TBS: Baseline Instruments

 

ARM has a suite of baseline instruments that are typically flown on its tethered balloon system (TBS) missions. Other instruments that may be flown on the TBS are available upon request. Typically, only a subset of the instruments in this second category could be accommodated on a particular mission. In the following table, instruments are designated as baseline or available upon request in the Type column.

Aerosol Properties

Instrument Property Measured Type
Printed Optical Particle Spectrometer (POPS) (6 units) Aerosol size distribution from 140 nm to 3 μm Baseline
Condensation Particle Counter (CPC) Model 3007 (4 units) Total aerosol concentration from 0.01 μm to 1 μm Baseline
Size- and Time-Resolved Aerosol Collector (STAC) Size- and time-resolved chemical composition from 0.1 µm to 5.0 µm Baseline
Cascade impactors (6 units) Size-resolved chemical composition at four cut-off sizes (0.25, 0.5, 1.0, 2.5 μm) Available upon request
MicroAeth AE-51 Black carbon concentration measured at 880 nm Available upon request

Atmospheric State and Aircraft State

Instrument Property Measured Type
iMet RSB-1 and RSB-4 radiosondes (multiple) Pressure, temperature, relative humidity, 3D GPS Baseline
iMet XQ2 UAV Sensor (multiple) Pressure, temperature, relative humidity, 3D GPS Baseline
40C cup anemometers (10 units) 1 Hz horizontal wind speed Baseline
VectorNav GNSS wind direction (10 units) 1 Hz wind direction Baseline
Sensornet Oryx DTS Distributed temperature sensing at 2 m spatial resolution and 0.08°C accuracy Available upon request
Silixa XT DTS Distributed temperature sensing at 0.5 m spatial resolution and 0.08°C accuracy Available upon request

Cloud Properties

Instrument Property Measured Type
Supercooled liquid water sondes Cloud supercooled liquid water content in g/m3 Available upon request
Video Ice Particle Sampler (VIPS) Ice particle maximum dimension, width, area, and aspect ratio from 1 µm to 5 mm Available upon request

Gas Phase Properties

Instrument Property Measured Type
Fielded Remote Organic Sampling Technology (FROST) Sampler Identification and concentration of volatile organic compounds on LECO GC-TOFMS > 1 picogram Available upon request

Remote Sensing

Instrument Property Measured Type
Mirage 640P 30 Hz imaging of 1.5 µm to 5.1 µm spectral band, surface temperature Available upon request