The scope of the project is to use the spectra measured by the SkySpec-2D - DOAS systems in San Pietro Capofiume (SPC, BO), and in Tor Vergata (Rome) to retrieve HCHO vertical cloumn densities (VCDs). The HCHO VCDs retrieved at SPC will be used together with NO2 VCDs to inverstigate their ratio woth respect to O3 values at surface, while the HCHO VCDs retrieved at Tor Vergata will be compared to the ones measured by the co-located Pandora instruments. In both cases comparisons with TROPOMI data will be performed.

Sun photometers are able to retrieve AOD only under cloudless (sun not obscured by clouds) conditions. Long term automated measurements use algorithms in order to identify and eliminate data affected by such cloud presence. Most algorithms are based on defining the limitations of short term changes of the radiative fields that can be attributed only to aerosols. We plan to try to combine instruments measuring at different frequencies and spectral resolutions in order to improve such algorithms especially in cases of clouds with low radiation related variability (e.g. cirrus) and aerosol cases with high variability (dust, smoke, pollution episodes etc), where the related uncertainties are higher. Also to use campaign based data from different instruments with different processing algorithms and measurement frequencies (e.g. CIMEL ~15min, PFR ~1 min) , in order to identify cloud elimination algorithm related advantages but also disadvantages.

In the last decades, several Mediterranean cyclones have attained similar cloud structures and comparable intensities to tropical cyclones. These systems compose a peculiar subcategory of Mediterranean cyclones, known in the scientific literature as medicanes (a portmanteau of the words Mediterranean hurricanes). Despite their limited number to about 1-3 events per year, medicanes are directly related with high impact weather and thus have been constantly attracting the interest of the scientific community, but also of open public. They often cause numerous fatalities and severe damages in several countries due to strong wind gusts, high sea waves and heavy rainfall. There is no doubt that medicanes constitute prominent environmental risks that affect more than 500 million people in one of the most densely populated regions of the world. In this project we will rely on Earth Observations (EO) to provide a comprehensive approach on the problem of increasing our understandying of medicanes, better forecasting their occurrence and quantifying the limitations of atmospheric modelling in reproducing relevant high-impact weather.

Questo progetto vuole identificare quali comunità di piante sono e saranno particolarmente
sensibili ai cambiamenti climatici in corso e alle specie invasive, in relazione anche ai
cambiamenti di disponibilità dei nutrienti (specie azoto, fosforo e il loro rapporto).
L’obiettivo finale del partner italiano, CNR-ISAC, è prevedere i probabili cambiamenti futuri
nell'assemblaggio della comunità e nei modelli di diversità, come conseguenza di i) espansione
di specie comuni e invasive; ii) migrazione verso nord di specie dall'Europa meridionale a causa
del cambiamento climatico.