Estimation of the broadband lidar potential for remote sensing of the molecular atmosphere

The results of a closed numerical experiment devoted to the laser sensing of the water vapor and trace gas concentrations in the tropospheric layer of the atmosphere based on a new LIDAR-DOAS hybrid technology using atmospheric aerosol as a distributed route reflector are discussed. The quantitative estimations, performed based on the Monte Carlo method, confirm the perspectives of a similar approach, which extends the potential of the classical scheme of differential optical atmospheric spectroscopy (DOAS) used to distantly control and localize dangerous anthropogenic emissions of toxic gases up to the tropopause altitude. The statistical modeling algorithms should be substantially modified, since it is necessary to estimate lidar returns with a high spectral resolution based on the transient transfer equation. A new method, which takes into account selective absorption of the gaseous atmosphere, has been used to locally estimate a flux. The combination of this method with the genetic algorithm for solving the inverse problem of reconstructing the required tropospheric gas components makes it possible to accurately quantitatively predict the efficiency of the developed lidar systems of environmental monitoring.