WACCM-D Whole Atmosphere Community Climate Model with D-region ion chemistry

Energetic particle precipitation (EPP) and ion chemistry affect the neutral composition of the polar middle atmosphere. For example, production of odd nitrogen and odd hydrogen during strong events can decrease ozone by tens of percent. However, the standard ion chemistry parameterization used in atmospheric models neglects the effects on some important species, such as nitric acid. We present WACCM-D, a variant of the Whole Atmosphere Community Climate Model, which includes a set of lower ionosphere (D-region) chemistry: 307 reactions of 20 positive ions and 21 negative ions. We consider realistic ionization scenarios and compare the WACCM-D results to those from the Sodankylä Ion and Neutral Chemistry (SIC), a state-of-the-art 1-D model of the D-region chemistry. We show that WACCM-D produces well the main characteristics of the D-region ionosphere, as well as the overall proportion of important ion groups, in agreement with SIC. Comparison of ion concentrations shows that the WACCM-D bias is typically within ±10% or less below 70 km. At 70–90 km, when strong altitude gradients in ionization rates and/or ion concentrations exist, the bias can be larger for some groups but is still within tens of percent. Based on the good agreement overall and the fact that part of the differences are caused by different model setups, WACCM-D provides a state-of-the-art global representation of D-region ion chemistry and is therefore expected to improve EPP modeling considerably. These improvements are demonstrated in a companion paper by Andersson et al

Hot water from cold. The dissociative recombination of water cluster ions

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Dissociative recombination of NH4+ and ND4+ ions: storage ring experiments and ab initio molecular dynamics.

The dissociative recombination (DR) process of NH4+ and ND4+ molecular ions with free electrons has been studied at the heavy-ion storage ring CRYRING (Manne Siegbahn Laboratory, Stockholm University). The absolute cross sections for DR of NH4+ and ND4+ in the collision energy range 0.001-1 eV are reported, and thermal rate coefficients for the temperature interval from 10 to 2000 K are calculated from the experimental data. The absolute cross section for NH4+ agrees well with earlier work and is about a factor of 2 larger than the cross section for ND4+. The dissociative recombination of NH4+ is dominated by the product channels NH3+H (0.85+/-0.04) and NH2+2H (0.13+/-0.01), while the DR of ND4+ mainly results in ND3+D (0.94+/-0.03). Ab initio direct dynamics simulations, based on the assumption that the dissociation dynamics is governed by the neutral ground-state potential energy surface, suggest that the primary product formed in the DR process is NH3+H. The ejection of the H atom is direct and leaves the NH3 molecule highly vibrationally excited. A fraction of the excited ammonia molecules may subsequently undergo secondary fragmentation forming NH2+H. It is concluded that the model results are consistent with gross features of the experimental results, including the sensitivity of the branching ratio for the three-body channel NH2+2H to isotopic exchange

Dissociative recombination of H+(H2O)3 and D+(D2O)3 water cluster ions with electrons: Cross sections and branching ratios

Dissociative recombination (DR) of the water cluster ions H+(H2O)3 and D+(D2O)3 with electrons has been studied at the heavy-ion storage ring CRYRING (Manne Siegbahn Laboratory, Stockholm University). For the first time, absolute DR cross sections have been measured for H+(H2O)3 in the energy range of 0.001–0.8 eV, and relative cross sections have been measured for D+(D2O)3 in the energy range of 0.001–1.0 eV. The DR cross sections for H+(H2O)3 are larger than previously observed for H+(H2O)n (n=1,2), which is in agreement with the previously observed trend indicating that the DR rate coefficient increases with size of the water cluster ion. Branching ratios have been determined for the dominating product channels. Dissociative recombination of H+(H2O)3 mainly results in the formation of 3H2O+H (probability of 0.95±0.05) and with a possible minor channel resulting in 2H2O+OH+H2 (0.05±0.05). The dominating channels for DR of D+(D2O)3 are 3D2O+D (0.88±0.03) and 2D2O+OD+D2 (0.09±0.02). The branching ratios are comparable to earlier DR results for H+(H2O)2 and D+(D2O)2, which gave 2X2O+X (X=H,D) with a probability of over 0.9