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An Arctic CCN-limited cloud-aerosol regime

På svenska

Author

  • T. Mauritsen
  • J. Sedlar
  • M. Tjernstrom
  • C. Leck
  • M. Martin
  • M. Shupe
  • Staffan Sjögren
  • B. Sierau
  • P. O. G. Persson
  • I. M. Brooks
  • Erik Swietlicki
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Summary, in English

On average, airborne aerosol particles cool the Earth's surface directly by absorbing and scattering sunlight and indirectly by influencing cloud reflectivity, life time, thickness or extent. Here we show that over the central Arctic Ocean, where there is frequently a lack of aerosol particles upon which clouds may form, a small increase in aerosol loading may enhance cloudiness thereby likely causing a climatologically significant warming at the ice-covered Arctic surface. Under these low concentration conditions cloud droplets grow to drizzle sizes and fall, even in the absence of collisions and coalescence, thereby diminishing cloud water. Evidence from a case study suggests that interactions between aerosol, clouds and precipitation could be responsible for attaining the observed low aerosol concentrations.

Publishing year

2011

Language

English

Pages

165-173

Publication/Series

Atmospheric Chemistry and Physics

Volume

11

Issue

1

Document type

Journal article

Publisher

Copernicus GmbH

Topic

  • Subatomic Physics

Status

Published

ISBN/ISSN/Other

  • ISSN: 1680-7324