Dust plume formation in the free troposphere and aerosol size distribution during the Saharan Mineral Dust Experiment in North Africa
Dust particles mixed in the free troposphere have longer lifetimes than airborne particles near the surface. Their cumulative radiative impact on earth’s meteorological processes and climate might be significant despite their relatively small contribution to total dust abundance. One example is the...
Published in: | Tellus B: Chemical and Physical Meteorology |
---|---|
Main Authors: | , , , , |
Other Authors: | , , , , |
Format: | Article in Journal/Newspaper |
Language: | English |
Published: |
Informa UK Limited
2015
|
Subjects: | |
Online Access: | http://hdl.handle.net/10754/592812 https://doi.org/10.3402/tellusb.v67.27170 |
id |
ftkingabdullahun:oai:repository.kaust.edu.sa:10754/592812 |
---|---|
record_format |
openpolar |
spelling |
ftkingabdullahun:oai:repository.kaust.edu.sa:10754/592812 2023-12-31T10:20:53+01:00 Dust plume formation in the free troposphere and aerosol size distribution during the Saharan Mineral Dust Experiment in North Africa Khan, Basit Ali Stenchikov, Georgiy L. Weinzierl, Bernadett Kalenderski, Stoitchko Osipov, Sergey King Abdullah University of Science and Technology (KAUST) Applied Mathematics and Computational Science Program Earth Science and Engineering Program Physical Science and Engineering (PSE) Division Red Sea Research Center (RSRC) 2015-11-27 application/pdf http://hdl.handle.net/10754/592812 https://doi.org/10.3402/tellusb.v67.27170 en eng Informa UK Limited http://www.tellusb.net/index.php/tellusb/article/view/27170 Dust plume formation in the free troposphere and aerosol size distribution during the Saharan Mineral Dust Experiment in North Africa 2015, 67 (0) Tellus B doi:10.3402/tellusb.v67.27170 1600-0889 0280-6509 Tellus B: Chemical and Physical Meteorology http://hdl.handle.net/10754/592812 This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, allowing third parties to copy and redistribute the material in any medium or format and to remix, transform, and build upon the material for any purpose, even commercially, provided the original work is properly cited and states its license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ regional modelling high resolution WRF-Chem SAL boundary layer dust load Article 2015 ftkingabdullahun https://doi.org/10.3402/tellusb.v67.27170 2023-12-02T20:18:17Z Dust particles mixed in the free troposphere have longer lifetimes than airborne particles near the surface. Their cumulative radiative impact on earth’s meteorological processes and climate might be significant despite their relatively small contribution to total dust abundance. One example is the elevated dust-laden Saharan Air Layer (SAL) over the tropical and subtropical North Atlantic, which cools the sea surface. To understand the formation mechanisms of a dust layer in the free troposphere, this study combines model simulations and dust observations collected during the first stage of the Saharan Mineral Dust Experiment (SAMUM-I), which sampled dust events that extended from Morocco to Portugal, and investigated the spatial distribution and the microphysical, optical, chemical, and radiative properties of Saharan mineral dust. The Weather Research Forecast model coupled with the Chemistry/Aerosol module (WRF-Chem) is employed to reproduce the meteorological environment and spatial and size distributions of dust. The model domain covers northwest Africa and adjacent water with 5 km horizontal grid spacing and 51 vertical layers. The experiments were run from 20 May to 9 June 2006, covering the period of the most intensive dust outbreaks. Comparisons of model results with available airborne and ground-based observations show that WRF-Chem reproduces observed meteorological fields as well as aerosol distribution across the entire region and along the airplane’s tracks. Several mechanisms that cause aerosol entrainment into the free troposphere are evaluated and it is found that orographic lifting, and interaction of sea breeze with the continental outflow are key mechanisms that form a surface-detached aerosol plume over the ocean. The model dust emission scheme is tuned to simultaneously fit the observed total optical depth and the ratio of aerosol optical depths generated by fine and coarse dust modes. Comparisons of simulated dust size distributions with airplane and ground-based observations are good for ... Article in Journal/Newspaper North Atlantic King Abdullah University of Science and Technology: KAUST Repository Tellus B: Chemical and Physical Meteorology 67 1 27170 |
institution |
Open Polar |
collection |
King Abdullah University of Science and Technology: KAUST Repository |
op_collection_id |
ftkingabdullahun |
language |
English |
topic |
regional modelling high resolution WRF-Chem SAL boundary layer dust load |
spellingShingle |
