Hygroscopic growth of aerosol scattering coefficient:A comparative analysis between urban and suburban sites at winter in Beijing

A humidity controlled inlet system was developed to measure the hygroscopic growth of aerosol scattering coefficient in conjunction with nephelometry at an urban site of Chinese Academy of Meteorological Sciences （CAMS） in Beijing and a rural site at Shangdianzi Regional Background Air Pollution Monitoring Station （SDZ） outside Beijing during winter, from December 2005 to January 2006. Measurements were carded out at a wavelength of 525 nm with an Ecotech M9003 nephelometer. The hygroscopic growth function （or factor） of the aerosol scattering coefficientf（RH） increased continuously with increasing relative humidity （RH） and showed no obvious ＂step-like＂ deliquescent behavior at both sites during the experiment. The average growth factorf（RH） at the SDZ site could reach 1.5 when RH increased from less than 40% to 92%, and to 2.1 at the CAMS site when RH increased from less than 40% to 93%. The average hygroscopic growth factor at a relative humidity of 80%, f（RH = 80 ± 1%）, was found to be about 1.26 ±0.15 at CAMS and 1.24 ±0.11 at SDZ. Further analysis indicated that under relatively polluted conditions, the average hygroscopic growth factor was higher at the CAMS site than that at the SDZ site. However, under relatively clean air conditions, the difference between the two sites was small, showing a hygroscopic growth behavior similar to those of burning biomass or blowing dust. These results reflected the different characteristics of aerosol types at the two sites.

Rlationship between the aerosol scattering ratio and temperature of atmosphere and the sensitivity of a Doppler wind lidar with iodine filter

The sensitivity of Doppler wind lidar is an important parameter which affects the performance of Doppler wind lidar. Aerosol scattering ratio, atmospheric temperature, and wind speed obviously affect the measurement of Doppler wind lidar with iodine filter. We discuss about the relationship between the measurement sensitivity and the above atmospheric parameters. The numerical relationship between them is given through the theoretical simulation and calculation.

Scattering Properties of Atmospheric Aerosols over Lanzhou City and Applications Using an Integrating Nephelometer

The data, measured by a three-wavelength Integrating Nephelometer over Lanzhou City during the winters of 2001/2002 and 2002/2003 respectively, have been analyzed for investigating the scattering properties of atmospheric aerosols and exploring their relationship and the status of air pollution. The aerosol particle volume distribution is inverted with the measured spectral scattering coe?cients. The results show that the daily variation of the aerosol scattering coe?cients is in a tri-peak shape. The average ratio of backscattering coe?cient to total scattering coe?cient at 550 nm is 0.158; there exists an excellent correlation between the scattering coe?cients and the concentration of PM10. The average ratio of the concentration of PM10 to the scattering coe?cients is 0.37 g m?2, which is contingent on the optical parameters of aerosol particles such as the size distribution, etc.; an algorithm is developed for inverting the volume distribution of aerosol particles by using the histogram and Monte-Carlo techniques, and the test results show that the inversion is reasonable.

Multiple scattering of light by water cloud droplets with external and internal mixing of black carbon aerosols

The mixture of water cloud droplets with black carbon impurities is modeled by external and internal mixing models.The internal mixing model is modeled with a two-layered sphere（water cloud droplets containing black carbon（BC） inclusions）,and the single scattering and absorption characteristics are calculated at the visible wavelength of 0.55 μm by using the Lorenz-Mie theory.The external mixing model is developed assuming that the same amount of BC particles are mixed with the water droplets externally.The multiple scattering characteristics are computed by using the Monte Carlo method.The results show that when the size of the BC aerosol is small,the reflection intensity of the internal mixing model is bigger than that of the external mixing model.However,if the size of the BC aerosol is big,the absorption of the internal mixing model will be larger than that of the external mixing model.

