Coastal-ART

About us

The Coastal Atmospheric Research Testbed (C-ART) has been recently established by IITM Pune at Andhra University in Visakhapatnam. The Open-Field Observatory of Coastal Atmospheric Research Testbed (C-ART) was inaugurated on 1st May 2026 by Dr. M. Ravichandran, Secretary, Ministry of Earth Sciences, in the august presence of Hon’ble Vice Chancellor Prof. G.P. Raja Sekhar, and Dr. Suryachandra Rao, Director, IITM, marking a significant milestone under the Mission Mausam initiative of the Ministry of Earth Sciences (MoES) aimed at enhancing the observational network and model prediction.

This Coastal Atmospheric Research Testbed (C-ART) will serve as a national user facility to provide research observations to support process-level diagnostics of monsoon convection, improve parameterization schemes in numerical weather prediction models, and enable data assimilation experiments for enhanced forecast skill and for model evaluation. This shall help in improving early warning systems for cyclones and extreme weather, supporting disaster management.

The future instruments for this testbed facility will include scanning wind lidar, polarimetric cloud and precipitation Doppler radars, phase array radars, proton transfer reaction mass spectrometer which will not only help us to understand the atmosphere better but also to predict the extremes with improved accuracy.

Objectives of C-ART

To understand the aerosol-CCN interaction, cloud microphysics, rain formation processes over the coastal environments and represent/modify/validate the physical processes in numerical models for the coastal environments utilising these in situ and remote sensing observations

Project Details

Observational Facilities at C-ART:

Cloud and rain microphysics:

Ceilometer
To study cloud properties like cloud base height, cloud depth, cloud layers, seasonal variability of clouds, etc. at three different sites around C-ART.
Impact Disdrometer
To study raindrop size distribution and rain rate.
2D Video Disdrometer
To study raindrop size distribution, rain rate, falling speed, and oblateness.

METEOROLOGY

Automatic Weather Station
To record surface-level ambient air temperature, relative humidity, atmospheric pressure, wind speed, wind direction and rain rate
3D PAWS system
To record surface-level ambient air temperature, relative humidity, atmospheric pressure, wind speed, wind direction and rain rate
Eddy covariance system
To measure vertical fluxes (including u and v components) of carbon di-oxide, water vapour, sensible heat flux, latent heat flux etc.

AEROSOL PHYSICS

Cloud Condensation Nuclei Counter
To study CCN activities of ambient aerosols
Scanning Mobility Particle Sizer
To measure size distribution, mean diameter, geometric mean diameter of the ambient aerosols
Nano- Condensation Nucleus Counter
To measure nucleation mode particles (1-10 nm), which are very useful for understanding the new particle formation events.

AEROSOL / GAS CHEMISTRY

Long Time of Flight Aerosol Mass Spectrometer
To study size-resolved chemistry of ambient aerosols
Proton Transfer Reaction Mass Spectrometry
To study Volatile Organic Compounds (VOCs), oxygenated VOCs, aerosols (offline and online both)
Aethalometer
Continuous monitoring of ambient black carbon.
TCA analyser
Continuous monitoring of ambient total organic carbon. The combination of TCA analyzer and Aethalometer is termed as CASS system.
Single Particle Soot Photometer-Extended range
For direct measurement of black carbon in individual aerosol particles.
PICCARO greenhouse gas analyser
Continuous monitoring of greenhouse gases over the C-ART site.

Project Activities

Extreme events observations

The project is dedicated to monitor the extreme events like low-pressure systems, cyclones, thunderstorm events to understand their dynamical and microphysical processes. Utilization of these datasets for improving the representation of these processes in the numerical modelling for better predictability

Future Plans

The future plan involves the installation of scanning wind lidar, polarimetric cloud and precipitation Doppler radars, phased array radars, storm chasing radars, etc. for monitoring of extreme events, which will further be useful for nowcasting.