The air
is not empty.
An invisible world shapes our skies,
our climate, and the way we see Earth.
AEROSOLS · LIGHT · CLOUDS · CLIMATE · INDIA
Explore the scienceAlmost invisible.
Never insignificant.
Dust from a distant desert. Salt lifted from the sea. Smoke transformed by sunlight.
Aerosols are tiny solid particles and liquid droplets suspended in air. They scatter and absorb light, influence clouds, and connect faraway places through the atmosphere.
Meet the particlesConceptual particle illustrations · Shapes and sizes are not to a common scale.
One atmosphere.
Many ways to understand it.
Read in sequence, or begin with the question that draws you in.
- ORIGINS / SIZE / TRANSFORMATION
The invisible atmosphere
From a grain of dust to a changing particle population.
- SCATTERING / ABSORPTION / ENERGY
Light, particles & radiation
Why a beam dims, a sky brightens and an atmosphere heats.
- DROPLETS / ICE / CLIMATE
Aerosols, clouds & climate
The small seeds inside clouds, and the limits of prediction.
- DUST / SMOKE / MONSOON
India’s many atmospheres
Land, ocean, seasons and the geography of an aerosol mixture.
- WINDS / LAYERS / REMOVAL
Following particles across Earth
Distance is only half the story. Height changes everything.
- PHOTOMETRY / LIDAR / SATELLITES
Observing the invisible
Read sunlight, time a laser pulse, take a laboratory into the air.
- HYDERABAD / AHMEDABAD / 1991–1994
A volcano above India
How balloons and lidar followed the aftermath of Pinatubo.
- INDIAN OCEAN / DELHI / RANN
Discoveries & expeditions
An ocean crossing, a foggy city and a bright salt desert.
- PRL / NARL / SHARED DISCOVERY
The people behind the science
A research lineage built through instruments and collaboration.
Curvature and particle density are illustrative.
A volcano.
A distant sky.
An Indian research story.
When Pinatubo erupted in the Philippines, its influence reached far beyond the mountain. Over India, balloons and lasers helped reveal what remained in the sky.
Follow the volcanic layerS. Ramachandran, A. Jayaraman, Y. B. Acharya & B. H. Subbaraya
Follow
the light.
A change in the atmosphere can change what reaches the ground. Make the connection yourself.
Open the light labIndia is not
one atmosphere.
From ocean crossings to high-altitude layers, a place changes the questions we ask—and the instruments we need.
Approximate research locations · Coastlines: Natural Earth
AEROSOL RESEARCH / PRL / AHMEDABADBefore the data,
the people.
Every measurement begins with someone asking how to see what cannot be seen. Explore a research journey through instruments, collaborations and the questions they pursued.
Meet the science and its peopleThe aerosol research team at PRL, beside a bust of Vikram Sarabhai. A. Jayaraman’s personal archive.
Where will you
begin?
Start with a particle, follow a beam of sunlight, or join an expedition.