Identification

Title

Widespread trace bromine and iodine in remote tropospheric non-sea-salt aerosols

Abstract

Reactive halogens catalytically destroy O3 and therefore affect (1) stratospheric O3 depletion and (2) the oxidative capacity of the troposphere. Reactive halogens also partition into the aerosol phase, but what governs halogen-aerosol partitioning is poorly constrained in models. In this work, we present global-scale measurements of non-sea-salt aerosol (nSSA) bromine and iodine taken during the NASA Atmospheric Tomography Mission (ATom). Using the Particle Analysis by Laser Mass Spectrometry instrument, we found that bromine and iodine are present in 8 %–26 % (interquartile range, IQR) and 12 %–44 % (IQR) of accumulation-mode nSSA, respectively. Despite being commonly found in nSSA, the concentrations of bromine and iodine in nSSA were low but potentially important, at 0.11–0.57 pmol mol−1 (IQR) and 0.04–0.24 pmol mol−1 (IQR), respectively. In the troposphere, we find two distinct sources of bromine and iodine for nSSA: (1) a primary source from biomass burning and (2) a pervasive secondary source. In the stratosphere, nSSA bromine and iodine concentrations increased with increasing O3 concentrations; however, higher concentrations of stratospheric nSSA bromine and iodine were found in organic-rich particles that originated in the troposphere. Finally, we compared our ATom nSSA iodine measurements to the global chemical transport model GEOS-Chem (Goddard Earth Observing System); nSSA bromine concentrations could not be compared because they were not tracked in the model. We found that the model compared well to our ATom nSSA iodine measurements in the background atmosphere but not in the marine boundary layer, biomass burning plumes, or stratosphere.

Resource type

document

Resource locator

Unique resource identifier

code

https://n2t.net/ark:/85065/d7rf60cn

codeSpace

Dataset language

eng

Spatial reference system

code identifying the spatial reference system

Classification of spatial data and services

Topic category

geoscientificInformation

Keywords

Keyword set

keyword value

Text

originating controlled vocabulary

title

Resource Type

reference date

date type

publication

effective date

2016-01-01T00:00:00Z

Geographic location

West bounding longitude

East bounding longitude

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Temporal reference

Temporal extent

Begin position

End position

Dataset reference date

date type

publication

effective date

2025-01-06T00:00:00Z

Frequency of update

Quality and validity

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Conformity

Data format

name of format

version of format

Constraints related to access and use

Constraint set

Use constraints

Limitations on public access

None

Responsible organisations

Responsible party

contact position

OpenSky Support

organisation name

UCAR/NCAR - Library

full postal address

PO Box 3000

Boulder

80307-3000

email address

opensky@ucar.edu

web address

http://opensky.ucar.edu/

name: homepage

responsible party role

pointOfContact

Metadata on metadata

Metadata point of contact