The Finnish Meteorological Institute (FMI), one of the most research-intensive meteorological services in the world, has joined the Flex consortium. The Atmospheric Radiation group of FMI will bring its expertize on remote sensing of aerosols and clouds to the Flex L2 Study.
The Finnish Meteorological Institute (FMI) works for the safety and successful development of the Finnish society providing high-quality services and scientific know-how on the weather, atmosphere and seas. FMI is one of the most research-intensive meteorological services in the world, as illustrated by the highest number of international peer-reviewed publications (based on the latest benchmarking survey of national meteorological institutes) from a meteorological institute. It produces more than 350 peer-reviewed publications per year which receive more than 12000 citations. FMI is regarded as a world expert in aerosol physics, including the radiative effects and satellite retrieval algorithms. FMI employs approximately 650 people, about 350 of which are involved in research programs focused on Climate Change, Air Quality, Atmospheric composition and chemistry, Meteorology, Marine Research, Earth Observation, and Arctic Research.
The Atmospheric Radiation group of FMI, which has joined to the FLEX L1B to L2 scientific study, focuses on remote sensing of aerosols and clouds, both in the algorithm development and in the use of satellite measurements in various scientific studies. This group is led by the Research Professor Antti Arola and it has a total of 15 group members. The main focus of the algorithm development has been applied to AATSR, MODIS and SLSTR. The Atmospheric Radiation group also encompasses a strong background on ground-based remote sensing measurements, particularly on developing methods to infer information about absorbing aerosol speciation, as well as a deep knowledge of atmospheric radiative transfer and inversion problems.