Heavy ozone distribution in the stratosphere from far‐infrared observations

Abstract

The distribution of isotopically heavy ozone in the stratosphere has been obtained from an analysis of balloon‐based high‐resolution thermal emission spectra in the far infrared. The mixing ratio profiles of 16 O 16 O 18 O and 16 O 18 O 16 O retrieved from inversion of several limb sequences of a number of spectral lines in the 39–76 cm −1 region, indicate enhancements over the expected values in the 25‐ to 37‐km altitude range. The ratio of total heavy isotopic ozone 50 O 3 to normal 48 O 3 shows enhancements of ∼45% at 37 km, decreasing to a minimum of ∼13% at ∼29 km, and increasing to ∼18% at 25 km. The results from this work are compared with Mauersberger's (1987) in situ mass spectrometer measurements.