Impacts of long-range transport of aerosols on marine-boundary-layer clouds in the eastern North Atlantic

Yuan Wang; Xiaojian Zheng; Xiquan Dong; Baike Xi; Peng Wu; Timothy Logan; Yuk L. Yung

doi:10.5194/acp-20-14741-2020

Impacts of long-range transport of aerosols on marine-boundary-layer clouds in the eastern North Atlantic

Yuan Wang, Xiaojian Zheng, Xiquan Dong, Baike Xi, Peng Wu, Timothy Logan, Yuk L. Yung

Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review

13 Scopus citations

Abstract

Vertical profiles of aerosols are inadequately observed and poorly represented in climate models, contributing to the current large uncertainty associated with aerosol cloud interactions. The US Department of Energy (DOE) Atmospheric Radiation Measurement (ARM) Aerosol and Cloud Experiments in the Eastern North Atlantic (ACEENA) aircraft field campaign near the Azores islands provided ample observations of vertical distributions of aerosol and cloud properties. Here we utilize the in situ aircraft measurements from the ACE-ENA and ground-based remotesensing data along with an aerosol-Aware Weather Research and Forecast (WRF) model to characterize the aerosols due to long-range transport over a remote region and to assess their possible influence on marine-boundary-layer (MBL) clouds. The vertical profiles of aerosol and cloud properties measured via aircraft during the ACE-ENA campaign provide detailed information revealing the physical contact between transported aerosols and MBL clouds. The European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts Copernicus Atmosphere Monitoring Service (ECMWF-CAMS) aerosol reanalysis data can reproduce the key features of aerosol vertical profiles in the remote region. The cloud-resolving WRF sensitivity experiments with distinctive aerosol profiles suggest that the transported aerosols and MBL cloud interactions (ACIs) require not only aerosol plumes to get close to the marine-boundary-layer top but also large cloud top height variations. Based on those criteria, the observations show that the occurrence of ACIs involving the transport of aerosol over the eastern North Atlantic (ENA) is about 62% in summer. For the case with noticeable long-rangetransport aerosol effects on MBL clouds, the susceptibilities of droplet effective radius and liquid water content are 0.11 and C0.14, respectively. When varying by a similar magnitude, aerosols originating from the boundary layer exert larger microphysical influence on MBL clouds than those entrained from the free troposphere.

Original language	English (US)
Article number	14741
Pages (from-to)	14741-14755
Number of pages	15
Journal	Atmospheric Chemistry and Physics
Volume	20
Issue number	23
DOIs	https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-20-14741-2020
State	Published - Dec 2 2020

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Atmospheric Science

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10.5194/acp-20-14741-2020

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@article{f278176c32c44b50aa4f48210b95c481,

title = "Impacts of long-range transport of aerosols on marine-boundary-layer clouds in the eastern North Atlantic",

abstract = "Vertical profiles of aerosols are inadequately observed and poorly represented in climate models, contributing to the current large uncertainty associated with aerosol cloud interactions. The US Department of Energy (DOE) Atmospheric Radiation Measurement (ARM) Aerosol and Cloud Experiments in the Eastern North Atlantic (ACEENA) aircraft field campaign near the Azores islands provided ample observations of vertical distributions of aerosol and cloud properties. Here we utilize the in situ aircraft measurements from the ACE-ENA and ground-based remotesensing data along with an aerosol-Aware Weather Research and Forecast (WRF) model to characterize the aerosols due to long-range transport over a remote region and to assess their possible influence on marine-boundary-layer (MBL) clouds. The vertical profiles of aerosol and cloud properties measured via aircraft during the ACE-ENA campaign provide detailed information revealing the physical contact between transported aerosols and MBL clouds. The European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts Copernicus Atmosphere Monitoring Service (ECMWF-CAMS) aerosol reanalysis data can reproduce the key features of aerosol vertical profiles in the remote region. The cloud-resolving WRF sensitivity experiments with distinctive aerosol profiles suggest that the transported aerosols and MBL cloud interactions (ACIs) require not only aerosol plumes to get close to the marine-boundary-layer top but also large cloud top height variations. Based on those criteria, the observations show that the occurrence of ACIs involving the transport of aerosol over the eastern North Atlantic (ENA) is about 62% in summer. For the case with noticeable long-rangetransport aerosol effects on MBL clouds, the susceptibilities of droplet effective radius and liquid water content are 0.11 and C0.14, respectively. When varying by a similar magnitude, aerosols originating from the boundary layer exert larger microphysical influence on MBL clouds than those entrained from the free troposphere.",

