Intercomparison and validation of first GLORIA-B measurements of stratospheric and upper tropospheric long-lived tracers and photochemically active species
Bibliographic record
Abstract
Accurate observations of the vertical distribution and variability of atmospheric trace gases are essential for understanding chemical processes, validating atmospheric models, and monitoring the impact of anthropogenic emissions on climate and ozone. The Gimballed Limb Observer for Radiance Imaging of the Atmosphere (GLORIA) is a limb-imaging Fourier-Transform Spectrometer (iFTS) designed to provide high-resolution mid-infrared spectra in the 780–1400 cm$^{−1}$ wavenumber range. Originally developed for aircraft, the instrument has now been adapted for stratospheric balloon deployment (GLORIA-B) to extend its observational range from the middle troposphere to the middle stratosphere. GLORIA-B completed its first flight from Kiruna (Sweden) in August 2021 and a second from Timmins (Canada) in August 2022 as part of the EU Research Infrastructure HEMERA (Integrated access to balloon-borne platforms for innovative research and technology). The main objectives of these flights were technical qualification and the provision of a first imaging hyperspectral limb-emission dataset from 5 to 36 km altitude. Here, we present a characterization and validation of GLORIA-B performance using vertical volume mixing ratio (VMR) profiles retrieved from the August 2021 flight. Comparisons with in-situ measurements (ozonesonde, MegaAirCore, and cryosampler) show agreement within 10 % for O$_3$, CH$_4$, SF$_6$, and CFC-12, and within 10 %–20 % for CFC-11, HCFC-22, and CFC-113 up to 18 km, with larger deviations above this altitude. Another objective is analyzing diurnal changes in photochemically active species (N$_2$O$_5$, NO$_2$, ClONO$_2$, BrONO$_2$). Observed VMR variations align well with simulations from the EMAC (ECHAM5/MESSy Atmospheric Chemistry) chemistry-climate model, though absolute concentrations differ to a certain extent. Nighttime BrONO$_2$ measurements allowed an estimate of lower stratospheric Br$_y$ (20.4 ± 2.5 pptv). These results demonstrate the suitability of balloon-borne limb-imaging spectroscopy for providing high-quality vertical trace gas profiles, offering valuable new data to improve our understanding of stratospheric composition and to support the validation of atmospheric models.
Fetched live from OpenAlex and de-inverted. Abstracts are not stored in this database: the inverted indexes are 8.6 GB of the frame’s 9.3 GB of text, and the host has 13 GB free.
How this classification was reachedexpand
Full frame machine prediction
Teacher imitationNot calibrated prevalence, not ground truth. Human validation pending. The Gemma side is a direct model label for every work in the frame, read from the title-only record. The Codex side is a classifier learned from the 10,348 direct Codex labels and calibrated to design-weighted sample rates; fields without enough sample support carry no Codex call. Candidate is the union of the two sides; consensus is their intersection. These outputs are machine_predicted_unvalidated and are not human labels.
Distilled classifier scores by category (both heads)
| Category | Codex | Gemma |
|---|---|---|
| Metaresearch | 0.003 | 0.002 |
| Meta-epidemiology (narrow) | 0.001 | 0.000 |
| Meta-epidemiology (broad) | 0.001 | 0.001 |
| Bibliometrics | 0.001 | 0.001 |
| Science and technology studies | 0.001 | 0.001 |
| Scholarly communication | 0.001 | 0.001 |
| Open science | 0.001 | 0.002 |
| Research integrity | 0.001 | 0.001 |
| Insufficient payload (model declined to judge) | 0.001 | 0.001 |
Machine scores (provisional)
The two teacher heads of the student model, read on this work. A score orders the frame for review; it never asserts a category, and the validation status ships verbatim with every row.
Baseline scores from an immature model (maturity gate not passed, 7 training rounds). Scores rank; they never assert a category.
score_only:v0-immature-baseline · verbatim from the scoring run: score_only means the number may rank works, and no category label ships from itClassification
machine, unvalidatedMachine predicted; a candidate call from one source (direct Gemma or distilled Codex), not a consensus.
How this classification was reached, model by model and score by score, is at the end of the page under "How this classification was reached".