Performance Study for a New-Generation MIPAS Experiment

The MIPAS experiment was conceived more than twenty years ago. In this time lapse new technologies have evolved and lessons have been learnt from the analysis of about ten years of measurements. It is therefore meaningful to investigate the performance of a similar experiment that exploits technological aspects not available at the time MIPAS was designed. In particular we examine here a MIPAS-like experiment that exploits the array detector technology to observe the atmosphere at the limb. The characterization (achieved along the full mission) of MIPAS measurements is used to identify observational parameters for this new experiment and to develop a retrieval strategy that enables to measure the status of the stratosphere and upper troposphere with precision and spatial resolutions that could not be achieved when MIPAS was designed. For this feasibility study we consider temperature and O3 volume mixing ratio profiles as targets and we exploit the Information Load analysis to select suitable spectral intervals for the retrievals. We introduce a new approach to the 2D retrieval strategy that is consistent with the Information Load analysis and we assess precision and spatial resolution of the products by means of retrievals on simulated observations. The new approach is efficient when, as for the considered experiment, the Information Load content of the observations allows for very high spatial resolution.