Articles | Volume 25, issue 2
https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-25-881-2025
https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-25-881-2025
Research article
 | 
22 Jan 2025
Research article |  | 22 Jan 2025

The surface tension and cloud condensation nuclei (CCN) activation of sea spray aerosol particles

Judith Kleinheins, Nadia Shardt, Ulrike Lohmann, and Claudia Marcolli

Related authors

On the evolution of sub- and super-saturated water uptake of secondary organic aerosol in chamber experiments from mixed precursors
Yu Wang, Aristeidis Voliotis, Dawei Hu, Yunqi Shao, Mao Du, Ying Chen, Judith Kleinheins, Claudia Marcolli, M. Rami Alfarra, and Gordon McFiggans
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 22, 4149–4166, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-22-4149-2022,https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-22-4149-2022, 2022
Short summary

Related subject area

Subject: Aerosols | Research Activity: Atmospheric Modelling and Data Analysis | Altitude Range: Troposphere | Science Focus: Chemistry (chemical composition and reactions)
Trends and drivers of soluble iron deposition from East Asian dust to the Northwest Pacific: a springtime analysis (2001–2017)
Hanzheng Zhu, Yaman Liu, Man Yue, Shihui Feng, Pingqing Fu, Kan Huang, Xinyi Dong, and Minghuai Wang
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 25, 5175–5197, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-25-5175-2025,https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-25-5175-2025, 2025
Short summary
Modelling of atmospheric variability in gas and aerosols during the ACROSS campaign 2022 of the greater Paris area: evaluation of the meteorology, dynamics and chemistry
Ludovico Di Antonio, Matthias Beekmann, Guillaume Siour, Vincent Michoud, Christopher Cantrell, Astrid Bauville, Antonin Bergé, Mathieu Cazaunau, Servanne Chevaillier, Manuela Cirtog, Joel F. de Brito, Paola Formenti, Cecile Gaimoz, Olivier Garret, Aline Gratien, Valérie Gros, Martial Haeffelin, Lelia N. Hawkins, Simone Kotthaus, Gael Noyalet, Diana L. Pereira, Jean-Eudes Petit, Eva Drew Pronovost, Véronique Riffault, Chenjie Yu, Gilles Foret, Jean-François Doussin, and Claudia Di Biagio
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 25, 4803–4831, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-25-4803-2025,https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-25-4803-2025, 2025
Short summary
Spatial–temporal patterns in anthropogenic and biomass burning emission contributions to air pollution and mortality burden changes in India from 1995 to 2014
Bin Luo, Yuqiang Zhang, Tao Tang, Hongliang Zhang, Jianlin Hu, Jiangshan Mu, Wenxing Wang, and Likun Xue
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 25, 4767–4783, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-25-4767-2025,https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-25-4767-2025, 2025
Short summary
A comprehensive global modeling assessment of nitrate heterogeneous formation on desert dust
Rubén Soussé Villa, Oriol Jorba, María Gonçalves Ageitos, Dene Bowdalo, Marc Guevara, and Carlos Pérez García-Pando
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 25, 4719–4753, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-25-4719-2025,https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-25-4719-2025, 2025
Short summary
AERO-MAP: a data compilation and modeling approach to understand spatial variability in fine- and coarse-mode aerosol composition
Natalie M. Mahowald, Longlei Li, Julius Vira, Marje Prank, Douglas S. Hamilton, Hitoshi Matsui, Ron L. Miller, P. Louis Lu, Ezgi Akyuz, Daphne Meidan, Peter Hess, Heikki Lihavainen, Christine Wiedinmyer, Jenny Hand, Maria Grazia Alaimo, Célia Alves, Andres Alastuey, Paulo Artaxo, Africa Barreto, Francisco Barraza, Silvia Becagli, Giulia Calzolai, Shankararaman Chellam, Ying Chen, Patrick Chuang, David D. Cohen, Cristina Colombi, Evangelia Diapouli, Gaetano Dongarra, Konstantinos Eleftheriadis, Johann Engelbrecht, Corinne Galy-Lacaux, Cassandra Gaston, Dario Gomez, Yenny González Ramos, Roy M. Harrison, Chris Heyes, Barak Herut, Philip Hopke, Christoph Hüglin, Maria Kanakidou, Zsofia Kertesz, Zbigniew Klimont, Katriina Kyllönen, Fabrice Lambert, Xiaohong Liu, Remi Losno, Franco Lucarelli, Willy Maenhaut, Beatrice Marticorena, Randall V. Martin, Nikolaos Mihalopoulos, Yasser Morera-Gómez, Adina Paytan, Joseph Prospero, Sergio Rodríguez, Patricia Smichowski, Daniela Varrica, Brenna Walsh, Crystal L. Weagle, and Xi Zhao
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 25, 4665–4702, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-25-4665-2025,https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-25-4665-2025, 2025
Short summary

Cited articles

Aumann, E., Hildemann, L., and Tabazadeh, A.: Measuring and modeling the composition and temperature-dependence of surface tension for organic solutions, Atmos. Environ., 44, 329–337, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.atmosenv.2009.10.033, 2010. a
Bain, A., Ghosh, K., Prisle, N. L., and Bzdek, B. R.: Surface-Area-to-Volume Ratio Determines Surface Tensions in Microscopic, Surfactant-Containing Droplets, ACS Central Science, 9, 2076–2083, https://doi.org/10.1021/acscentsci.3c00998, 2023. a, b, c, d, e, f, g
Bain, A., Prisle, N. L., and Bzdek, B. R.: Model-Measurement Comparisons for Surfactant-Containing Aerosol Droplets, ACS Earth Space Chem., 8, 2244–2255, https://doi.org/10.1021/acsearthspacechem.4c00199, 2024. a
Bates, T. S., Quinn, P. K., Coffman, D. J., Johnson, J. E., Upchurch, L., Saliba, G., Lewis, S., Graff, J., Russell, L. M., and Behrenfeld, M. J.: Variability in Marine Plankton Ecosystems Are Not Observed in Freshly Emitted Sea Spray Aerosol Over the North Atlantic Ocean, Geophys. Res. Lett., 47, e2019GL085938, https://doi.org/10.1029/2019GL085938, 2020. a, b, c
Bertram, T. H., Cochran, R. E., Grassian, V. H., and Stone, E. A.: Sea spray aerosol chemical composition: elemental and molecular mimics for laboratory studies of heterogeneous and multiphase reactions, Chem. Soc. Rev., 47, 2374–2400, https://doi.org/10.1039/C7CS00008A, 2018. a, b, c, d, e, f, g
Download
Short summary
We model the cloud condensation nuclei (CCN) activation of sea spray aerosol particles with classical Köhler theory and with a new model approach that takes surface tension lowering into account. We categorize organic compounds into weak, intermediate, and strong surfactants, and we outline for which composition surface tension lowering is important. The results suggest that surface tension lowering allows sea spray aerosol particles in the Aitken mode to be a source of CCN in marine updraughts.
Share
Altmetrics
Final-revised paper
Preprint