Study of seasonal distribution of dust in the Middle East region using CALIOP and MODIS data

Aerosol optical depth in 550 nm and angstrom exponent measurements with MODIS have been studied with 1-degree resolution for the period 2006-2017 in the middle east. Moreover, tropospheric aerosol optical depth and depolarization ratios measured at 532 nm with CALIOP have been studied for same area and same period of time too. These parameters have been classified seasonally. Optical depth results show high values for the region especially in spring and summer seasons. During the cold seasons, optical depth values are much less compared with their values at warm seasons. At spring, dust sources located in northern Iraq and those located in central and northern parts of Arabian Peninsula are much more active. Sources located in southern parts of Arabian Peninsula get more active by summer. Angstrom exponent results show that in arid and semi-arid parts of middle east, aerosol sizes are mainly in coarse mode. In arid parts of Iraq and Arabian Peninsula coarse mode particles are dominant during 4 seasons, but for arid parts inside Iran coarse mode is dominant during warm seasons and a modification in suspended particle sizes can be seen during cold seasons. Depolarization measurements of CALIOP show that almost in all seasons, non-spherical particles are ready in middle east atmosphere which is usual for an area inside the dust belt.