The impact of aerosol size-dependent hygroscopicity and mixing state on the cloud condensation nuclei potential over the north-east Atlantic

Xu et al. 2021

 

Cloud condensation nuclei (CCN) are an important topic in atmospheric studies, especially for evaluating the climate impact of aerosol. In this study, CCN closure is studied by using chemical composition based on an aerosol mass spectrometer (AMS) and hygroscopicity growth measurements based on a humidified tandem differential mobility analyzer (HTDMA) at the Mace Head atmospheric research station. The study further compared the results of using different methods to quantify the impact of size-dependent hygroscopicity and mixing state and found that ignoring size-dependent hygroscopicity induced overestimation of CCN number concentration (NCCN) by up to 12%, and ignoring a mixing state induced overestimation of NCCN by up to 15%.

Reference: Xu, W., Fossum, K. N., Ovadnevaite, J., et al. (2021). The impact of aerosol size-dependent hygroscopicity and mixing state on the cloud condensation nuclei potential over the north-east Atlantic. Atmos. Chem. Phys., 21, 8655–8675, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-21-8655-2021.

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