I  ntegration of routine A ircraft measurements into a G lobal O bserving S ystem

IAGOS is a Design Study for New Infrastructures in FP6. It pursues the preparation of the distributed infrastructure  IAGOS ERI for observations of atmospheric composition, aerosols, clouds and contrails on the global scale from commercial in-service aircraft. For this purpose, new instrument packages are developed based on the former  MOZAIC instrumentation for O₃, H₂O, CO and NO_y/NO_x. Central elements are the aeronautical certification for installation and deployment on Airbus longrange aircraft, the design of new instrumentation for aerosol, cloud particles and for stratospheric water vapour, and the design of real time data provision to meteorological services. IAGOS will also establish the logistic and financial boundary conditions for the operation of the new infrastructure.

Observations in the Upper Troposphere and Lower Stratosphere (UTLS) are critical for improving the scientific understanding of chemistry-climate interactions, particularly those associated with the roles of clouds, aerosols and chemical composition. This information is essential for improving the scientific basis related to predictions of global climate change and for the assessment of surface air pollution, including the influence of aviation impacts and of emissions from other parts of the world on Europe.
 
 IAGOS Flyer print version (PDF Format, ~4MB)
 IAGOS Flyer web version (PDF Format, ~5kB)

Contact:  Dr. Andreas Volz-Thomas