CÆLIS: a System for Aersol Measurement Network

Aerosols are of main importance in atmospheric and climate studies, thus the number of instruments and measurement networks which focus on its characterization are growing. Many challenges are derived from: standardization of protocols, monitoring of the instrument status to evaluate the network data quality, manipulation and distribution of large volume of data (raw and processed). CÆLIS is a software system which aims at simplifying the management of a network, providing tools by monitoring the instruments, processing the data in real time and offering the scientific community a new tool to work with the data. CÆLIS has been successfully applied since 2008 to the photometer calibration facility managed by the University of Valladolid, Spain, in the frame of AERONET. Thanks to the use of advanced tools, this facility has been able to analyze a growing number of stations and data in real time, which means great benefit to the network management and data quality control. Additionally, the system provides tools to assist research studies, as for example aerosol climatology analysis or aerosol satellite sensor product validation. The present work describes the system architecture of CÆLIS and some examples of applications and data processing.