Exploring the processes controlling secondary inorganic aerosol: evaluating the global GEOS-Chem simulation using a suite of aircraft campaigns

Norman, Olivia G.; Heald, Colette L.; Bililign, Solomon; Campuzano-Jost, Pedro; Coe, Hugh; Fiddler, Marc N.; Green, Jaime R.; Jimenez, Jose L.; Kaiser, Katharina; Liao, Jin; Middlebrook, Ann M.; Nault, Benjamin A.; Nowak, John B.; Schneider, Johannes; Welti, André

doi:https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-25-771-2025

Articles | Volume 25, issue 2

https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-25-771-2025

© Author(s) 2025. This work is distributed under
the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.

https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-25-771-2025

© Author(s) 2025. This work is distributed under
the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.

Articles | Volume 25, issue 2

Research article

|

21 Jan 2025

Research article |

| 21 Jan 2025

Exploring the processes controlling secondary inorganic aerosol: evaluating the global GEOS-Chem simulation using a suite of aircraft campaigns

Olivia G. Norman, Colette L. Heald, Solomon Bililign, Pedro Campuzano-Jost, Hugh Coe, Marc N. Fiddler, Jaime R. Green, Jose L. Jimenez, Katharina Kaiser, Jin Liao, Ann M. Middlebrook, Benjamin A. Nault, John B. Nowak, Johannes Schneider, and André Welti

Supplement

https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-25-771-2025-supplement

Data sets

geoschem/GCClassic: GEOS-Chem 13.3.4 (13.3.4) The International GEOS-Chem User Community https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.5764874

INTEX-B Data INTEX-B Science Team https://doi.org/10.5067/Aircraft/INTEXB/Aerosol-TraceGas

DC3 Field Campaign Data from DC-8 aircraft DC3 Science Team https://doi.org/10.5067/Aircraft/DC3/DC8/Aerosol-TraceGa

KORUS-AQ Data KORUS-AQ Science Team https://doi.org/10.5067/Suborbital/KORUSAQ/DATA01

FIREX-AQ Data FIREX-AQ Science Team https://doi.org/10.5067/SUBORBITAL/FIREXAQ2019/DATA001

Aerosol Direct Radiative Impact Experiment (ADRIEX): In-situ airborne atmospheric measurements and atmospheric model data ADRIEX Science Team https://data.ceda.ac.uk/badc/adriex/data/bae-146

Exploring the processes controlling secondary inorganic aerosol: Evaluating the global GEOS-Chem simulation using a suite of aircraft campaigns O. G. Norman and C. L. Heald https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.14029436

CalNex CalNex Science Team https://csl.noaa.gov/groups/csl7/measurements/2010calnex/P3/DataDownload/DataDownloadMerged.html

SENEX SENEX Science Team https://csl.noaa.gov/groups/csl7/measurements/2013senex/P3/DataDownload/mergeFiles.html

WINTER Data Sets WINTER Science Team https://data.eol.ucar.edu/master_lists/generated/winter

Facility for Airborne Atmospheric Measurements (FAAM) flights EUCAARI Science Team https://data.ceda.ac.uk/badc/faam/data/2008

Mission: EMeRGe-AS EMeRGe-AS Science Team https://halo-db.pa.op.dlr.de/mission/97

Mission: EMeRGe-EU EMeRGe-EU Science Team https://halo-db.pa.op.dlr.de/mission/95

Download

Article (7380 KB)
Full-text XML

Short summary

This study finds that one component of secondary inorganic aerosols, nitrate, is greatly overestimated by a global atmospheric chemistry model compared to observations from 11 flight campaigns. None of the loss and production pathways explored can explain the nitrate bias alone. The model’s inability to capture the variability in the observations remains and requires future investigation to avoid biases in policy-related studies (i.e., air quality, health, climate impacts of these aerosols).