E. Krieg C. von Savigny S. Noel A. Reichl H. Bovensmann J.P. Burrows M. Gottwald 2007 The instrument SCIAMACHY onboard the European ENVISAT mission provides unique capabilities for deriving atmospheric geophysical parameters. Since its launch in early 2002 it has operated successfully in orbit. Due to ENVISAT’s high inclination orbit the polar regions are monitored continuously. We report here results about the status of the polar atmosphere in the past 5 years with special emphasis on the southern hemisphere. This part of the atmosphere is considered to be highly sensitive to anthropogenic impacts on the Earth system and thus to climate change. The acquired data permit retrieving information on the Earth’s atmosphere from troposphere up to the mesosphere application/pdf 10.3133/ofr20071047SRP011 en U.S. Geological Survey SCIAMACHY’s View of the Polar Atmosphere reports