141 research outputs found
Heterogeneous ice nucleation on dust particles sourced from nine deserts worldwide - Part 1: Immersion freezing
Desert dust is one of the most abundant ice nucleating particle types in the atmosphere. Traditionally, clay minerals were assumed to determine the ice nucleation ability of desert dust and constituted the focus of ice nucleation studies over several decades. Recently some feldspar species were identified to be ice active at much higher temperatures than clay minerals, redirecting studies to investigate the contribution of feldspar to ice nucleation on desert dust. However, so far no study has shown the atmospheric relevance of this mineral phase. For this study four dust samples were collected after airborne transport in the troposphere from the Sahara to different locations (Crete, the Peloponnese, Canary Islands, and the Sinai Peninsula). Additionally, 11 dust samples were collected from the surface from nine of the biggest deserts worldwide. The samples were used to study the ice nucleation behavior specific to different desert dusts. Furthermore, we investigated how representative surface-collected dust is for the atmosphere by comparing to the ice nucleation activity of the airborne samples. We used the IMCA-ZINC setup to form droplets on single aerosol particles which were subsequently exposed to temperatures between 233 and 250 K. Dust particles were collected in parallel on filters for offline cold-stage ice nucleation experiments at 253–263 K. To help the interpretation of the ice nucleation experiments the mineralogical composition of the dusts was investigated. We find that a higher ice nucleation activity in a given sample at 253 K can be attributed to the K-feldspar content present in this sample, whereas at temperatures between 238 and 245 K it is attributed to the sum of feldspar and quartz content present. A high clay content, in contrast, is associated with lower ice nucleation activity. This confirms the importance of feldspar above 250 K and the role of quartz and feldspars determining the ice nucleation activities at lower temperatures as found by earlier studies for monomineral dusts. The airborne samples show on average a lower ice nucleation activity than the surface-collected ones. Furthermore, we find that under certain conditions milling can lead to a decrease in the ice nucleation ability of polymineral samples due to the different hardness and cleavage of individual mineral phases causing an increase of minerals with low ice nucleation ability in the atmospherically relevant size fraction. Comparison of our data set to an existing desert dust parameterization confirms its applicability for climate models. Our results suggest that for an improved prediction of the ice nucleation ability of desert dust in the atmosphere, the modeling of emission and atmospheric transport of the feldspar and quartz mineral phases would be key, while other minerals are only of minor importance
Heterogeneous ice nucleation on dust particles sourced from nine deserts worldwide – Part 2: Deposition nucleation and condensation freezing
Mineral dust particles from deserts are amongst the most common
ice nucleating particles in the atmosphere. The mineralogy of desert dust
differs depending on the source region and can further fractionate during the
dust emission processes. Mineralogy to a large extent explains the ice
nucleation behavior of desert aerosol, but not entirely. Apart from pure
mineral dust, desert aerosol particles often exhibit a coating or are mixed with small amounts of
biological material. Aging on the ground or
during atmospheric transport can deactivate nucleation sites, thus strong
ice nucleating minerals may not exhibit their full potential. In the partner
paper of this work, it was shown that mineralogy determines most but not
all of the ice nucleation behavior in the immersion mode found for desert dust.
In this study, the influence of semi-volatile organic compounds and the
presence of crystal water on the ice nucleation behavior of desert aerosol is
investigated. This work focuses on the deposition and condensation ice
nucleation modes at temperatures between 238 and 242 K of 18 dust samples
sourced from nine deserts worldwide. Chemical imaging of the particles' surface
is used to determine the cause of the observed differences in ice nucleation.
It is found that, while the ice nucleation ability of the majority of the dust
samples is dominated by their quartz and feldspar content, in one
carbonaceous sample it is mostly caused by organic matter, potentially
cellulose and/or proteins. In contrast, the ice nucleation ability of
an airborne Saharan sample is found to be diminished, likely by semi-volatile
species covering ice nucleation active sites of the minerals. This study
shows that in addition to mineralogy, other factors such as organics and
crystal water content can alter the ice nucleation behavior of desert aerosol
during atmospheric transport in various ways.</p
Equation of state of a strongly magnetized hydrogen plasma
The influence of a constant uniform magnetic field on the thermodynamic
properties of a partially ionized hydrogen plasma is studied. Using the method
of Green' s function various interaction contributions to the thermodynamic
functions are calculated. The equation of state of a quantum magnetized plasma
is presented within the framework of a low density expansion up to the order
e^4 n^2 and, additionally, including ladder type contributions via the bound
states in the case of strong magnetic fields (2.35*10^{5} T << B << 2.35*10^{9}
T). We show that for high densities (n=10^{27-30} m^{-3}) and temperatures
T=10^5 - 10^6 K typical for the surface of neutron stars nonideality effects
as, e.g., Debye screening must be taken into account.Comment: 12 pages, 2 Postscript figures. uses revtex, to appear in Phys. Rev.
