| 1. |
- Kulmala, M., et al.
(författare)
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General overview: European Integrated project on Aerosol Cloud Climate and Air Quality interactions (EUCAARI) - integrating aerosol research from nano to global scales
- 2011
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Ingår i: Atmospheric Chemistry And Physics. - : Copernicus GmbH. - 1680-7316 .- 1680-7324. ; 11:24, s. 13061-13143
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- In this paper we describe and summarize the main achievements of the European Aerosol Cloud Climate and Air Quality Interactions project (EUCAARI). EUCAARI started on 1 January 2007 and ended on 31 December 2010 leaving a rich legacy including: (a) a comprehensive database with a year of observations of the physical, chemical and optical properties of aerosol particles over Europe, (b) comprehensive aerosol measurements in four developing countries, (c) a database of airborne measurements of aerosols and clouds over Europe during May 2008, (d) comprehensive modeling tools to study aerosol processes fron nano to global scale and their effects on climate and air quality. In addition a new Pan-European aerosol emissions inventory was developed and evaluated, a new cluster spectrometer was built and tested in the field and several new aerosol parameterizations and computations modules for chemical transport and global climate models were developed and evaluated. These achievements and related studies have substantially improved our understanding and reduced the uncertainties of aerosol radiative forcing and air quality-climate interactions. The EUCAARI results can be utilized in European and global environmental policy to assess the aerosol impacts and the corresponding abatement strategies.
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| 2. |
- Mann, G. W., et al.
(författare)
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Intercomparison and evaluation of global aerosol microphysical properties among AeroCom models of a range of complexity
- 2014
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Ingår i: Atmospheric Chemistry And Physics. - : Copernicus GmbH. - 1680-7316 .- 1680-7324. ; 14:9, s. 4679-4713
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Many of the next generation of global climate models will include aerosol schemes which explicitly simulate the microphysical processes that determine the particle size distribution. These models enable aerosol optical properties and cloud condensation nuclei (CCN) concentrations to be determined by fundamental aerosol processes, which should lead to a more physically based simulation of aerosol direct and indirect radiative forcings. This study examines the global variation in particle size distribution simulated by 12 global aerosol microphysics models to quantify model diversity and to identify any common biases against observations. Evaluation against size distribution measurements from a new European network of aerosol supersites shows that the mean model agrees quite well with the observations at many sites on the annual mean, but there are some seasonal biases common to many sites. In particular, at many of these European sites, the accumulation mode number concentration is biased low during winter and Aitken mode concentrations tend to be overestimated in winter and underestimated in summer. At high northern latitudes, the models strongly underpredict Aitken and accumulation particle concentrations compared to the measurements, consistent with previous studies that have highlighted the poor performance of global aerosol models in the Arctic. In the marine boundary layer, the models capture the observed meridional variation in the size distribution, which is dominated by the Aitken mode at high latitudes, with an increasing concentration of accumulation particles with decreasing latitude. Considering vertical profiles, the models reproduce the observed peak in total particle concentrations in the upper troposphere due to new particle formation, although modelled peak concentrations tend to be biased high over Europe. Overall, the multimodel-mean data set simulates the global variation of the particle size distribution with a good degree of skill, suggesting that most of the individual global aerosol microphysics models are performing well, although the large model diversity indicates that some models are in poor agreement with the observations. Further work is required to better constrain size-resolved primary and secondary particle number sources, and an improved understanding of nucleation and growth (e. g. the role of nitrate and secondary organics) will improve the fidelity of simulated particle size distributions.
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| 3. |
- Monks, P. S., et al.
(författare)
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Atmospheric composition change : global and regional air quality
- 2009
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Ingår i: Atmospheric Environment. - : Elsevier BV. - 1352-2310 .- 1873-2844. ; 43:33, s. 5268-5350
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Forskningsöversikt (refereegranskat)abstract
- Air quality transcends all scales with in the atmosphere from the local to the global with handovers and feedbacks at each scale interaction. Air quality has manifold effects on health, ecosystems heritage and, climate. In this review the state of scientific understanding in relation to global and regional air quality is outlined. The review discusses air quality, in terms of emissions, processing and transport of trace gases and aerosols. New insights into the characterization of both natural and anthropogenic emissions are reviewed looking at both natural (e.g. dust and lightning) as well as plant emissions. Trends in anthropogenic emissions both by region and globally are discussed as well as biomass burning emissions. In terms of chemical processing the major air quality elements of ozone, non-methane hydrocarbons, nitrogen oxides and aerosols are covered. A number of topics are presented as a way of integrating the process view into the atmospheric context; these include the atmospheric oxidation efficiency, halogen and HOx chemistry, nighttime chemistry, tropical chemistry, heat waves, megacities, biomass burning and the regional hot spot of the Mediterranean. New findings with respect to the transport of pollutants across the scales are discussed, in particular the move to quantify the impact of long-range transport on regional air quality. Gaps and research questions that remain intractable are identified. The review concludes with a focus of research and policy questions for the coming decade. In particular, the policy challenges for concerted air quality and climate change policy (co-benefit) are discussed.
