Articles | Volume 11, issue 9
https://doi.org/10.5194/amt-11-5237-2018
https://doi.org/10.5194/amt-11-5237-2018
Research article
 | 
18 Sep 2018
Research article |  | 18 Sep 2018

The Global Ozone Monitoring Experiment: review of in-flight performance and new reprocessed 1995–2011 level 1 product

Melanie Coldewey-Egbers, Sander Slijkhuis, Bernd Aberle, Diego Loyola, and Angelika Dehn

Abstract. The Global Ozone Monitoring Experiment (GOME) on-board the second European Remote Sensing satellite provided measurements of atmospheric constituents such as ozone and other trace gases for the 16-year period from 1995 to 2011. In this paper we present a detailed analysis of the long-term performance of the sensor and introduce the new homogenised and fully calibrated level 1 product that has been generated using the recently developed GOME Data Processor level-0-to-1b (GDP-L1) Version 5.1. By means of the various in-flight calibration parameters, we monitor the behaviour and stability of the instrument during the entire mission. Severe degradation of the optical components has led to a significant decrease in intensity, in particular in channels 1 and 2, which cover the spectral ranges of 240–316 and 311–405 nm, respectively. Thus, a soft correction based on using the Sun as a stable calibration source is applied. Revision and optimisation of other calibration algorithms such as the wavelength assignment, polarisation correction, and dark current correction resulted in an improved and homogeneous level 1 product that can be regarded as the European satellite reference data for successor atmospheric composition sensors and that provides an excellent prerequisite for further exploitation of GOME measurements.

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Short summary
We present a detailed analysis of the long-term performance of the Global Ozone Monitoring Experiment (GOME) on-board ERS-2, which provided measurements of atmospheric constituents for the 16-year period from 1995 to 2011. By means of various in-flight calibration parameters, we monitor the behavior and stability during the entire mission. Furthermore, we introduce the new homogenized level 1 product generated using the recently developed GOME Data Processor Version 5.1.