Chemical Composition Based Aerosol Optical Properties According to Size Distribution and Mixture Types during Smog and Asian Dust Events in Seoul, Korea

Chang Hoon Jung, Ji Yi Lee, Junshik Um, Seung Soo Lee, Yong Pyo Kim

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

9 Scopus citations

Abstract

This study investigated the optical properties of aerosols involved in different meteorological events, including smog and Asian dust days. Carbonaceous components and inorganic species were measured in Seoul, Korea between 25 and 31 March 2012. Based on the measurements, the optical properties of aerosols were calculated by considering composition, size distribution, and mixing state of aerosols. To represent polydisperse size distributions of aerosols, a lognormal size distribution with a wide range of geometric mean diameters and geometric standard deviations was used. For the optical property calculations, the Mie theory was used to compute single-scattering properties of aerosol particles with varying size and composition. Analysis of the sampled data showed that the water-soluble components of organic matter increased on smog days, whereas crustal elements increased on dust days. The water content significantly influenced the optical properties of aerosols during the smog days as a result of high relative humidity and an increase in the water-soluble component. The absorption coefficients depended on the aerosol mixture type and the aerosol size distributions. Therefore, to improve our knowledge on radiative impacts of aerosols, especially the regional impacts of aerosols in East Asia, accurate measurements of aerosols, such as size distribution, composition, and mixture type, under different meteorological conditions are required.

Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)19-32
Number of pages14
JournalAsia-Pacific Journal of Atmospheric Sciences
Volume54
Issue number1
DOIs
StatePublished - 1 Feb 2018

Bibliographical note

Funding Information:
Acknowledgements. This research was supported by the Basic Science Research Program through the National Research Foundation of Korea (NRF), funded by the Ministry of Education (No. NRF-2015R1D1A1A09059906), and by the Korea Meteorological Administration Research and Development Program under Grant CATER 2014-3190. The authors gratefully acknowledge the NOAA Air Resources Laboratory (ARL) for the provision of the HYSPLIT transport and dispersion model and/or READY website (http://www.ready. noaa.gov) used in this research.

Publisher Copyright:
© 2018, Korean Meteorological Society and Springer Science+Business Media B.V., part of Springer Nature.

Keywords

  • Aerosol optical properties
  • aerosol mixture
  • mass extinction efficiency
  • smog and Asian dust
  • water soluble organic carbon

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