Detection of tar brown carbon with a single  particle soot photometer (SP2)

Corbin, Joel C.; Gysel-Beer, Martin

doi:https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-19-15673-2019

Articles | Volume 19, issue 24

Atmos. Chem. Phys., 19, 15673–15690, 2019

https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-19-15673-2019

© Author(s) 2019. This work is distributed under
the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.

Atmos. Chem. Phys., 19, 15673–15690, 2019

https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-19-15673-2019

© Author(s) 2019. This work is distributed under
the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.

Articles | Volume 19, issue 24

Research article 20 Dec 2019

Research article | 20 Dec 2019

Detection of tar brown carbon with a single particle soot photometer (SP2)

Joel C. Corbin and Martin Gysel-Beer

Download

Final revised paper (published on 20 Dec 2019)
Preprint (discussion started on 11 Jul 2019)

Interactive discussion

Status: closed

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

- Printer-friendly version

- Supplement

RC1: 'Detection of tar brown carbon with the SP2', Anonymous Referee #1, 18 Aug 2019
- AC1: 'Response to reviewers', J. C. Corbin, 24 Oct 2019
RC2: 'Review of "Detection of tar brown carbon with the single particle soot photometer (SP2)"', Anonymous Referee #2, 27 Aug 2019
- AC1: 'Response to reviewers', J. C. Corbin, 24 Oct 2019
AC1: 'Response to reviewers', J. C. Corbin, 24 Oct 2019

Peer-review completion

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

AR by J. C. Corbin on behalf of the Authors (24 Oct 2019) Author's response Manuscript

ED: Publish as is (06 Nov 2019) by Manvendra K. Dubey

Short summary

We review the literature to refine the definition of "tar balls" (or tar particles). Then, using a marine-engine data set, we show that a standard SP2 can identify tar particles in two ways, as evaporating and non-incandescing (30 % of tar particles by number) or incandescing particles which scatter more light than soot at incandescence (70 % of tar particles by number). To our knowledge, no other technique can provide in situ, real-time evidence for the presence of tar particles in an aerosol.