From a polar to a marine environment: has the changing Arctic led to a shift in aerosol light scattering properties?

Heslin-Rees, Dominic; Burgos, Maria; Hansson, Hans-Christen; Krejci, Radovan; Ström, Johan; Tunved, Peter; Zieger, Paul

doi:https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-20-13671-2020

Articles | Volume 20, issue 21

https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-20-13671-2020

© Author(s) 2020. This work is distributed under
the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.

https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-20-13671-2020

© Author(s) 2020. This work is distributed under
the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.

Articles | Volume 20, issue 21

Research article

|

13 Nov 2020

Research article |

| 13 Nov 2020

From a polar to a marine environment: has the changing Arctic led to a shift in aerosol light scattering properties?

Dominic Heslin-Rees, Maria Burgos, Hans-Christen Hansson, Radovan Krejci, Johan Ström, Peter Tunved, and Paul Zieger

Supplement

https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-20-13671-2020-supplement

Data sets

Aerosol light scattering properties at Zeppelin Observatory, Svalbard, 1999-2016, combined with back trajectory analysis parameters D. Heslin-Rees, M. Burgos, H. C. Hansson, R. Krejci, J. Ström, P. Tunved, and P. Zieger https://doi.org/10.17043/zeppelin-aerosol-light-scattering

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Short summary

Aerosol particles are one important key player in the Arctic climate. Using long-term measurements of particle light scattering from an observatory on Svalbard, this study investigates the reasons behind an observed shift towards larger particles seen in the last 2 decades. We find that increases in sea spray are the most likely cause. Air masses from the south-west have increased significantly, suggestive of a potential mechanism, whilst the retreat in sea ice has a marginal influence.