author = "Yuan Wang and Xiaojian Zheng and Xiquan Dong and Baike Xi and Peng Wu and Timothy Logan and Yung, {Yuk L.}",

note = "Funding Information: Financial support. This research has been supported by the Na- Funding Information: ing author{\textquoteright}s website at http://web.gps.caltech.edu/~yzw/share/ Wang-2020-ACP-Azores (Wang, 2020). The aircraft and ground-based measurements used in this study were obtained from the Atmospheric Radiation Measurement (ARM) program sponsored by the US Department of Energy (DOE) Office of Energy Research, Office of Health and Environmental Research, and Environmental Sciences Division. The data can be downloaded from https://adc. arm.gov/discovery/#/results/site_code::ena (Atmospheric Radiation Measurement Data Center, 2020). The CAMS global aerosol reanalysis product at pressure level used in this study can be downloaded at https://apps.ecmwf.int/datasets/data/cams-nrealtime/levtype=pl/ (European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts, 2020). ERA5 data are available for download via the data archive at the National Center for Atmospheric Research, Computational and Information Systems Laboratory (https://doi.org/10.5065/D6X34W69) (European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts, 2017). Funding Information: Acknowledgements. This study was primarily supported by the collaborative NSF grant (award nos. AGS-1700727, 1700728). We acknowledge helpful discussions on the model setup with Zheng Lu at Texas A&M University. We thank the instrument mentors of the AMS, SP2, and CPC instruments and the individuals collecting measurements during the ACE-ENA field campaign. We also acknowledge high-performance computing support from Pleiades provided at NASA Ames. All requests for materials in this paper should be addressed to Yuan Wang (yuan.wang@caltech.edu). Publisher Copyright: {\textcopyright} 2020 BMJ Publishing Group. All rights reserved.",

year = "2020",

month = dec,

day = "2",

doi = "10.5194/acp-20-14741-2020",

language = "English (US)",

volume = "20",

pages = "14741--14755",

journal = "Atmospheric Chemistry and Physics",

issn = "1680-7316",

publisher = "European Geosciences Union",

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TY - JOUR

T1 - Impacts of long-range transport of aerosols on marine-boundary-layer clouds in the eastern North Atlantic

AU - Wang, Yuan

AU - Zheng, Xiaojian

AU - Dong, Xiquan

AU - Xi, Baike

AU - Wu, Peng

AU - Logan, Timothy

AU - Yung, Yuk L.

N1 - Funding Information: Financial support. This research has been supported by the Na- Funding Information: ing author’s website at http://web.gps.caltech.edu/~yzw/share/ Wang-2020-ACP-Azores (Wang, 2020). The aircraft and ground-based measurements used in this study were obtained from the Atmospheric Radiation Measurement (ARM) program sponsored by the US Department of Energy (DOE) Office of Energy Research, Office of Health and Environmental Research, and Environmental Sciences Division. The data can be downloaded from https://adc. arm.gov/discovery/#/results/site_code::ena (Atmospheric Radiation Measurement Data Center, 2020). The CAMS global aerosol reanalysis product at pressure level used in this study can be downloaded at https://apps.ecmwf.int/datasets/data/cams-nrealtime/levtype=pl/ (European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts, 2020). ERA5 data are available for download via the data archive at the National Center for Atmospheric Research, Computational and Information Systems Laboratory (https://doi.org/10.5065/D6X34W69) (European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts, 2017). Funding Information: Acknowledgements. This study was primarily supported by the collaborative NSF grant (award nos. AGS-1700727, 1700728). We acknowledge helpful discussions on the model setup with Zheng Lu at Texas A&M University. We thank the instrument mentors of the AMS, SP2, and CPC instruments and the individuals collecting measurements during the ACE-ENA field campaign. We also acknowledge high-performance computing support from Pleiades provided at NASA Ames. All requests for materials in this paper should be addressed to Yuan Wang (yuan.wang@caltech.edu). Publisher Copyright: © 2020 BMJ Publishing Group. All rights reserved.

