Secondary organic aerosol (SOA) accounts for a significant fraction of ambient tropospheric aerosol and a detailed knowledge of the formation, properties and transformation of SOA is therefore required to evaluate its impact on atmospheric processes, climate and human health. The chemical and physical processes associated with SOA formation are complex and varied, and, despite considerable prog...

Evaluation of the forcing of climate by aerosol scattering of shortwave radiation in cloud-free conditions (direct aerosol forcing) requires knowledge of aerosol optical properties on relevant spatial and temporal scales. It is convenient to measure these properties at the surface. However, before these measurements can be used to quantitatively estimate direct climate forcing, it is necessary ...

RESUME The MERIS L2 reflectance of the data product requires over land surface an atmospheric correction for the aerosol effect. For this purpose the determination of aerosol optical thickness will be done by the BAER (Bremen AErosol Retrieval) approach, modified for this type of data product. Validation and application of the retrieval of spectral aerosol optical thickness and its application ...

Modeling atmospheric aerosols containing a large organic fraction with unknown chemical composition and properties has been a constant challenge. The dissertation focuses on the theoretical treatment of the thermodynamic equilibrium of atmospheric aerosol involving organic species. We present a vapor pressure estimation method, based on quantum chemistry methods, to predict the liquid vapor pre...

Aerosol refractive index and size distribution estimations based on polarized atmospheric irradiance measurements are proposed together with its application to reflectance based vicarious calibration. A method for reflectance based vicarious calibration with aerosol refractive index and size distribution estimation using atmospheric polarization irradiance data is proposed. It is possible to es...

[1] An analysis of satellite and surface measurements of aerosol optical depth suggests that global average of aerosol optical depth has been recently decreasing at the rate of around 0.0014/a. This decrease is nonuniform with the fastest decrease observed over the United States and Europe. The observed rate of decreasing aerosol optical depth produces the top of the atmosphere radiative forcin...

The importance of the atmospheric deposition of biologically essential trace elements, especially iron, is widely recognized, as are the difficulties of accurately quantifying the rates of trace element wet and dry deposition and their fractional solubility. This paper summarizes some of the recent progress in this field, particularly that driven by the GEOTRACES, and other, international resea...

Atmospheric Chemistry and Physics Discussions This discussion paper is/has been under review for the journal Atmospheric Chemistry and Physics (ACP). Please refer to the corresponding final paper in ACP if available. Abstract We used chemical ionization mass spectrometry with a volatilization flow tube inlet (Aerosol-CIMS) to characterize secondary organic material formed by methylglyoxal with ...

A new paradigm in benchmark absorption-scattering radiative transfer is presented that enables both the globally averaged and spatially resolved testing of climate model radiation parameterizations in order to uncover persistent sources of biases in the aerosol instantaneous radiative effect (IRE). A proof of concept is demonstrated with the Geophysical Fluid Dynamics Laboratory AM4 and Communi...

Currently, there exists a great deal of uncertainty regarding atmospheric aerosols and the role that they play within the Earth’s atmosphere. It is known that atmospheric aerosols can play a role in the Earth’s climate by scattering and absorbing solar radiation or acting as a cloud condensation nuclei. The purpose of this work is to obtain an improved understanding of the chemistry of atmosphe...