The Antarctic continent: Quite devoid of ice nucleating particles

• Main Authors: Wex, H., Henning, S., Mangold, A., Van Overmeiren, P., Stratmann, F.
• Format: Conference Object
• Language: English
• Published: 2023
• Subjects: Antarctic; Arctic; Austral; Neumayer; Southern Ocean; The Antarctic; Antarc*; Antarctica
• Online Access: https://gfzpublic.gfz-potsdam.de/pubman/item/item_5016910

In this contribution, we present data on observed concentrations of ice nucleating particles (INP) on the Antarctic continent (N_INP) at some distance from the coast. Data already published for the Southern Ocean suggests low INP concentrations in general. More specific, low concentrations were observed as long as air masses did not have recent contact to continents (with the exception of Antarctica) or islands. It was assumed that Antarctica itself is not a source for INP. Our measurements were done on the Antarctic continent itself, based on filter samples and subsequent off-line analysis at TROPOS, Germany. Filters were collected at the German research station Neumayer during the course of two years, and at the Belgium research station Princess Elisabeth, collected during three austral summers. Altogether low INP concentrations, similar to those reported in recent literature on Southern Ocean INP, were found for all samples, with quasi no contribution of proteinaceous material of biological origin (determined via heating the samples). Similar to work recently done for the Arctic, we propose a temperature dependent parameterization of these data.