Atmospheric Chemistry and Physics Discussions www.atmos-chem-phys-discuss.net 1680-7367 1680-7375 3 5 2003 10.5194/acpd-3-4671-2003 http://www.atmos-chem-phys-discuss.net/3/4671/2003/ http://www.atmos-chem-phys-discuss.net/3/4671/2003/acpd-3-4671-2003.html http://www.atmos-chem-phys-discuss.net/3/4671/2003/acpd-3-4671-2003.pdf 4671 4700 2003-09-02 Study of the effect of different type of aerosols on UV-B radiation from measurements during EARLINET D. S. Balis V. Amiridis C. Zerefos A. Kazantzidis S. Kazadzis A. F. Bais C. Meleti A. Papayannis V. Matthias H. Dier Laboratory of Atmospheric Physics, Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, 54006 Greece Laboratory of Climatology, University of Athens, Greece National Technical University of Athens, Greece Max Planck Institute for Meteorology, Hamburg, Germany German Weather Service, Meteorological Observatory Lindenberg, Germany Routine lidar measurements of the vertical distribution of the aerosol extinction coefficient and the extinction-to-backscatter ratio have been performed at Thessaloniki, Greece using a Raman lidar system in the frame of the EARLINET project since 2000. Spectral and broadband UV-B irradiance measurements, as well as total ozone observations, were available whenever lidar measurements were obtained. From the available measurements several cases could be identified that allowed the study of the effect of different types of aerosol on the levels of the UV-B solar irradiance at the Earth's surface. The TUV radiative transfer model has been used to simulate the irradiance measurements, using total ozone and the lidar aerosol data as input. From the comparison of the model results with the measured spectra the effective single scattering albedo was determined using an iterative procedure, which has been verified against results from the 1998 Lindenberg Aerosol Characterization Experiment. It is shown that the same aerosol optical depth and same total ozone values can show differences up to 10% in the UV-B irradiance at the Earth's surface, which can be attributed to differences in the aerosol type. It is shown that the combined use of the estimated single scattering albedo and the measured extinction-to-backscatter ratio leads to a better characterization of the aerosol type probed.