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Welcome to the Microwave Limb Sounder (MLS) Web Site


The Microwave Limb Sounder (MLS) experiments measure naturally-occurring microwave thermal emission from the limb (edge) of Earth's atmosphere to remotely sense vertical profiles of atmospheric gases, temperature, pressure, and cloud ice.  The overall objective of these experiments is to provide information that will help improve our understanding of Earth's atmosphere and global change.

The first MLS experiment in space (UARS MLS) was on NASA's Upper Atmosphere Research Satellite (UARS) launched 12 Sept 1991. After March 1994, the UARS MLS measurements became increasingly intermittent due to conserving satellite power and the MLS scan mechanism lifetime. The last data were obtained on 25 August 2001 (for more information go to UARS MLS data).

The second (EOS MLS) is on the NASA Earth Observing System (EOS) Aura mission launched 15 July 2004. EOS MLS began full-up atmospheric science observations on 13 August 2004, with excellent performance to date in all portions of the instrument. Provisional and Stage I validated data are now publicly available (for information go to EOS MLS data).



Recent JPL laboratory measurements have called into question the theory behind chlorine-catalyzed polar ozone destruction. We have used Aura MLS and other satellite data to study seasonal changes in the partitioning between ozone-destroying (ClO) and "benign" (HCl) forms of stratospheric chlorine. The below plot shows the observed evolution of the chlorine species and ozone over the 2005 Antarctic winter and compares it to results from a state-of-the-art chemistry transport model. The standard model compares well with observations (cf. two top rows). In contrast, modeled chlorine species and ozone do not match measured values when the new laboratory results are used in the model (cf. top and bottom rows).

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