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| 4. |
- Kiendler-Scharr, A., et al.
(författare)
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Ubiquity of organic nitrates from nighttime chemistry in the European submicron aerosol
- 2016
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Ingår i: Geophysical Research Letters. - 0094-8276. ; 43:14, s. 7735-7744
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- In the atmosphere nighttime removal of volatile organic compounds is initiated to a large extent by reaction with the nitrate radical (NO3) forming organic nitrates which partition between gas and particulate phase. Here we show based on particle phase measurements performed at a suburban site in the Netherlands that organic nitrates contribute substantially to particulate nitrate and organic mass. Comparisons with a chemistry transport model indicate that most of the measured particulate organic nitrates are formed by NO3 oxidation. Using aerosol composition data from three intensive observation periods at numerous measurement sites across Europe, we conclude that organic nitrates are a considerable fraction of fine particulate matter (PM1) at the continental scale. Organic nitrates represent 34% to 44% of measured submicron aerosol nitrate and are found at all urban and rural sites, implying a substantial potential of PM reduction by NOx emission control.
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| 5. |
- Wiedensohler, A., et al.
(författare)
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Mobility particle size spectrometers: harmonization of technical standards and data structure to facilitate high quality long-term observations of atmospheric particle number size distributions
- 2012
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Ingår i: Atmospheric Measurement Techniques. - : Copernicus GmbH. - 1867-1381 .- 1867-8548. ; 5:3, s. 657-685
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Mobility particle size spectrometers often referred to as DMPS (Differential Mobility Particle Sizers) or SMPS (Scanning Mobility Particle Sizers) have found a wide range of applications in atmospheric aerosol research. However, comparability of measurements conducted world-wide is hampered by lack of generally accepted technical standards and guidelines with respect to the instrumental set-up, measurement mode, data evaluation as well as quality control. Technical standards were developed for a minimum requirement of mobility size spectrometry to perform long-term atmospheric aerosol measurements. Technical recommendations include continuous monitoring of flow rates, temperature, pressure, and relative humidity for the sheath and sample air in the differential mobility analyzer. We compared commercial and custom-made inversion routines to calculate the particle number size distributions from the measured electrical mobility distribution. All inversion routines are comparable within few per cent uncertainty for a given set of raw data. Furthermore, this work summarizes the results from several instrument intercomparison workshops conducted within the European infrastructure project EUSAAR (European Supersites for Atmospheric Aerosol Research) and ACTRIS (Aerosols, Clouds, and Trace gases Research InfraStructure Network) to determine present uncertainties especially of custom-built mobility particle size spectrometers. Under controlled laboratory conditions, the particle number size distributions from 20 to 200 nm determined by mobility particle size spectrometers of different design are within an uncertainty range of around +/- 10% after correcting internal particle losses, while below and above this size range the discrepancies increased. For particles larger than 200 nm, the uncertainty range increased to 30%, which could not be explained. The network reference mobility spectrometers with identical design agreed within +/- 4% in the peak particle number concentration when all settings were done carefully. The consistency of these reference instruments to the total particle number concentration was demonstrated to be less than 5%. Additionally, a new data structure for particle number size distributions was introduced to store and disseminate the data at EMEP (European Monitoring and Evaluation Program). This structure contains three levels: raw data, processed data, and final particle size distributions. Importantly, we recommend reporting raw measurements including all relevant instrument parameters as well as a complete documentation on all data transformation and correction steps. These technical and data structure standards aim to enhance the quality of long-term size distribution measurements, their comparability between different networks and sites, and their transparency and traceability back to raw data.
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| 6. |
- Crippa, M., et al.