regional modelling high resolution WRF-Chem SAL boundary layer dust load Khan, Basit Ali Stenchikov, Georgiy L. Weinzierl, Bernadett Kalenderski, Stoitchko Osipov, Sergey Dust plume formation in the free troposphere and aerosol size distribution during the Saharan Mineral Dust Experiment in North Africa |
topic_facet |
regional modelling high resolution WRF-Chem SAL boundary layer dust load |
description |
Dust particles mixed in the free troposphere have longer lifetimes than airborne particles near the surface. Their cumulative radiative impact on earth’s meteorological processes and climate might be significant despite their relatively small contribution to total dust abundance. One example is the elevated dust-laden Saharan Air Layer (SAL) over the tropical and subtropical North Atlantic, which cools the sea surface. To understand the formation mechanisms of a dust layer in the free troposphere, this study combines model simulations and dust observations collected during the first stage of the Saharan Mineral Dust Experiment (SAMUM-I), which sampled dust events that extended from Morocco to Portugal, and investigated the spatial distribution and the microphysical, optical, chemical, and radiative properties of Saharan mineral dust. The Weather Research Forecast model coupled with the Chemistry/Aerosol module (WRF-Chem) is employed to reproduce the meteorological environment and spatial and size distributions of dust. The model domain covers northwest Africa and adjacent water with 5 km horizontal grid spacing and 51 vertical layers. The experiments were run from 20 May to 9 June 2006, covering the period of the most intensive dust outbreaks. Comparisons of model results with available airborne and ground-based observations show that WRF-Chem reproduces observed meteorological fields as well as aerosol distribution across the entire region and along the airplane’s tracks. Several mechanisms that cause aerosol entrainment into the free troposphere are evaluated and it is found that orographic lifting, and interaction of sea breeze with the continental outflow are key mechanisms that form a surface-detached aerosol plume over the ocean. The model dust emission scheme is tuned to simultaneously fit the observed total optical depth and the ratio of aerosol optical depths generated by fine and coarse dust modes. Comparisons of simulated dust size distributions with airplane and ground-based observations are good for ... |
author2 |
King Abdullah University of Science and Technology (KAUST) Applied Mathematics and Computational Science Program Earth Science and Engineering Program Physical Science and Engineering (PSE) Division Red Sea Research Center (RSRC) |
format |
Article in Journal/Newspaper |
author |
Khan, Basit Ali Stenchikov, Georgiy L. Weinzierl, Bernadett Kalenderski, Stoitchko Osipov, Sergey |
author_facet |
Khan, Basit Ali Stenchikov, Georgiy L. Weinzierl, Bernadett Kalenderski, Stoitchko Osipov, Sergey |
author_sort |
Khan, Basit Ali |
title |
Dust plume formation in the free troposphere and aerosol size distribution during the Saharan Mineral Dust Experiment in North Africa |
title_short |
Dust plume formation in the free troposphere and aerosol size distribution during the Saharan Mineral Dust Experiment in North Africa |
title_full |
Dust plume formation in the free troposphere and aerosol size distribution during the Saharan Mineral Dust Experiment in North Africa |
title_fullStr |
Dust plume formation in the free troposphere and aerosol size distribution during the Saharan Mineral Dust Experiment in North Africa |
title_full_unstemmed |
Dust plume formation in the free troposphere and aerosol size distribution during the Saharan Mineral Dust Experiment in North Africa |
title_sort |
dust plume formation in the free troposphere and aerosol size distribution during the saharan mineral dust experiment in north africa |
publisher |
Informa UK Limited |
publishDate |
2015 |
url |
http://hdl.handle.net/10754/592812 https://doi.org/10.3402/tellusb.v67.27170 |
genre |
North Atlantic |
genre_facet |
North Atlantic |
op_relation |
http://www.tellusb.net/index.php/tellusb/article/view/27170 Dust plume formation in the free troposphere and aerosol size distribution during the Saharan Mineral Dust Experiment in North Africa 2015, 67 (0) Tellus B doi:10.3402/tellusb.v67.27170 1600-0889 0280-6509 Tellus B: Chemical and Physical Meteorology http://hdl.handle.net/10754/592812 |
op_rights |
This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, allowing third parties to copy and redistribute the material in any medium or format and to remix, transform, and build upon the material for any purpose, even commercially, provided the original work is properly cited and states its license. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ |
op_doi |
https://doi.org/10.3402/tellusb.v67.27170 |
container_title |
Tellus B: Chemical and Physical Meteorology |
container_volume |
67 |
container_issue |
1 |
container_start_page |
27170 |
_version_ |
1786831450772865024 |