SAM II 1-MICRON AEROSOL EXTINCTION COEFFICIENT: VARIANCE ESTIMATES; LONG-TERM TRENDS; CORRELATION TIMES; SOUTHERN HEMISPHERE SPRING WAVE 1 PHASES (ENTROPY)

The Stratospheric Aerosol Measurement II (SAM II) satellite instrument generates a data product consisting of vertical soundings of the 1(mu) aerosol extinction coefficient in the polar middle atmospheres. The principles used by SAM II in remote sensing the atmosphere have been described. Statistical methods were applied to the aerosol extinction data from which several results emerged.; The aerosol extinction during several periods of time in the summers of both hemispheres was sampled and variances estimated over the altitudes from 10 km. to 39 km. Confidence intervals on the estimates of the standard deviations of the aerosol extinction during these summer periods were, in general, smaller than the error bars provided with the data set.; Long term trends in both the aerosol extinction and temperature showed distinct seasonal variability in both hemispheres. The effects of several volcanic events were clearly superposed on the seasonality of the aerosol extinction.; Estimates of the average correlation time in the aerosol extinction provided time scales for stratospheric air movements. The results indicated that the shortest correlation times occurred in summer.; During the austral springs, periods of time in the aersol extinction data were searched for two specific characteristics: the low level constant extinction occurring immediately after the removal of polar stratospheric cloud aerosols and the constant increasing extinction preceding the summer aerosol extinction levels. During the latter periods cyclical variations associated with the polar vortex predominate. For the years 1979 through 1984, the longitudes of the maximum of the wave 1 component of these cyclical variations were estimated. Results indicated that this maximum consistently oriented itself in the same general direction from year to year.; A maximum entropy method for interpolating and smoothing a random process was generalized and extended. The nonlinear equations occurring in the maximum entropy formalism were solved. The behavior of the interpolator/smoother was demonstrated using sample realizations of two random processes. The maximum entropy interpolator was used to estimate missing profiles in the SAM II data set. From the complete set of SAM II profiles a VHS video movie of the aerosol extinction process was produced.