Sunshine duration as a proxy of the atmospheric aerosol content

One of the most important radiative properties of aerosols is their optical thickness (AOD), which is closely linked to the total burden of atmospheric aerosols. On the contrary, we do avail of long time series of sunshine duration (SD) measurements, which is defined as the total time length of thos...

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Detalles Bibliográficos
Autor: Sanchez Romero, Alejandro
Tipo de recurso: tesis doctoral
Estado:Versión publicada
Fecha de publicación:2016
País:España
Institución:CBUC, CESCA
Repositorio:TDR. Tesis Doctorales en Red
OAI Identifier:oai:www.tdx.cat:10803/394045
Acceso en línea:http://hdl.handle.net/10803/394045
Access Level:acceso abierto
Palabra clave:Atmospheric aerosols
Aerosols atmosfèrics
Aerosoles atmosféricos
Solar radiation
Radiación solar
Radiació solar
Campbell-Stokes sunshine recorder
Heliògraf Campbell-Stokes
Heliógrafo Campbell-Stokes
Climatic changes
Canvis climàtics
Cambios climáticos
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Descripción
Sumario:One of the most important radiative properties of aerosols is their optical thickness (AOD), which is closely linked to the total burden of atmospheric aerosols. On the contrary, we do avail of long time series of sunshine duration (SD) measurements, which is defined as the total time length of those sub-periods for which the direct solar irradiance exceeds a certain threshold. In the past, the Campbell-Stokes sunshine recorder (CSSR) has been the most common instrument for measuring SD. Specifically, SD is obtained measuring the length of the burn produced on a cardboard. The principal goal of the present thesis is to investigate the suitability of sunshine observations, as well as the width of the burn on the cards, for detecting changes in atmospheric aerosol load for both high time resolution and long time scales. The initial hypothesis is that an increase of AOD reduces both SD and the burn width.