Measurement and analysis of ozone, ultraviolet B and aerosol light scattering coefficients in the Arctic

Tropospheric ozone （O3）, ultraviolet B （UVB） radiation and aerosol light scattering coefficients （SC） were investigated on a cruise ship during the fourth Chinese National Arctic Research Expedition from July 1 September 20, 2010. The results showed that O3, UVB and SC decreased with increasing latitude, with minimum values recorded in the central Arctic Ocean. Average O3 concentrations were 15.9 ppbv and 15.1 ppbv in the Bering Sea and Arctic Ocean, respectively. Ozone concentrations increased to 17.5 ppbv in the high Arctic region. Average UVB values were 0.26 W.m-2 and 0.14 W.m-2 in the Bering Sea and Arctic Ocean, respectively. The average SC in the Bering Sea was 4.3 M.m-1, more than twice the value measured in the Arctic Ocean, which had an average value of 1.7 M.m-1. Overall, UVB and SC values were stable in the central Arctic Ocean.

A New Way to Study Water-Vapor Absorption Coefficient

In the visible spectrum, the atmospheric attenuations to sunlight mainly include aerosol scattering, atmospheric molecule Rayleigh scattering and ozone absorption, while in the near-infrared spectrum (from 650 nm to 1 000 nm), we must take water-vapor absorption into account. Based on the atmospheric correction theory, using spectrum irradiance data measured by Instantaneous Ground spectrometer, ozone content measured by Microtops Ⅱozone monitor, water-vapor content and aerosol optical thickness measured by sun photometer, we give a new way to study water-vapor absorption to sunlight, and the result shows that the main peak values of water-vapor absorption coefficients are 0.025 cm-1, 0.073 cm-1, 0.124 cm-1, 0.090 cm-1, 0.141 cm-1 and 0.417 cm-1, which respectively lie at 692 nm, 725 nm, 761 nm, 818 nm, 912 nm and 937 nm.

Atmospheric temperature dependence of the aerosol backscattering coefficient

In extracting vertical profiles of aerosol backscattering coefficient from lidar signals, the effects of atmo- spheric temperature are usually ignored, In this study, these effects are analyzed using a rotational Raman-Mie lidar system, which is capable of simultaneously measuring atmospheric temperature and vertical profiles of aerosols, A method is presented to correct the aerosol backscattering coefficient using atmospheric temperature profiles, obtained from Raman scattering signals. The differences in the extracted aerosol backscattering coefficient with and without considering temperature effects are fur- ther discussed. The backscattering coefficients for scattering off clouds are shown to be more sensitive to temperature than that of aerosols and atmosphere molecules; the aerosol backscattering coefficient is more sensitive to temperature in summer due to higher atmospheric temperatures,

Observation Study of Aerosol Radiative Properities over China

With a simplified radiation balance model, study is performed of aerosol direct radiation forcing in relation to its optical properties and surface reflectance, indicating that with the thickened aerosol layer the earth-atmosphere system may increase or weaken the solar radiation albedo, depending upon different combinations of aerosol single scattering albedo （SSA, ω^-o）, asymmetry factor （g）, and surface albedo （ag） rather than relying directly on the aerosol optical depth （δ）, which has its value just in proportion to the changed range of albedo alone. As indicated by the model results, systematic observations of aerosol radiative properties are required to make quantitative study of aerosol direct radiative forcing. Observational research of the properties has been undertaken based on ground and space measurements over China, including ground-based sunphotometeraerosol optical depth （AOD）, nephelometer-aerosol scattering coefficients, aethalometer-aerosol absorption coefficients, and MODIS products-retrieved AOD. The satellite retrieved AOD is validated against in situ sun photometer measured AOD, indicating that for eastern China remote sensing given AODs are acceptable owing mainly to lower surface reflectance there whereas for poor vegetation in the north of China the surface reflectance may be underestimated in AOD retrieval. However, appropriate modification of the scheme of aerosol remote sensing is likely to improve the retrieval accuracy. The aerosol single scattering albedo in dry condition is around 0.80 from surface-measured scattering and absorption coefficients. It requires further studies based on more observations to improve our understanding of the issue.

