Hygroscopic growth of common organic aerosol solutes, including humic substances, as derived from water activity measurements

[1] Studies have shown that organic matter often constitutes up to 50% by mass of tropospheric aerosols. These organics may considerably affect the water uptake properties of these aerosols, impacting Earth's climate and atmosphere. However, considerable uncertainties still exist about hygroscopic properties of organic carbon (OC) in particles. In this study, we have assembled an apparatus to measure equilibrium water vapor pressure over bulk solutions. We used these results to calculate the hygroscopic growth curve and deliquescence relative humidity (DRH) of representative compounds in three OC categories: saccharides, mono/dicarboxylic acids, and HULIS (Humic-Like Substances). To our knowledge, this is the first study to examine the hygroscopic growth of HULIS by means of a bulk method on representative compounds such as fulvic and humic acids. We also explored the temperature effect on hygroscopic growth within the 0°C-30°C temperature range and found no effect. The DRH and hygroscopic growth obtained were in excellent agreement with published tandem differential mobility analyzer (TDMA), electrodynamic balance, and bulk data for sodium chloride, ammonium sulfate, d-glucose, levoglucosan, succinic acid, and glutaric acid. However, we found a hygroscopic growth factor of 1.0 at a relative humidity of 90% for phthalic, oxalic, humic, and two fulvic acids; these results disagree with various TDMA studies. The TDMA is used widely to study water uptake of organic particles but can be affected by particle microstructural arrangements before the DRH and by the inability to fully dry particles. Thus, in the future it will be important to confirm TDMA data for nondeliquescent organic particles with alternate methods. Citation: Zamora, I. R., A. Tabazadeh, D. M. Golden, and M. Z. Jacobson (2011), Hygroscopic growth of common organic aerosol solutes, including humic substances, as derived from water activity measurements

Observational Evidence Against Mountain-Wave Generation of Ice Nuclei as a Prerequisite for the Formation of Three Solid Nitric Acid Polar Stratospheric Clouds Observed in the Arctic in Early December 1999

A number of recently published papers suggest that mountain-wave activity in the stratosphere, producing ice particles when temperatures drop below the ice frost point, may be the primary source of large NAT particles. In this paper we use measurements from the Advanced Very High Resolution Radiometer (AVHRR) instruments on board the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) polar-orbiting satellites to map out regions of ice clouds produced by stratospheric mountain-wave activity inside the Arctic vortex. Lidar observations from three DC-8 flights in early December 1999 show the presence of solid nitric acid (Type Ia or NAT) polar stratospheric clouds (PSCs). By using back trajectories and superimposing the position maps on the AVHRR cloud imagery products, we show that these observed NAT clouds could not have originated at locations of high-amplitude mountain-wave activity. We also show that mountain-wave PSC climatology data and Mountain Wave Forecast Model 2.0 (MWFM-2) raw hemispheric ray and grid box averaged hemispheric wave temperature amplitude hindcast data from the same time period are in agreement with the AVHRR data. Our results show that ice cloud formation in mountain waves cannot explain how at least three large scale NAT clouds were formed in the stratosphere in early December 1999