CECoS: A case experience combination system for knowledge acquisition for expert systems
Semiclassical cross section correlations
We calculate within a semiclassical approximation the autocorrelation
function of cross sections. The starting point is the semiclassical expression
for the diagonal matrix elements of an operator. For general operators with a
smooth classical limit the autocorrelation function of such matrix elements has
two contributions with relative weights determined by classical dynamics. We
show how the random matrix result can be obtained if the operator approaches a
projector onto a single initial state. The expressions are verified in
calculations for the kicked rotor.Comment: 6 pages, 2 figure
Heterogeneous ice nucleation on dust particles sourced from nine deserts worldwide - Part 1: Immersion freezing
Desert dust is one of the most abundant ice nucleating particle types in the atmosphere. Traditionally, clay minerals were assumed to determine the ice nucleation ability of desert dust and constituted the focus of ice nucleation studies over several decades. Recently some feldspar species were identified to be ice active at much higher temperatures than clay minerals, redirecting studies to investigate the contribution of feldspar to ice nucleation on desert dust. However, so far no study has shown the atmospheric relevance of this mineral phase.
For this study four dust samples were collected after airborne transport in the troposphere from the Sahara to different locations (Crete, the Peloponnese, Canary Islands, and the Sinai Peninsula). Additionally, 11 dust samples were collected from the surface from nine of the biggest deserts worldwide. The samples were used to study the ice nucleation behavior specific to different desert dusts. Furthermore, we investigated how representative surface-collected dust is for the atmosphere by comparing to the ice nucleation activity of the airborne samples. We used the IMCA-ZINC setup to form droplets on single aerosol particles which were subsequently exposed to temperatures between 233 and 250 K. Dust particles were collected in parallel on filters for offline cold-stage ice nucleation experiments at 253–263 K. To help the interpretation of the ice nucleation experiments the mineralogical composition of the dusts was investigated. We find that a higher ice nucleation activity in a given sample at 253K can be attributed to the K-feldspar content present in this sample, whereas at temperatures between 238 and 245K it is attributed to the sum of feldspar and quartz content present. A high clay content, in contrast, is associated with lower ice nucleation activity. This confirms the importance of feldspar above 250K and the role of quartz and feldspars determining the ice nucleation activities at lower temperatures as found by earlier studies for monomineral dusts. The airborne samples show on average a lower ice nucleation activity than the surface-collected ones. Furthermore, we find that under certain conditions milling can lead to a decrease in the ice nucleation ability of polymineral samples due to the different hardness and cleavage of individual mineral phases causing an increase of minerals with low ice nucleation ability in the atmospherically relevant size fraction. Comparison of our data set to an existing desert dust parameterization confirms its applicability for climate models. Our results suggest that for an improved prediction of the ice nucleation ability of desert dust in the atmosphere, the modeling of emission and atmospheric transport of the feldspar and quartz mineral phases would be key, while other minerals are only of minor importance
Intercomparing different devices for the investigation of ice nucleating particles using Snomax as test substance
Intercomparing different devices for the investigation of ice nucleating particles using Snomax® as test substance
Seven different instruments and measurement methods were used to examine the immersion freezing of bacterial ice nuclei from Snomax® (hereafter Snomax), a product containing ice-active protein complexes from non-viable Pseudomonas syringae bacteria. The experimental conditions were kept as similar as possible for the different measurements. Of the participating instruments, some examined droplets which had been made from suspensions directly, and the others examined droplets activated on previously generated Snomax particles, with particle diameters of mostly a few hundred nanometers and up to a few micrometers in some cases. Data were obtained in the temperature range from -2 to -38 °C, and it was found that all ice-active protein complexes were already activated above -12 °C. Droplets with different Snomax mass concentrations covering 10 orders of magnitude were examined. Some instruments had very short ice nucleation times down to below 1 s, while others had comparably slow cooling rates around 1 K min-1. Displaying data from the different instruments in terms of numbers of ice-active protein complexes per dry mass of Snomax, nm, showed that within their uncertainty, the data agree well with each other as well as to previously reported literature results. Two parameterizations were taken from literature for a direct comparison to our results, and these were a time-dependent approach based on a contact angle distribution (Niedermeier et al., 2014) and a modification of the parameterization presented in Hartmann et al. (2013) representing a time-independent approach. The agreement between these and the measured data were good; i.e., they agreed within a temperature range of 0.6 K or equivalently a range in nm of a factor of 2. From the results presented herein, we propose that Snomax, at least when carefully shared and prepared, is a suitable material to test and compare different instruments for their accuracy of measuring immersion freezing
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