(författare)
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Organic aerosol components derived from 25 AMS data sets across Europe using a consistent ME-2 based source apportionment approach
- 2014
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Ingår i: Atmospheric Chemistry and Physics. - : Copernicus GmbH. - 1680-7324. ; 14:12, s. 6159-6176
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Organic aerosols (OA) represent one of the major constituents of submicron particulate matter (PM1) and comprise a huge variety of compounds emitted by different sources. Three intensive measurement field campaigns to investigate the aerosol chemical composition all over Europe were carried out within the framework of the European Integrated Project on Aerosol Cloud Climate and Air Quality Interactions (EUCAARI) and the intensive campaigns of European Monitoring and Evaluation Programme (EMEP) during 2008 (May-June and September-October) and 2009 (February-March). In this paper we focus on the identification of the main organic aerosol sources and we define a standardized methodology to perform source apportionment using positive matrix factorization (PMF) with the multilinear engine (ME-2) on Aerodyne aerosol mass spectrometer (AMS) data. Our source apportionment procedure is tested and applied on 25 data sets accounting for two urban, several rural and remote and two high altitude sites; therefore it is likely suitable for the treatment of AMS-related ambient data sets. For most of the sites, four organic components are retrieved, improving significantly previous source apportionment results where only a separation in primary and secondary OA sources was possible. Generally, our solutions include two primary OA sources, i.e. hydrocarbon-like OA (HOA) and biomass burning OA (BBOA) and two secondary OA components, i.e. semi-volatile oxygenated OA (SV-OOA) and low-volatility oxygenated OA (LV-OOA). For specific sites cooking-related (COA) and marine-related sources (MSA) are also separated. Finally, our work provides a large overview of organic aerosol sources in Europe and an interesting set of highly time resolved data for modeling purposes.
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| 7. |
- Dall'Osto, M., et al.
(författare)
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Novel insights on new particle formation derived from a pan-european observing system
- 2018
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Ingår i: Scientific Reports. - : Springer Science and Business Media LLC. - 2045-2322. ; 8
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- The formation of new atmospheric particles involves an initial step forming stable clusters less than a nanometre in size (similar to 10 nm). Although at times, the same species can be responsible for both processes, it is thought that more generally each step comprises differing chemical contributors. Here, we present a novel analysis of measurements from a unique multi-station ground-based observing system which reveals new insights into continental-scale patterns associated with new particle formation. Statistical cluster analysis of this unique 2-year multi-station dataset comprising size distribution and chemical composition reveals that across Europe, there are different major seasonal trends depending on geographical location, concomitant with diversity in nucleating species while it seems that the growth phase is dominated by organic aerosol formation. The diversity and seasonality of these events requires an advanced observing system to elucidate the key processes and species driving particle formation, along with detecting continental scale changes in aerosol formation into the future.
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| 8. |
- Fountoukis, C., et al.
(författare)
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Organic aerosol concentration and composition over Europe: insights from comparison of regional model predictions with aerosol mass spectrometer factor analysis
- 2014
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Ingår i: Atmospheric Chemistry and Physics. - : Copernicus GmbH. - 1680-7324. ; 14:17, s. 9061-9076
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- A detailed three-dimensional regional chemical transport model (Particulate Matter Comprehensive Air Quality Model with Extensions, PMCAMx) was applied over Europe, focusing on the formation and chemical transformation of organic matter. Three periods representative of different seasons were simulated, corresponding to intensive field campaigns. An extensive set of AMS measurements was used to evaluate the model and, using factor-analysis results, gain more insight into the sources and transformations of organic aerosol (OA). Overall, the agreement be-tween predictions and measurements for OA concentration is encouraging, with the model reproducing two-thirds of the data (daily average mass concentrations) within a factor of 2. Oxygenated OA (OOA) is predicted to contribute 93% to total OA during May, 87% during winter and 96% during autumn, with the rest consisting of fresh primary OA (POA). Predicted OOA concentrations compare well with the observed OOA values for all periods, with an average fractional error of 0.53 and a bias equal to -0.07 (mean error = 0.9 mu g m(-3), mean bias =-0.2 mu g m(-3)). The model systematically underpredicts fresh POA at most sites during late spring and autumn (mean bias up to -0.8 mu g m(-3)). Based on results from a source apportionment algorithm running in parallel with PMCAMx, most of the POA originates from biomass burning (fires and residential wood combustion), and therefore biomass burning OA is most likely underestimated in the emission inventory. The sensitivity of POA predictions to the corresponding emissions' volatility distribution is discussed. The model performs well at all sites when the Positive Matrix Factorization (PMF)-estimated low-volatility OOA is compared against the OA with saturation concentrations of the OA surrogate species C* <= 0.1 mu g m(-3) and semivolatile OOA against the OA with C* > 0.1 mu g m(-3).
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| 9. |
- Fowler, D., et al.
