Dear AGU,

greetings from the middle of the Amazon Rainforest! We’re here at the Amazon Tall Tower Observatory, short ATTO. I’m standing on top of the tall tower, the heart of the observatory. It’s 325 m high (slightly taller than the Eiffel Tower) and looking down onto the rainforest below is quite a sight! The purpose of ATTO is to get a better understanding of how the Amazon rainforest interacts with the atmosphere. We also want to know how the forest influences weather and climate on different spatial and temporal scales and what impact climate change has. We measure greenhouse gases, meteorological data, VOC emissions from the forest biosphere and soils and observe cloud formation processes, among many other things. ATTO is in an ideal location to do so because it was built in an undisturbed section of the Amazon. The project is a cooperation between Brazil and Germany, and our scientific team includes people from many different countries and scientific fields, ranging from atmospheric physics over biology to ecology. It’s really cool to work with people from so many different backgrounds!

Cheers,

Sebastian

P.S.: I hope the fog clears out soon, so I can see the full glory of that sea of trees below, stretching to the horizon in all directions!

https://www.attoproject.org/