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Ice Nucleating Particles in the Marine Atmosphere

Descrizione del progetto

Una nuova strumentazione colma le lacune dei dati in relazione alle particelle oceaniche di nucleazione del ghiaccio

Gli aerosol svolgono un ruolo fondamentale nella formazione del ghiaccio nelle nubi, influenzando il clima e il ciclo idrologico. Le particelle di nucleazione del ghiaccio (INP, ice-nucleating particle) provenienti da fonti terrestri sono da tempo oggetto di molti studi. La nostra comprensione delle INP nello spray marino, un aerosol contenente sali marini e componenti organici che entra nell’atmosfera principalmente attraverso l’azione di onde e venti di grande intensità, è piuttosto limitata, un fatto dovuto in gran parte alla mancanza di dati sul campo. Il progetto MarineIce, finanziato dal Consiglio europeo della ricerca, affronterà questa lacuna implementando un nuovo laboratorio mobile semi-autonomo basato sulle INP che sfrutta una nuova tecnologia microfluidica, e sviluppando una nuova camera di espansione portatile. I dati ottenuti informeranno un modello globale di aerosol all’avanguardia per sostenere modelli meteorologici e climatici più accurati.

Obiettivo

The formation of ice in clouds is fundamentally important to life on our planet since clouds play a key role in climate and the hydrological cycle. Despite the significance of ice formation, our quantitative understanding of sources, properties, mode of action and transport of Ice-Nucleating Particles (INP) is poor. In order to improve our representation of clouds in models we need to understand the ice-nucleating ability of all major aerosol types, including those from the world’s oceans.

Despite oceans covering over 70% of the planet and sea spray being one of the dominant aerosol types in the atmosphere, its role in the formation of ice in clouds remains poorly understood. There are strong indications that biological organic components of sea spray can nucleate ice, but there is a lack of data to quantify it. In contrast, the ice-nucleating ability of major aerosol species from terrestrial sources, such as mineral dusts or bacteria, has received significant attention over the past few decades. A similar effort now needs to be made to understand marine INP. The key limitation to accurately representing INP in models over the world’s oceans is the lack of field data, a deficiency which I intend to address during this ERC fellowship.

I propose to develop and deploy a new semi-autonomous INP instrument based on novel microfluidics technology which will cover the full range of mixed phase cloud conditions, unlike existing instruments. It will be housed in a unique highly instrumented mobile laboratory, which will allow us to access the remote oceans from atmospheric observatories and research ships. The data from these campaigns will be used to constrain the oceanic INP source and define the spatial and temporal distribution of marine INP in a state-of-the-art global aerosol model. In combination, these activities will allow us to quantify this potentially important source of INP which is needed to underpin the next generation of weather and climate models.

Meccanismo di finanziamento

ERC-COG - Consolidator Grant

Istituzione ospitante

UNIVERSITY OF LEEDS
Contribution nette de l'UE
€ 2 681 881,00
Indirizzo
WOODHOUSE LANE
LS2 9JT Leeds
Regno Unito

Mostra sulla mappa

Regione
Yorkshire and the Humber West Yorkshire Leeds
Tipo di attività
Higher or Secondary Education Establishments
Collegamenti
Costo totale
€ 2 681 881,00

Beneficiari (1)