A. Pazmiño^1,2,3, E. Wolfram^1,4, D. Lazarte^1,5, J. Porteneuve², S. Godin-Beekmann2 and E. Quel¹

¹Centro de Investigaciones en Láseres y Aplicaciones (CITEFA-CONICET), Villa Martelli, Argentina
²Service d'Aéronomie, Institut Pierre Simon Laplace, CNRS, Paris, France
³Fellow of Estenssoro Grant of Repsol-YPF Foundation
⁴Fellow of CONICET
⁵Fellow of Universidad Nacional de General San Martín (UNSAM)

The CEILAP's (Centro de Investigaciones en Láseres y Aplicaciones) Stratospheric Ozone Lidar (SOL) system is undergoing several modifications and improvements. This system uses the DIfferential Absorption Lidar (DIAL) technique to retrieve the ozone profiles. This self-calibrating technique requires the emission of two laser beams characterized by a different absorption cross-section. Our system uses a wavelength at 308 nm emitted by a XeCl excimer laser as the strong line of ozone absorption. The reference wavelength corresponds to the third harmonic of a Nd:YAG laser (355 nm). The experimental improvement of our system concerns different changes in the transmitter, the receiver and the detection subsystems. A new laser will be used at the reference wavelength with a higher repetition rate that will reduce the acquisition time required for these measurements. The light collecting area of the receiver is increased four times, a detector is changed to include a mechanical chopper and the number of channels is increased to seven, where six of them will be used for ozone measurements. The elastically backscattered signals of the emitted wavelengths are detected at high and low energy, as well as the signals originating from the first Stokes nitrogen Raman spectrum. The Raman signals avoid the problems linked to the presence of volcanic stratospheric aerosols. The expected altitude range of the measured ozone profiles is between 15 and 45 km. The new system will be placed in a trailer. The goal is to measure the ozone vertical profile at different places in Argentina. The signals processing program will be presented in this work and also the scientific applications of this new system.