Abstract: Atmospheric aerosol is an indispensable component of the atmosphere composition, and the aerosol optical depth is one of most important parameters of atmospheric aerosol. In March 2013, we established a Sun photometer, MICROTOPS II, in the National Field Station for Forest Ecosystem in Shennongjia, Hubei and Shennongjia Biodiversity Location Research Station, Chinese Academy of Sciences (“Shennongjia Station” for short), located on the southern slope of Shennongjia Mountain. We recorded the aerosol optical depth of 440 nm to 936 nm from 2013 to 2018 by the Sun photometer. The qualified dataset for the aerosol optical depth was the first empirical records for the aerosol optical depth in southern slope of Shennongjia Mountain. After collecting the original record data, we checked the integrity of the original data file, filtered out the outliers and calculate the average value of monthly observation values and angstrom parameters to create this dataset. The dataset could be used as a reference for the exploration of the aerosol variation and climate change; it could also provide empirical data for the remote sensing inversion and model establishment for the aerosol optical depth.
Keywords: atmospheric aerosol; aerosol optical depth; Shennongjia; location monitoring