PY - 2020/12/2

Y1 - 2020/12/2

N2 - Vertical profiles of aerosols are inadequately observed and poorly represented in climate models, contributing to the current large uncertainty associated with aerosol cloud interactions. The US Department of Energy (DOE) Atmospheric Radiation Measurement (ARM) Aerosol and Cloud Experiments in the Eastern North Atlantic (ACEENA) aircraft field campaign near the Azores islands provided ample observations of vertical distributions of aerosol and cloud properties. Here we utilize the in situ aircraft measurements from the ACE-ENA and ground-based remotesensing data along with an aerosol-Aware Weather Research and Forecast (WRF) model to characterize the aerosols due to long-range transport over a remote region and to assess their possible influence on marine-boundary-layer (MBL) clouds. The vertical profiles of aerosol and cloud properties measured via aircraft during the ACE-ENA campaign provide detailed information revealing the physical contact between transported aerosols and MBL clouds. The European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts Copernicus Atmosphere Monitoring Service (ECMWF-CAMS) aerosol reanalysis data can reproduce the key features of aerosol vertical profiles in the remote region. The cloud-resolving WRF sensitivity experiments with distinctive aerosol profiles suggest that the transported aerosols and MBL cloud interactions (ACIs) require not only aerosol plumes to get close to the marine-boundary-layer top but also large cloud top height variations. Based on those criteria, the observations show that the occurrence of ACIs involving the transport of aerosol over the eastern North Atlantic (ENA) is about 62% in summer. For the case with noticeable long-rangetransport aerosol effects on MBL clouds, the susceptibilities of droplet effective radius and liquid water content are 0.11 and C0.14, respectively. When varying by a similar magnitude, aerosols originating from the boundary layer exert larger microphysical influence on MBL clouds than those entrained from the free troposphere.

AB - Vertical profiles of aerosols are inadequately observed and poorly represented in climate models, contributing to the current large uncertainty associated with aerosol cloud interactions. The US Department of Energy (DOE) Atmospheric Radiation Measurement (ARM) Aerosol and Cloud Experiments in the Eastern North Atlantic (ACEENA) aircraft field campaign near the Azores islands provided ample observations of vertical distributions of aerosol and cloud properties. Here we utilize the in situ aircraft measurements from the ACE-ENA and ground-based remotesensing data along with an aerosol-Aware Weather Research and Forecast (WRF) model to characterize the aerosols due to long-range transport over a remote region and to assess their possible influence on marine-boundary-layer (MBL) clouds. The vertical profiles of aerosol and cloud properties measured via aircraft during the ACE-ENA campaign provide detailed information revealing the physical contact between transported aerosols and MBL clouds. The European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts Copernicus Atmosphere Monitoring Service (ECMWF-CAMS) aerosol reanalysis data can reproduce the key features of aerosol vertical profiles in the remote region. The cloud-resolving WRF sensitivity experiments with distinctive aerosol profiles suggest that the transported aerosols and MBL cloud interactions (ACIs) require not only aerosol plumes to get close to the marine-boundary-layer top but also large cloud top height variations. Based on those criteria, the observations show that the occurrence of ACIs involving the transport of aerosol over the eastern North Atlantic (ENA) is about 62% in summer. For the case with noticeable long-rangetransport aerosol effects on MBL clouds, the susceptibilities of droplet effective radius and liquid water content are 0.11 and C0.14, respectively. When varying by a similar magnitude, aerosols originating from the boundary layer exert larger microphysical influence on MBL clouds than those entrained from the free troposphere.

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Impacts of long-range transport of aerosols on marine-boundary-layer clouds in the eastern North Atlantic

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