). 80 second 400*96 6km resolution 5 minute 203*135 10km resolution

VIIRS-Like (IDPS, Drop 4.9.4) vs. MODIS 01/25/2003, DOY025 LandOcean  There is wavelength difference issue in this comparison: MODIS B3 is 470 nm, and VIIRS M3 is 488 nm, resulting in a possible 0.2 AOT difference over land (Sid Jackson, NGAS).

 Over water, the Advanced Baseline Imager (ABI) adopts VIIRS aerosol algorithm and uses MODIS VIS-NIR reflectances from 10-km MODIS aerosol product  VIIRS aerosol retrieval over ocean achieves comparable performances to MODIS 20 Part 2: Algorithm Performance 2.2 VIIRS – AERONET Comparison VIIRS(ABI) AOT vs. AERONET 126 AERONET ocean/island sites (Results provided by Istvan Laszlo NOAA/NESDIS/STAR)

SUMMARY 21 Sensor performance  VIIRS sensor optical crosstalk does not have significant impact on VIIRS aerosol EDR Algorithm performance:  Use of latest VIIRS aerosol algorithm is essential in making the VIIRS-MODIS comparisons to evaluate algorithm performance (drop 4.9 vs vs );  VIIRS (drop 4.9.3) achieves comparable results to MODIS over land and ocean when AOT 1.5.  There are still challenging issues with VIIRS algorithm, such as heavy aerosol observations and cloud screening;  The VIIRS(ABI, Ocean) algorithm also produces comparable AOT to the AERONET AOT observations.

THANK YOU! 22  AQUA MODIS AOT Seasonal Climatology, to be continued by VIIRS VIIRS +MODIS VIIRS +MODIS Jingfeng

23 Q: How comparable are the MODIS Dark Target AOT retrievals to the AERONET AOT retrievals? A: Aqua MODIS DT AOT (Best QA) vs. AERONET AOT ( ). The expected error ranges are ±0.05±0.15AOT for Land, and ±0.03±0.05AOT for Ocean. LandOcean Backup slide

Backup slide: Algorithms 24 VIIRSMODIS Aerosol Models 5 Static Aerosol Models (Dust, Smoke- High Absorption, Smoke-Low absorption, Urban-high absorption, Urban-low absorption), each with 1 fine and 1 coarse mode, model determined from observation Dust in combination with regional fine mode models,13 fine mode fraction Dynamic selection of 2020 possible over-ocean aerosol models, with 4 fine and 5 coarse modes and 101 fine mode fractions 200 combinations of 4 fine model, 5 coarse mode and 10 fine mode fractions, same models Input Bands412, 445, 488, 672, 2250 nm470, 667, 2130 nm 672, 746, 865, 1240, 1610, 2250 nm466, 553, 667, 855, 1240, 1640, 2130 nm Cloud MaskInternal + VCMInternal AggregationConduct aerosol retrieval at IP level first, then aggregate AOT to EDR level (40% top, 20% bottom) Aggregate L1B surface reflectance to L2 resolution first, then do aerosol retrieval (50% brightest and 20% darkest for land, 25% and 25% for ocean)

25 Backup slide: VIIRS Bands

MODIS-Like VIIRS (10km) QA=best (3), using best QA (0) only from IP (1km) MODIS (10km) QA=3 VIIRS(PEATE): Heavy Aerosol Case on (Aqua) VIIRS IP (1km), QA=best (0),degraded (1): It seems the heavy aerosol pixels were degraded. VIIRS IP Cloud Confidence Flag: It seems the region is fairly confidently cloud free. VIIRS IP bad SDR qualify flag: All seems good SDR. VIIRS IP AOT out of range quality flag: Only a small portion seems to have AOT out of range. The question is: why those heavy aerosol pixels were degraded from QA=0 to QA=1 at IP level? It seems VCM is not the cause, bad SDR is not the cause either, nor the AOT range, BUT THE VOLCANIC ASH! VIIRS IP VOLCANIC ASH