Articles | Volume 24, issue 4
https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-24-2443-2024
© Author(s) 2024. This work is distributed under
the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.
the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.
https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-24-2443-2024
© Author(s) 2024. This work is distributed under
the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.
the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.
Research article
| 
27 Feb 2024
Research article |
| 27 Feb 2024
| 27 Feb 2024
Investigation of observed dust trends over the Middle East region in NASA Goddard Earth Observing System (GEOS) model simulations
Adriana Rocha-Lima
CORRESPONDING AUTHOR
Physics Department, University of Maryland, Baltimore County (UMBC), Baltimore, MD, USA
Peter R. Colarco
Atmospheric Chemistry and Dynamics Laboratory, NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, MD, USA
Anton S. Darmenov
Global Modeling and Assimilation Office, NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, MD, USA
Edward P. Nowottnick
Mesoscale Atmospheric Processes Laboratory, NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, MD, USA
Arlindo M. da Silva
Global Modeling and Assimilation Office, NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, MD, USA
Luke D. Oman
Atmospheric Chemistry and Dynamics Laboratory, NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, MD, USA
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Galina Wind, Arlindo M. da Silva, Kerry G. Meyer, Steven Platnick, and Peter M. Norris
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Sarah J. Doherty, Pablo E. Saide, Paquita Zuidema, Yohei Shinozuka, Gonzalo A. Ferrada, Hamish Gordon, Marc Mallet, Kerry Meyer, David Painemal, Steven G. Howell, Steffen Freitag, Amie Dobracki, James R. Podolske, Sharon P. Burton, Richard A. Ferrare, Calvin Howes, Pierre Nabat, Gregory R. Carmichael, Arlindo da Silva, Kristina Pistone, Ian Chang, Lan Gao, Robert Wood, and Jens Redemann
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Between July and October, biomass burning smoke is advected over the southeastern Atlantic Ocean, leading to climate forcing. Model calculations of forcing by this plume vary significantly in both magnitude and sign. This paper compares aerosol and cloud properties observed during three NASA ORACLES field campaigns to the same in four models. It quantifies modeled biases in properties key to aerosol direct radiative forcing and evaluates how these biases propagate to biases in forcing.
Nick Gorkavyi, Nickolay Krotkov, Can Li, Leslie Lait, Peter Colarco, Simon Carn, Matthew DeLand, Paul Newman, Mark Schoeberl, Ghassan Taha, Omar Torres, Alexander Vasilkov, and Joanna Joiner
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The 21 June 2019 eruption of the Raikoke volcano produced significant amounts of volcanic aerosols (sulfate and ash) and sulfur dioxide (SO2) gas that penetrated into the lower stratosphere. We showed that the amount of SO2 decreases with a characteristic period of 8–18 d and the peak of sulfate aerosol lags the initial peak of SO2 by 1.5 months. We also examined the dynamics of an unusual stratospheric coherent circular cloud of SO2 and aerosol observed from 18 July to 22 September 2019.
Jerald R. Ziemke, Gordon J. Labow, Natalya A. Kramarova, Richard D. McPeters, Pawan K. Bhartia, Luke D. Oman, Stacey M. Frith, and David P. Haffner
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Seasonal and interannual ozone profile climatologies are produced from combined MLS and MERRA-2 GMI ozone for the general public. Both climatologies extend from pole to pole at altitudes of 0–80 km (1 km spacing) for the time record from 1970 to 2018. These climatologies are important for use as a priori information in satellite ozone retrieval algorithms, as validation of other measured and model-simulated ozone, and in radiative transfer studies of the atmosphere.
Xinxin Ye, Pargoal Arab, Ravan Ahmadov, Eric James, Georg A. Grell, Bradley Pierce, Aditya Kumar, Paul Makar, Jack Chen, Didier Davignon, Greg R. Carmichael, Gonzalo Ferrada, Jeff McQueen, Jianping Huang, Rajesh Kumar, Louisa Emmons, Farren L. Herron-Thorpe, Mark Parrington, Richard Engelen, Vincent-Henri Peuch, Arlindo da Silva, Amber Soja, Emily Gargulinski, Elizabeth Wiggins, Johnathan W. Hair, Marta Fenn, Taylor Shingler, Shobha Kondragunta, Alexei Lyapustin, Yujie Wang, Brent Holben, David M. Giles, and Pablo E. Saide
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Wildfire smoke has crucial impacts on air quality, while uncertainties in the numerical forecasts remain significant. We present an evaluation of 12 real-time forecasting systems. Comparison of predicted smoke emissions suggests a large spread in magnitudes, with temporal patterns deviating from satellite detections. The performance for AOD and surface PM2.5 and their discrepancies highlighted the role of accurately represented spatiotemporal emission profiles in improving smoke forecasts.
