Platforms

Our lidar instruments are specifically designed for different platforms. We developed TELMA and CORAL as ground-based instruments. They are used as technology testbeds, miniaturizing the instruments and developing techniques for remote and autonomous control. They are portable and were used world-wide in extreme conditions. For a balloon-borne platform we developed BOLIDE - lightweight, small, inside a pressure vessel with remote control over limited satellite bandwidth and advanced telemetry options. ALIMA is designed to fit into an aircraft rack and be operated in this specific environment.

• Kaifler, Bernd und Kaifler, Natalie und Büdenbender, Christian und Witschas, Benjamin und Gomez Kabelka, Pau und Rapp, Markus und Mahnke, Peter und Sauder, Daniel und Geyer, Gerhard und Speiser, Jochen (2015) New lidar systems at the German Aerospace Center. 12th International Workshop on Layered Phenomena in the Mesopause Region, 10.-13. August 2015, Boulder, USA.

Instruments

ALIMA The Airborne Lidar for Middle Atmosphere Research (ALIMA) is a Rayleigh and Doppler iron lidar designed to fly on an aircraft. Its development started in 2014. It is currently being built and certified for operation on the HALO research aircraft. The first campaign will be SOUTHTRAK in southern America in fall 2019. Bernd Kaifler, Christian Büdenbender, Peter Mahnke, Matthias Damm, Daniel Sauder, Natalie Kaifler, and Markus Rapp (2017) Demonstration of an iron fluorescence lidar operating at 372 nm wavelength using a newly-developed Nd:YAG laser, Opt. Lett. 42, 2858-2861. Kaifler, Bernd und Kaifler, Natalie und Rapp, Markus (2014) The ALIMA “all atmosphere” lidar (s). 41st Annual European Meeting on Atmospheric Studies by Optical Methods, 18.-21. Aug. 2014, Stockholm, Sweden.

BOLIDE

Type: Rayleigh backscatter lidar Mass: 145 kg including pressure vessel and radiator Power: 268 W Laser: 5 W at 532 nm and 100 Hz Receiver: 50 cm diameter telescope, 90 microrad FOV, 3 detectors, 0.3 nm wide filters The Balloon Lidar Experiment (BOLIDE) is a compact, balloon-borne lidar housed in a pressure vessel that flew on the NASA long-duration balloon mission PMC-Turbo in July 2018.

• BOLIDE/PMC-Turbo campaign webpage
• Institute News
• Data on HALO-DB
  

CORAL Type: Rayleigh backscatter lidar Housing: 8-foot steel container Mass: 2400 kg total Laser: 11 W at 532 nm and 100 Hz Receiver: 63 cm diameter telescope, 240 microrad FOV, 4 detectors, 0.8 nm filter for 532 nm, 3 nm filter for 608 nm

The Compact Rayleigh Autonomous Lidar (CORAL) is a stratosphere/mesosphere temperature lidar developed in 2015. The primary objective of the instrument is to autonomously collect high-resolution soundings of atmospheric gravity waves. To achieve this, CORAL features several technologies which are new to middle atmosphere lidars: diode-pumped laser, highly integrated electronics, redundant computer systems, advance software with fault protection algorithms. CORAL was employed during the NORTHWAVE campaign in Sodankylä, Finland, in winter 2015/2016, for the LART-A/ARISE-2 campaign in the Bavarian Forest in summer 2016 and in the SOUTHWAVE campaign in Rio Grande, Tierra del Fuego, Argentina since November 2017.

• Instrument webpage
• Institute website
• Data on HALO-DB
  

TELMA

The Temperature Lidar for the Middle Atmosphere (TELMA) is the predecessor of CORAL with support for remote operation that was used during the DEEPWAVE campaign at Lauder, New Zealand in southern winter 2014. The instrument is housed in an 11-foot container. It emits 12 W at 532 nm and uses a 63 cm aperture telescope. The field of view is 200 microrad.