Volatility measurement of atmospheric submicron aerosols in an urban atmosphere in southern China

Cao, Li-Ming; Huang, Xiao-Feng; Li, Yuan-Yuan; Hu, Min; He, Ling-Yan

doi:https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-18-1729-2018

Articles | Volume 18, issue 3

https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-18-1729-2018

© Author(s) 2018. This work is distributed under
the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.

https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-18-1729-2018

© Author(s) 2018. This work is distributed under
the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.

Articles | Volume 18, issue 3

Research article

|

06 Feb 2018

Research article |

| 06 Feb 2018

Volatility measurement of atmospheric submicron aerosols in an urban atmosphere in southern China

Li-Ming Cao, Xiao-Feng Huang, Yuan-Yuan Li, Min Hu, and Ling-Yan He

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Final revised paper (published on 06 Feb 2018)
Supplement to the final revised paper
Preprint (discussion started on 17 Aug 2017)
Supplement to the preprint

Interactive discussion

Status: closed

AC: Author comment | RC: Referee comment | SC: Short comment | EC: Editor comment

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- Supplement

RC1: 'TD-AMS measurements', Anonymous Referee #1, 15 Sep 2017
- AC1: 'Reply to comments #1', X.F. Huang, 16 Nov 2017
RC2: 'Comments to ACP-2017-663', Anonymous Referee #3, 22 Sep 2017
- AC3: 'Reply to comments #3', X.F. Huang, 16 Nov 2017
RC3: 'Comments on ACP-2017-663', Anonymous Referee #2, 29 Sep 2017
- AC2: 'Reply to comments #2', X.F. Huang, 16 Nov 2017

Peer-review completion

AR: Author's response | RR: Referee report | ED: Editor decision

AR by X.F. Huang on behalf of the Authors (18 Nov 2017) Author's response Manuscript

ED: Referee Nomination & Report Request started (20 Nov 2017) by Aijun Ding

RR by Anonymous Referee #1 (04 Dec 2017)

RR by Anonymous Referee #3 (13 Dec 2017)

RR by Anonymous Referee #2 (19 Dec 2017)

Suggestions for revision or reasons for rejection

The authors addressed my comments from the first review step and revised the manuscript. However, I still have some comments that need to be addressed as the following areas.
1. For the framework of “3 Results and discussion”, I feel like that the authors should consider re-organizing it. Why did not discuss “3.4 Volatility of OA factors” together with the section of “3.2 Volatility of PM1 species”? The “3.3 Source apportionment” section can be discussed before “3.2 Volatility of PM1 species”, which may just follow “3.1 PM1 chemical compositions”.
2. Is it possible that the authors could show the time series of the observed data with TD-processing?
3. More detailed descriptions (e.g., show the calculation formulas, alpha values for fossil fuel and biomass burning, etc.) regarding to the source apportionment of black carbon need to be provided in main text or supplement. Otherwise, the readers would have a similar/same question about that.
4. Page 4 Lines 1-2: Does it means that all RIEs for each species were from default/reference values, as showing a reference of (Jimenez et al., 2003)? Can the authors please show your calibration results (figures) in supplement? My mention here is because some discussions relative to aerosol acidity that was resulting from the neutralization plot (Page 7 Lines 12-13). Atmospheric aerosol acidity can be largely affected by particulate sulfate and ammonium concentrations. This means if the RIE calibrations for sulfate and ammonium weren’t performed well, then it’s very hard to discuss any information about aerosol acidity.
5. Page 16 lines 23-24 and Page17 lines 12. How could we get “…fact that it is difficult to resolve HOA in …” that can support the previous discussion? Again, I did not find direct evidence that can prove “evaporation–oxidation in gas phase–condensation” process, even from Huang et al. (2012).

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ED: Publish as is (27 Dec 2017) by Aijun Ding

AR by X.F. Huang on behalf of the Authors (05 Jan 2018) Author's response Manuscript

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Short summary

A TD-AMS (thermodenuder aerosol mass spectrometer) system was deployed to study the volatility of non-refractory PM₁ species during winter in Shenzhen, China. The volatility of chemical species measured with the AMS varied, with nitrate showing the highest volatility. Organics showed semi-volatile characteristics, and five subtypes of OA resolved by PMF modeling presented different volatilities. The results can contribute to the understanding of the formation and ageing of submicron aerosols.