Jacobian matrix for near-infrared remote sensing based on vector radiative transfer model

Due to the polarization effects of the Earth’s surface reflection and atmospheric particles’scattering,high-precision retrieval of atmospheric parameters from near-infrared satellite data requires accurate vector atmospheric radiative transfer simulations.This paper presents a near-infrared vector radiative transfer model based on the doubling and adding method.This new model utilizes approximate calculations of the atmospheric transmittance,reflection,and solar scattering radiance for a finitely thin atmospheric layer.To verify its accuracy,the results for four typical scenarios(single molecular layer with Rayleigh scattering,single aerosol layer scattering,multi-layer Rayleigh scattering,and true atmospheric with multi-layer molecular absorption,Rayleigh and aerosol scattering)were compared with benchmarks from a well-known model.The comparison revealed an excellent agreement between the results and the reference data,with accuracy within a few thousandths.Besides,to fulfill the retrieval algorithm,a numerical differentiation-based Jacobian calculation method is developed for the atmospheric and surface parameters.This is coupled with the adding and doubling process for the radiative transfer calculation.The Jacobian matrix produced by the new algorithm is evaluated by comparison with that from the perturbation method.The relative Jacobian matrix deviations between the two methods are within a few thousandths for carbon dioxide and less than 1.0×10-3%for aerosol optical depth.The two methods are consistent for surface albedo,with a deviation below 2.03×10-4%.All validation results suggest that the accuracy of the proposed radiative transfer model is suitable for inversion applications.This model exhibits the potential for simulating near-infrared measurements of greenhouse gas monitoring instruments.

A model for accurately calculating hyper-spectral, middle-shortwave infrared radiative transfer for remote sensing

Although the calculation of radiative transfer in the middle-shortwave infrared band is important in the field of optical remote sensing, studies in this area of research are rare in China. Both solar reflection and atmospheric emission should be considered when calculating radiative transfer in the middle-shortwave infrared band. This paper presents a new radiative transfer model based on the doubling and adding method. The new model uses approximate calculations of direct solar reflection,multiple scattering, and thermal emissions for a finitely thin atmospheric layer and considers both the solar and thermal sources of radiation. To verify its accuracy, the calculation results produced by the model for four typical scenarios(single layer at night,multi-layer aerosols, double-layer with ice and water clouds, and multi-layer with clouds and aerosols) were compared with those of the DISORT model. With the exception of a few channels, the absolute deviation between the two models was less than2×10^(-6) K. For the same calculation, the computation speed of the new model was approximately two to three times faster than that of the DISORT model. Sensitivity studies were performed to evaluate the error resulting from using simplified calculation methods in the new model. The results obtained in this study indicated that atmospheric thermal emission made a significant contribution to the measured radiance in the strong-absorption band(2230–2400 cm^(-1)), whereas solar radiation could be neglected in this region. However, neglecting solar radiation in the window region(2400–2580 cm^(-1)) introduced error on the order of dozens of K. Employing the average-layer temperature method simplified the calculation of thermal radiation but caused a larger error in the strong-absorption band than in the window region. In the doubling and adding method, the calculation error decreased as the value used for minimum optical thickness decreased. Under the condition of satisfying the requirement of calculation precision, we can consider using the layer-average temperature radiation method and selecting a relative larger minimum optical thickness value to improve the calculation efficiency. The new radiative calculation model proposed herein can be used in the simulation, inversion, and assimilation of middle-shortwave infrared measurements by hyper-spectral satellite instruments.

From micro-to nanosized particles:Selected characterization methods and measurable parameters

Airborne micro- and nanoparticles-aerosols - play an important role in many natural phenomena and in a variety of industrial processes, as well as the public health issue. They may be of natural or anthropogenic origin; their presence in an environment might be intentional or due to undesirable release. In any case, merely the particle detection and characterization, ideally in real-time, provide an insight into the potential burden allowing also controlling and abatement measures. Due to the broad size range it is not possible to characterize the entire particle spectrum with only one method. This contribution discusses selected optical techniques based on elastic light scattering, which are suitable for characterization of micrometer sized particles and particular electrical techniques allowing measurement of nanoparticles. It is shown that combination of instruments measuring different properties of the same nanoparticles offers derivative parameters contributing to more complete characterization of aerosols