A powerful lidar system capable of 1 h measurements of water vapour in the troposphere and the lower stratosphere as well as the temperature in the upper stratosphere and mesosphere

A high-power Raman lidar system has been installed at the high-altitude research station Schneefernerhaus (Garmisch-Partenkirchen, Germany) at 2675 ma.s.l., at the side of an existing wide-range differential absorption lidar (DIAL). An industrial XeCl laser was modified for linearly polarized single-line operation at an average power of about 180 W. This high power and a 1.5 m diameter receiver allow us to extend the operating range for water-vapour sounding to 20 km for a measurement time of just 1 h, at an uncertainty level of the mixing ratio of 1 to 2 ppm. This was achieved for a vertical resolution varied between just 0.2 and 0.6 km in the stratosphere. The lidar was successfully validated with a balloon-borne cryogenic frost-point hygrometer (CFH). In addition, temperature measurements up to altitudes of around 87 km were demonstrated for 1 h of signal averaging. The system has been calibrated with the DIAL, the CFH and radiosondes.