The « FENNEC » project aims to gain a better understanding of the Saharan climate and is particularly interested in the mesoscale physico-chemical processes involved in the central Sahara region.
The project aims to characterise the dynamics, thermodynamics and composition of particles over the desert, in the Saharan atmospheric boundary layer and in the free troposphere, and to assess their representation in global and regional models. A second objective is to study the mechanisms by which desert aerosols are lifted at source, as a function of surface and meteorological conditions, in order to improve dust storm forecasts in the central Sahara region.