• Korean Journal of Remote Sensing
• /
• v.22 no.6
• /
• pp.495-505
• /
• 2006

In order to classify aerosol type, Aerosol Optical Thickness (AOT) and Fine mode Fraction (FF), which is the optical thickness ratio of small particles$(<1{\mu}m)$ to total particles, data from MODIS (MODerate Imaging Spectraradiometer) aerosol products were analyzed over North-East Asia during one year period of 2005. A study area was in the ocean region of $20^{\circ}N\sim50^{\circ}N$ and $110^{\circ}E\simt50^{\circ}E$. Three main atmospheric aerosols such as dust, sea-salt, and pollution can be classified by using the relationship between AOT and FF. Dust aerosol has frequently observed over the study area with relatively high aerosol loading (AOT>0.3) of large particles (FF<0.65) and its contribution to total AOT in spring was up to 24.0%. Pollution aerosol, which is originated from anthropogenic sources as well as a natural process like biomass burning, has observed in the regime of high FF (>0.65) with wide AOT variation. Average pollution AOT was $0.31{\pm}0.05$ and its contribution to total AOT was 79.8% in summer. Characteristic of sea-salt aerosol was identified with low AOT (<0.3), almost below 0.1, and slightly higher FF than dust and lower FF than pollution. Seasonal analysis results show that maximum AOT $(0.33{\pm}0.11)$ with FF $(0.66{\pm}0.21)$ in spring and minimum AOT $(0.19{\pm}0.05)$, FF $(0.60{\pm}0.14)$ in fall were observed in the study area. Spatial characteristic was that AOT increasing trend is observed as closing to the eastern part of China due to transport of aerosols from China by the prevailing westerlies.