– PI: Markus Petters
– Source: Department of Energy
– Co-PI: Nicholas Meskhidze
– Years: Aug 2020 – Aug 2024
– Postdoctoral Researchers: Maksim Islam and Sabin Kasparoglu
Background. The overall goal of the ARM TRACER campaign is to provide high temporal and spatial resolution observations of convective clouds in the Houston region, over a broad range of environmental and aerosol regimes. This proposal is in response to the call for studies that build upon the measurements that ARM will make for aerosol and cloud processes, with a focus on aerosol processes relevant to the formation and growth of atmospheric new particles, the influence of aerosol composition, mixing state, and physical properties on aerosol growth, aging, and removal processes, and aerosol-cloud interactions. This project will deploy a PI-developed instrument package during the Intensive Observation Period. The package includes aerosol instrumentation for size-resolved eddy-covariance particle flux measurement, refractory black carbon measurements, and a hygroscopicity tandem differential mobility analyzer.
Objectives. The overall objectives of the project are (1) Quantify turbulent vertical particle fluxes during the TRACER IOP in Houston, TX; (2) Quantify the hygroscopic growth factors and hygroscopicity parameter of the material responsible for modal aerosol growth during new particle formation/growth events; (3) Quantify turbulent aerosol mass flux derived from the co-located Doppler LIDAR; and (4) Create quality-controlled PI data products that support science following from the data collected during the TRACER campaign.
Islam, MM, N Meskhidze, A Rasheeda Satheesh, and MD Petters. 2022. “Turbulent flux measurements of the near-surface and residual-layer small particle events.” Journal of Geophysical Research − Atmospheres 127(17): e2021JD036289, https://doi.org/10.1029/2021JD036289
Kasparoglu, S, MM Islam, N Meskhidze, and MD Petters. 2022. “Characterization of a modified printed optical particle spectrometer for high-frequency and high-precision laboratory and field measurements.” Atmospheric Measurement Techniques 15(17): 5007–5018, https://doi.org/10.5194/amt-15-5007-2022
Petters, MD. 2021. “Revisiting matrix-based inversion of scanning mobility particle sizer (SMPS) and humidified tandem differential mobility analyzer (HTDMA) data.” Atmospheric Measurement Techniques 14(12): 7909–7928, https://doi.org/10.5194/amt-14-7909-2021
Petters, MD, T Pujiastuti, A Rasheeda Satheesh, S Kasparoglu, B Sutherland, and NM Meskhidze. 2023. “Wind-Driven Emissions of Coarse-Mode Particles in an Urban Environment.” TEGUsphere [preprint], https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-2023-951.
Kasparoglu, S., Cai, L., Meskhidze, N., Petters, M.D., 2024a. “Evolution of refractory black carbon mixing state in an urban environment.” Atmos. Environ. 333, 120651. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.atmosenv.2024.120651.
Kasparoglu, S., Meskhidze, N., Petters, M.D., 2024b. “Aerosol mixing state, new particle formation, and cloud droplet number concentration in an urban environment.” Sci. Total Environ. 951, 175307. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.scitotenv.2024.175307.