Huisheng Bian, Eunjee Lee, Randal D. Koster, Donifan Barahona, Mian Chin, Peter R. Colarco, Anton Darmenov, Sarith Mahanama, Michael Manyin, Peter Norris, John Shilling, Hongbin Yu, and Fanwei Zeng
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 21, 14177–14197, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-21-14177-2021, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-21-14177-2021, 2021
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The study using the NASA Earth system model shows ~2.6 % increase in burning season gross primary production and ~1.5 % increase in annual net primary production across the Amazon Basin during 2010–2016 due to the change in surface downward direct and diffuse photosynthetically active radiation by biomass burning aerosols. Such an aerosol effect is strongly dependent on the presence of clouds. The cloud fraction at which aerosols switch from stimulating to inhibiting plant growth occurs at ~0.8.
Xiaoxia Shang, Tero Mielonen, Antti Lipponen, Elina Giannakaki, Ari Leskinen, Virginie Buchard, Anton S. Darmenov, Antti Kukkurainen, Antti Arola, Ewan O'Connor, Anne Hirsikko, and Mika Komppula
Atmos. Meas. Tech., 14, 6159–6179, https://doi.org/10.5194/amt-14-6159-2021, https://doi.org/10.5194/amt-14-6159-2021, 2021
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The long-range-transported smoke particles from a Canadian wildfire event were observed with a multi-wavelength Raman polarization lidar and a ceilometer over Kuopio, Finland, in June 2019. The optical properties and the mass concentration estimations were reported for such aged smoke aerosols over northern Europe.
Hongbin Yu, Qian Tan, Lillian Zhou, Yaping Zhou, Huisheng Bian, Mian Chin, Claire L. Ryder, Robert C. Levy, Yaswant Pradhan, Yingxi Shi, Qianqian Song, Zhibo Zhang, Peter R. Colarco, Dongchul Kim, Lorraine A. Remer, Tianle Yuan, Olga Mayol-Bracero, and Brent N. Holben
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 21, 12359–12383, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-21-12359-2021, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-21-12359-2021, 2021
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This study characterizes a historic African dust intrusion into the Caribbean Basin in June 2020 using satellites and NASA GEOS. Dust emissions in West Africa were large albeit not extreme. However, a unique synoptic system accumulated the dust near the coast for about 4 d before it was ventilated. Although GEOS reproduced satellite-observed plume tracks well, it substantially underestimated dust emissions and did not lift up dust high enough for ensuing long-range transport.
Sampa Das, Peter R. Colarco, Luke D. Oman, Ghassan Taha, and Omar Torres
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 21, 12069–12090, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-21-12069-2021, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-21-12069-2021, 2021
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Interactions of extreme fires with weather systems can produce towering smoke plumes that inject aerosols at very high altitudes (> 10 km). Three such major injections, largest at the time in terms of emitted aerosol mass, took place over British Columbia, Canada, in August 2017. We model the transport and impacts of injected aerosols on the radiation balance of the atmosphere. Our model results match the satellite-observed plume transport and residence time at these high altitudes very closely.
Kristina Pistone, Paquita Zuidema, Robert Wood, Michael Diamond, Arlindo M. da Silva, Gonzalo Ferrada, Pablo E. Saide, Rei Ueyama, Ju-Mee Ryoo, Leonhard Pfister, James Podolske, David Noone, Ryan Bennett, Eric Stith, Gregory Carmichael, Jens Redemann, Connor Flynn, Samuel LeBlanc, Michal Segal-Rozenhaimer, and Yohei Shinozuka
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 21, 9643–9668, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-21-9643-2021, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-21-9643-2021, 2021
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Using aircraft-based measurements off the Atlantic coast of Africa, we found the springtime smoke plume was strongly correlated with the amount of water vapor in the atmosphere (more smoke indicated more humidity). We see the same general feature in satellite-assimilated and free-running models. Our analysis suggests this relationship is not caused by the burning but originates due to coincident continental meteorology plus fires. This air is transported over the ocean without further mixing.
