Abstract View
Entrainment of Long-Range Transported Aerosols in the Marine Boundary Layer in the Azores
SHREYA JOSHI, Paulo Fialho, Diamantino Henriques, Renato Pinto Reveggino, Andrea Baccarini, Silvia Henning, Birgit Wehner, Lynn Mazzoleni, Simeon Schum, Bo Zhang, Raymond Shaw, Jian Wang, Claudio Mazzoleni, Michigan Technological University
Abstract Number: 537
Working Group: Aerosols, Clouds and Climate
Abstract
Atmospheric aerosols have significant impacts on Earth’s radiation budget by interacting with solar radiation and by affecting the properties of clouds. Aerosols can be transported over long distances in the free troposphere to remote regions such as the Azores, in the mid-North Atlantic ocean. Free-tropospheric long-range transported aerosols like Saharan desert dust or North-American biomass burning carbonaceous particles can contribute to the aerosol loading and properties in this region. We analyzed data from two sites in the Azores: (a) Pico mountain observatory at 2225 m a.s.l., and (b) Eastern North Atlantic (ENA) DOE-ARM facility, near sea level. The two sites are within a horizontal distance of 70 km from each other. Pico generally lies in the lower free troposphere, while ENA lies in the lower marine boundary layer. These sites provide a unique opportunity for the analysis of aerosols at two different elevations. Aerosol properties from these facilities are used to understand the statistical and mechanistic connections between the aerosol properties in the free troposphere and those in the boundary layer and their potential effects on clouds and radiation. We used continuous aerosol data (e.g., light scattering, and absorption) at the two sites to detect possible events of entrainment of free tropospheric aerosols into the boundary layer. Candidate events were studied in more detail including determining their frequency, and duration. We will discuss these analyses and links between these events and the cloud condensation nuclei concentrations at the two sites, as well as, the properties of the stratocumulus clouds in the region.