PDF and graduate students

Research keywords: imaging spectrometers, radiative transfer, atmospheric optics, water optics

In general my research objectives revolve around the study of radiative transfer phenomena and their remote sensing implications in the atmosphere, in coastal waters and over forested terrain. In order to advance these goals our research team employs a variety of radiative transfer models and a program of ground based and airborne field measurements. This program incorporates three separate research axes:

• development and adaptation of radiative transfer models and algorithms;
• ground based radiometric measurements;
• multi-dimensional airborne measurement program.

General Activities

• list of publications and conference presentations 

• member of COREL Net, a Canadian lidar network being implemented by Kevin Strawbridge and his group at the CARE, Environment Canada site in Egbert, ON.
   
• Scientific management of AEROCAN in partnership with Environment Canada who have taken over operations (AEROCAN is a subnetwork of AERONET). One recent initiative was the development of a wiki manual for the CIMEL sunphotometer
   
• Co-I of the Canadian Network for the Detection of Atmospheric Change (CANDAC). Mentor of the "photometry suite" which includes two CIMEL sunphotometers, a starphotometer and an IR multi-band radiometer.

• Overview of postdoctoral and graduate student projects under my supervison

• courses which I give or have given in the past

• O'Neill family tree - my Dad's genealogical research project (Gerald H. O'Neill)

• Artist's corner (Gladys Hann-O'Neill ... my better half)

• Norm's Spawning Service
   
• May 27, 28, 2007 Sunphotometry workshop at the CMOS conference in St. John's Newfoundland
  

Research projects

Recent publications

• ACPD comment on how the bimodal nature of aerosols yields a simple analytical formulation in a' versus a space (spectral curvature space).
   
• GRL paper on the detection of fine mode events at the PEARL (Eureka, Nunavut) atmospheric observatory  (comparison with Ed Eloranta's AHSRL lidar results and further validation of the SDA)
   
• JGR paper on the development of an enhanced SDA retrieval (SDA+) which employs the CIMEL 1.64 mm channel and application of the technique to data collected during the UAE² (United Arab Emirates field campaign of 2004).
   
• JGR paper on the measurement and modelling of a dust plume over Vancouver which was traced back to a dust storm in Algeria.
   
• A model evaluation article (Atmospheric Environment) on comparisons between intensive and extensive sunphotometry derived parameters and the aerosol optical predictions of an air quality model (GEM-AQ).
   
• Review article; Recent Progress in the remote sensing of aerosols (Physics in Canada, 2005)
   
• Robust optical features of fine mode size distributions; application to the Québec smoke event of 2002 (JGR paper) and a correction to this JGR paper (improved approximation to the effective fine mode radius as a function of the Angstrom exponent and the derivative of the Angstrom exponent at 500 nm).
   
• Discrimination of fine and coarse mode ODs from a purely spectral algorithm ( JGR paper). This algorithm (which we call the SDA for "Spectral Deconvolution Algorithm") was applied to MODIS validation and model evaluation studies and other data sources described immediately above. Algorithmic details can be found in our Applied Optics paper. The fundamental bi-modal theory can be found in an earlier JGR paper.
   
• Atmospheric Environment paper on comparisons between sunphotometry and mult-angle LIDAR data acquired during the Pacific2001 experiment near Vancouver B.C.
   

Funded projects

• CALIPSO validation - CALIPSO analyis and validation ; application to model evaluation (CFCAS funded project)
   
• PEARL (Polar Environment Atmospheric Research Laboratory) CFI funded project led by Jim Drummond at the U. of T. Our participation involves two CIMEL sunphotometer for deployment during the Arctic summer and a starphotometer for deployment during the Arctic winter. Information on the surface station (OPAL) and the station at 600 meters (PEARL) can be found at the CANDAC web site
   
• GEM-AQ - Canadian air quality model. Our current activities (as part of MAQNet and funded by CANDAC) is in terms of evaluating the modelling of Arctic aerosols as measured using sunphotometry, ground-based and satellite-based (CALIOP) lidar backscatter profiles
   
• Aerosol Optical Network - is a part of a CFI funded project led by Jack McConnell at York University to enhance AEROCAN with new stations and starphotometers and to update existing lidar facilities with multi-spectral features.
   
• LIDAR/sun photometry - Aerosol remote sensing using passive sunphotometry and LIDAR backscatter; ground-based investigations into the information content of a multi-year combined data set (CFCAS funded project)
   
• Real time project; preparation for the assimilation of (near-real time) aerosol optical (AEROCAN) data into the Environment Canada assimilation system.