Jasper F. Kok, Adeyemi A. Adebiyi, Samuel Albani, Yves Balkanski, Ramiro Checa-Garcia, Mian Chin, Peter R. Colarco, Douglas S. Hamilton, Yue Huang, Akinori Ito, Martina Klose, Danny M. Leung, Longlei Li, Natalie M. Mahowald, Ron L. Miller, Vincenzo Obiso, Carlos Pérez García-Pando, Adriana Rocha-Lima, Jessica S. Wan, and Chloe A. Whicker
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 21, 8127–8167, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-21-8127-2021, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-21-8127-2021, 2021
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Desert dust interacts with virtually every component of the Earth system, including the climate system. We develop a new methodology to represent the global dust cycle that integrates observational constraints on the properties and abundance of desert dust with global atmospheric model simulations. We show that the resulting representation of the global dust cycle is more accurate than what can be obtained from a large number of current climate global atmospheric models.
Jasper F. Kok, Adeyemi A. Adebiyi, Samuel Albani, Yves Balkanski, Ramiro Checa-Garcia, Mian Chin, Peter R. Colarco, Douglas S. Hamilton, Yue Huang, Akinori Ito, Martina Klose, Longlei Li, Natalie M. Mahowald, Ron L. Miller, Vincenzo Obiso, Carlos Pérez García-Pando, Adriana Rocha-Lima, and Jessica S. Wan
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 21, 8169–8193, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-21-8169-2021, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-21-8169-2021, 2021
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The many impacts of dust on the Earth system depend on dust mineralogy, which varies between dust source regions. We constrain the contribution of the world’s main dust source regions by integrating dust observations with global model simulations. We find that Asian dust contributes more and that North African dust contributes less than models account for. We obtain a dataset of each source region’s contribution to the dust cycle that can be used to constrain dust impacts on the Earth system.
Youhua Tang, Huisheng Bian, Zhining Tao, Luke D. Oman, Daniel Tong, Pius Lee, Patrick C. Campbell, Barry Baker, Cheng-Hsuan Lu, Li Pan, Jun Wang, Jeffery McQueen, and Ivanka Stajner
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 21, 2527–2550, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-21-2527-2021, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-21-2527-2021, 2021
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Chemical lateral boundary condition (CLBC) impact is essential for regional air quality prediction during intrusion events. We present a model mapping Goddard Earth Observing System (GEOS) to Community Multi-scale Air Quality (CMAQ) CB05–AERO6 (Carbon Bond 5; version 6 of the aerosol module) species. Influence depends on distance from the inflow boundary and species and their regional characteristics. We use aerosol optical thickness to derive CLBCs, achieving reasonable prediction.
Jens Redemann, Robert Wood, Paquita Zuidema, Sarah J. Doherty, Bernadette Luna, Samuel E. LeBlanc, Michael S. Diamond, Yohei Shinozuka, Ian Y. Chang, Rei Ueyama, Leonhard Pfister, Ju-Mee Ryoo, Amie N. Dobracki, Arlindo M. da Silva, Karla M. Longo, Meloë S. Kacenelenbogen, Connor J. Flynn, Kristina Pistone, Nichola M. Knox, Stuart J. Piketh, James M. Haywood, Paola Formenti, Marc Mallet, Philip Stier, Andrew S. Ackerman, Susanne E. Bauer, Ann M. Fridlind, Gregory R. Carmichael, Pablo E. Saide, Gonzalo A. Ferrada, Steven G. Howell, Steffen Freitag, Brian Cairns, Brent N. Holben, Kirk D. Knobelspiesse, Simone Tanelli, Tristan S. L'Ecuyer, Andrew M. Dzambo, Ousmane O. Sy, Greg M. McFarquhar, Michael R. Poellot, Siddhant Gupta, Joseph R. O'Brien, Athanasios Nenes, Mary Kacarab, Jenny P. S. Wong, Jennifer D. Small-Griswold, Kenneth L. Thornhill, David Noone, James R. Podolske, K. Sebastian Schmidt, Peter Pilewskie, Hong Chen, Sabrina P. Cochrane, Arthur J. Sedlacek, Timothy J. Lang, Eric Stith, Michal Segal-Rozenhaimer, Richard A. Ferrare, Sharon P. Burton, Chris A. Hostetler, David J. Diner, Felix C. Seidel, Steven E. Platnick, Jeffrey S. Myers, Kerry G. Meyer, Douglas A. Spangenberg, Hal Maring, and Lan Gao
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 21, 1507–1563, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-21-1507-2021, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-21-1507-2021, 2021
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Southern Africa produces significant biomass burning emissions whose impacts on regional and global climate are poorly understood. ORACLES (ObseRvations of Aerosols above CLouds and their intEractionS) is a 5-year NASA investigation designed to study the key processes that determine these climate impacts. The main purpose of this paper is to familiarize the broader scientific community with the ORACLES project, the dataset it produced, and the most important initial findings.