(författare)
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Atmospheric composition change : Ecosystems-Atmosphere interactions
- 2009
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Ingår i: Atmospheric Environment. - : Elsevier BV. - 1352-2310 .- 1873-2844. ; 43:33, s. 5193-5267
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Forskningsöversikt (refereegranskat)abstract
- Ecosystems and the atmosphere: This review describes the state of understanding the processes involved in the exchange of trace gases and aerosols between the earth's surface and the atmosphere. The gases covered include NO, NO2, HONO, HNO3, NH3, SO2, DMS, Biogenic VOC, O-3, CH4, N2O and particles in the size range 1 nm-10 mu m including organic and inorganic chemical species. The main focus of the review is on the exchange between terrestrial ecosystems, both managed and natural and the atmosphere, although some new developments in ocean-atmosphere exchange are included. The material presented is biased towards the last decade, but includes earlier work, where more recent developments are limited or absent. New methodologies and instrumentation have enabled, if not driven technical advances in measurement. These developments have advanced the process understanding and upscaling of fluxes, especially for particles, VOC and NH3. Examples of these applications include mass spectrometric methods, such as Aerosol Mass Spectrometry (AMS) adapted for field measurement of atmosphere-surface fluxes using micrometeorological methods for chemically resolved aerosols. Also briefly described are some advances in theory and techniques in micrometeorology. For some of the compounds there have been paradigm shifts in approach and application of both techniques and assessment. These include flux measurements over marine surfaces and urban areas using micrometeorological methods and the up-scaling of flux measurements using aircraft and satellite remote sensing. The application of a flux-based approach in assessment of O-3 effects on vegetation at regional scales is an important policy linked development secured through improved quantification of fluxes. The coupling of monitoring, modelling and intensive flux measurement at a continental scale within the NitroEurope network represents a quantum development in the application of research teams to address the underpinning science of reactive nitrogen in the cycling between ecosystems and the atmosphere in Europe. Some important developments of the science have been applied to assist in addressing policy questions, which have been the main driver of the research agenda, while other developments in understanding have not been applied to their wider field especially in chemistry-transport models through deficiencies in obtaining appropriate data to enable application or inertia within the modelling community. The paper identifies applications, gaps and research questions that have remained intractable at least since 2000 within the specialized sections of the paper, and where possible these have been focussed on research questions for the coming decade.
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| 10. |
- Paramonov, M., et al.
(författare)
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A synthesis of cloud condensation nuclei counter (CCNC) measurements within the EUCAARI network
- 2015
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Ingår i: Atmospheric Chemistry and Physics. - : Copernicus GmbH. - 1680-7324. ; 15:21, s. 12211-12229
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Cloud condensation nuclei counter (CCNC) measurements performed at 14 locations around the world within the European Integrated project on Aerosol Cloud Climate and Air Quality interactions (EUCAARI) framework have been analysed and discussed with respect to the cloud condensation nuclei (CCN) activation and hygroscopic properties of the atmospheric aerosol. The annual mean ratio of activated cloud condensation nuclei (N-CCN) to the total number concentration of particles (N-CN), known as the activated fraction A, shows a similar functional dependence on supersaturation S at many locations - exceptions to this being certain marine locations, a free troposphere site and background sites in south-west Germany and northern Finland. The use of total number concentration of particles above 50 and 100 nm diameter when calculating the activated fractions (A(50) and A(100), respectively) renders a much more stable dependence of A on S; A(50) and A(100) also reveal the effect of the size distribution on CCN activation. With respect to chemical composition, it was found that the hygroscopicity of aerosol particles as a function of size differs among locations. The hygroscopicity parameter kappa decreased with an increasing size at a continental site in south-west Germany and fluctuated without any particular size dependence across the observed size range in the remote tropical North Atlantic and rural central Hungary. At all other locations kappa increased with size. In fact, in Hyytiala, Vavihill, Jungfraujoch and Pallas the difference in hygroscopicity between Aitken and accumulation mode aerosol was statistically significant at the 5% significance level. In a boreal environment the assumption of a size-independent kappa can lead to a potentially substantial overestimation of N-CCN at S levels above 0.6 %. The same is true for other locations where kappa was found to increase with size. While detailed information about aerosol hygroscopicity can significantly improve the prediction of N-CCN, total aerosol number concentration and aerosol size distribution remain more important parameters. The seasonal and diurnal patterns of CCN activation and hygroscopic properties vary among three long-term locations, highlighting the spatial and temporal variability of potential aerosol-cloud interactions in various environments.
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