Aerosol and Rainfall variability over the Northern African Sahel

The main objective of this study is to show the link between African Aerosol and Rainfall variability in the North African Sahel. In this study, I use more recent satellite data of high resolution and quality to investigate the extent to which the observed large-scale relationship between the two can be interpreted as an aerosol effect on precipitation. I want to list out the main objectives as follows: To show the relationship between Aerosols, water vapor and rainfall in the Northern African Sahel. Using statistical methods of correlation and regression (forecast) by taking a 6-month time lag, which is the most appropriate time lag that we found after repeated checking of the correlation factor R. To check out the forecasted value of rain fall in the year 2002 using a predictor of the four parameters (total optical depth, dust, anthropogenic and fine mode aerosols)to identify the major types of aerosols that contributes the precipitation variability over the Northern African Sahel. To show the seasonal distribution of aerosols (by plotting their time series), this leads to seasonal variability of precipitation over the northern African Sahel.