Jianglong Zhang, Robert J. D. Spurr, Jeffrey S. Reid, Peng Xian, Peter R. Colarco, James R. Campbell, Edward J. Hyer, and Nancy L. Baker
Geosci. Model Dev., 14, 27–42, https://doi.org/10.5194/gmd-14-27-2021, https://doi.org/10.5194/gmd-14-27-2021, 2021
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A first-of-its-kind scheme has been developed for assimilating Ozone Monitoring Instrument (OMI) aerosol index (AI) measurements into the Naval Aerosol Analysis and Predictive System. Improvements in model simulations demonstrate the utility of OMI AI data assimilation for improving the accuracy of aerosol model analysis over cloudy regions and bright surfaces. This study can be considered one of the first attempts at direct radiance assimilation in the UV spectrum for aerosol analyses.
Peng Xian, Philip J. Klotzbach, Jason P. Dunion, Matthew A. Janiga, Jeffrey S. Reid, Peter R. Colarco, and Zak Kipling
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 20, 15357–15378, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-20-15357-2020, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-20-15357-2020, 2020
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Using dust AOD (DAOD) data from three aerosol reanalyses, we explored the correlative relationships between DAOD and multiple indices representing seasonal Atlantic TC activities. A robust negative correlation with Caribbean DAOD and Atlantic TC activity was found. We documented for the first time the regional differences of this relationship for over the Caribbean and the tropical North Atlantic. We also evaluated the impacts of potential confounding climate factors in this relationship.
Mingxuan Wu, Xiaohong Liu, Hongbin Yu, Hailong Wang, Yang Shi, Kang Yang, Anton Darmenov, Chenglai Wu, Zhien Wang, Tao Luo, Yan Feng, and Ziming Ke
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 20, 13835–13855, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-20-13835-2020, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-20-13835-2020, 2020
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The spatiotemporal distributions of dust aerosol simulated by global climate models (GCMs) are highly uncertain. In this study, we evaluate dust extinction profiles, optical depth, and surface concentrations simulated in three GCMs and one reanalysis against multiple satellite retrievals and surface observations to gain process-level understanding. Our results highlight the importance of correctly representing dust emission, dry/wet deposition, and size distribution in GCMs.
Yohei Shinozuka, Pablo E. Saide, Gonzalo A. Ferrada, Sharon P. Burton, Richard Ferrare, Sarah J. Doherty, Hamish Gordon, Karla Longo, Marc Mallet, Yan Feng, Qiaoqiao Wang, Yafang Cheng, Amie Dobracki, Steffen Freitag, Steven G. Howell, Samuel LeBlanc, Connor Flynn, Michal Segal-Rosenhaimer, Kristina Pistone, James R. Podolske, Eric J. Stith, Joseph Ryan Bennett, Gregory R. Carmichael, Arlindo da Silva, Ravi Govindaraju, Ruby Leung, Yang Zhang, Leonhard Pfister, Ju-Mee Ryoo, Jens Redemann, Robert Wood, and Paquita Zuidema
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 20, 11491–11526, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-20-11491-2020, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-20-11491-2020, 2020
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In the southeast Atlantic, well-defined smoke plumes from Africa advect over marine boundary layer cloud decks; both are most extensive around September, when most of the smoke resides in the free troposphere. A framework is put forth for evaluating the performance of a range of global and regional atmospheric composition models against observations made during the NASA ORACLES (ObseRvations of Aerosols above CLouds and their intEractionS) airborne mission in September 2016.
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Short summary
Observations show an increasing aerosol optical depth trend in the Middle East between 2003–2012. We evaluate the NASA Goddard Earth Observing System (GEOS) model's ability to capture these trends and examine the meteorological and surface parameters driving dust emissions. Our results highlight the importance of data assimilation for long-term trends of atmospheric aerosols and support the hypothesis that vegetation cover loss may have contributed to increasing dust emissions in the period.
Observations show an increasing aerosol optical depth trend in the Middle East between...
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