Advances in Day/Night Band Science and Applications: Making Good on Promises of the Moon

The Day/Night Band (DNB), part of the Visible Infrared Imaging Radiometer Suite (VIIRS) carried on the Suomi National Polar-orbiting Partnership (S-NPP) satellite and future members of the Joint Polar Satellite System (JPSS) series, continues to expand our range possibilities for characterizing the nocturnal environment. At the heart of many quantitative applications that utilize moonlight reflectance, such as nighttime cloud optical depth retrievals, is a top-of-atmosphere downwelling lunar irradiance model tailored to the Day/Night Band's spectral response. In this presentation we will detail our most recent results in validating this model vicariously—comparisons of long-term records of DNB day vs. night reflectance as measured at surface targets such as White Sands, NM, Salar de Uyuni, Bolivia, and deep convective clouds over the tropical Pacific. Selected imagery applications based on lunar reflectance will also be shown. Finally, we will provide an update on the DNB's unique sensitivity to atmospheric nightglow, and specifically perturbations thereof that are linked to atmospheric gravity waves launched by a variety of mechanisms. This novel and unforeseen capability offers a looking-glass into key energy transfer processes heretofore unobserved at sub-kilometer spatial resolution.