Dear Colleagues,

It is our pleasure to organize a Special Issue of “Remote Sensing of Cloud and Aerosol Properties in a Three-Dimensional Atmosphere” in the journal Remote Sensing.
Clouds and aerosols play a vital role in modulating the radiative energy budget of the Earth-atmosphere system. They can interact with each other, as well as many other components of the Earth system, in various ways. Remote sensing is an invaluable source of observation for cloud and aerosol studies. In the traditional paradigm, “all sky” is divided into the “cloudy-sky” and “clear-sky” first. Then, cloud remote sensing is done only for cloudy sky and aerosol remote sensing for clear-sky. Moreover, almost all current cloud and aerosol remote sensing algorithms are based on one-dimensional (1-D) radiative transfer theory, which assumes cloud and aerosol fields to be plane-parallel. Similarly, clouds and aerosols are treated as plane-parallel mediums in most numerical weather and climate models. More and more studies have indicated that this traditional paradigm may not be appropriate in many circumstances, because clouds and aerosols often co-exist with each other and can have significant three-dimensional (3-D) structures and variations at various scales. 
This Special Issue invites recent theoretical, observational and technological studies that attempt to advance the 3-D remote sensing of clouds and aerosols. Potential topics for this Special Issue include, but are not limited to the following:

• The identification and reduction of the uncertainties and errors caused by 3-D radiative effects and unresolved small-scale horizontal variations in cloud and aerosol remote sensing, and in atmospheric correction for ocean color or other surface remote sensing.
• Theoretical and/or numerical studies of how 3-D radiative effects of clouds and aerosols influence cloud dynamics, surface energy budget, and land-air interactions.
• Remote sensing of aerosol properties in the vicinity of clouds.
• Advanced theories and novel techniques (e.g., machine learning) to retrieve the 3-D structure of clouds and aerosols.
• Sub-grid parameterization schemes to account for the impacts of small-scale cloud and aerosol variability on radiation simulations in global climate models.
• Advances in 3-D radiative transfer theory and models.

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Remote Sensing is an international peer-reviewed open access semimonthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2700 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

Dear Colleagues,

It is our pleasure to organize a Special Issue of “Remote Sensing of Cloud and Aerosol Properties in a Three-Dimensional Atmosphere” in the journal Remote Sensing.
Clouds and aerosols play a vital role in modulating the radiative energy budget of the Earth-atmosphere system. They can interact with each other, as well as many other components of the Earth system, in various ways. Remote sensing is an invaluable source of observation for cloud and aerosol studies. In the traditional paradigm, “all sky” is divided into the “cloudy-sky” and “clear-sky” first. Then, cloud remote sensing is done only for cloudy sky and aerosol remote sensing for clear-sky. Moreover, almost all current cloud and aerosol remote sensing algorithms are based on one-dimensional (1-D) radiative transfer theory, which assumes cloud and aerosol fields to be plane-parallel. Similarly, clouds and aerosols are treated as plane-parallel mediums in most numerical weather and climate models. More and more studies have indicated that this traditional paradigm may not be appropriate in many circumstances, because clouds and aerosols often co-exist with each other and can have significant three-dimensional (3-D) structures and variations at various scales. 
This Special Issue invites recent theoretical, observational and technological studies that attempt to advance the 3-D remote sensing of clouds and aerosols. Potential topics for this Special Issue include, but are not limited to the following:

• The identification and reduction of the uncertainties and errors caused by 3-D radiative effects and unresolved small-scale horizontal variations in cloud and aerosol remote sensing, and in atmospheric correction for ocean color or other surface remote sensing.
• Theoretical and/or numerical studies of how 3-D radiative effects of clouds and aerosols influence cloud dynamics, surface energy budget, and land-air interactions.
• Remote sensing of aerosol properties in the vicinity of clouds.
• Advanced theories and novel techniques (e.g., machine learning) to retrieve the 3-D structure of clouds and aerosols.
• Sub-grid parameterization schemes to account for the impacts of small-scale cloud and aerosol variability on radiation simulations in global climate models.
• Advances in 3-D radiative transfer theory and models.

Dr. Zhibo Zhang
Dr. Tamas Várnai
Dr. Hironobu Iwabuchi
Guest Editors

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