Ion-induced nucleation of pure biogenic particles

  • Atmospheric aerosols and their effect on clouds are thought to be important for anthropogenic radiative forcing of the climate, yet remain poorly understood1. Globally, around half of cloud condensation nuclei originate from nucleation of atmospheric vapours2. It is thought that sulfuric acid is essential to initiate most particle formation in the atmosphere3,4, and that ions have a relatively minor role5. Some laboratory studies, however, have reported organic particle formation without the intentional addition of sulfuric acid, although contamination could not be excluded6,7. Here we present evidence for the formation of aerosol particles from highly oxidized biogenic vapours in the absence of sulfuric acid in a large chamber under atmospheric conditions. The highly oxygenated molecules (HOMs) are produced by ozonolysis of α-pinene. We find that ions from Galactic cosmic rays increase the nucleation rate by one to two orders of magnitude compared with neutral nucleation. Our experimental findings are supported by quantum chemical calculations of the cluster binding energies of representative HOMs. Ion-induced nucleation of pure organic particles constitutes a potentially widespread source of aerosol particles in terrestrial environments with low sulfuric acid pollution.

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Author:Jasper KirkbyORCiD, Jonathan DuplissyORCiD, Kamalika Sengupta, Carla Frege, Hamish Gordon, Christina Williamson, Martin HeinritziORCiDGND, Mario SimonORCiD, Chao Yan, Joao Almeida, Jasmin Tröstl, Tuomo Nieminen, Ismael K. Ortega, Robert WagnerORCiDGND, Alexey Adamov, Antonio AmorimORCiD, Anne-Kathrin Bernhammer, Federico BianchiORCiDGND, Martin BreitenlechnerORCiD, Sophia Brilke, Xuemeng Chen, Jill Craven, Antonio Dias, Sebastian Ehrhart, Richard C. FlaganORCiD, Alessandro Franchin, Claudia Fuchs, Roberto Guida, Jani Hakala, Christopher Robert Hoyle, Tuija Jokinen, Heikki Junninen, Juha Kangasluoma, Jaeseok Kim, Manuel Krapf, Christoph Andreas KürtenORCiDGND, Ari Laaksonen, Katrianne LehtipaloORCiDGND, Vladimir MakhmutovORCiD, Serge Mathot, Ugo Molteni, Antti OnnelaORCiD, Otso Peräkylä, Felix Piel, Tuukka Petäjä, Arnaud Patrick Praplan, Kirsty Pringle, Alexandru Rap, Nigel A. D. Richards, Ilona RiipinenORCiD, Matti P. RissanenORCiD, Linda Rondo, Nina Sarnela, Siegfried SchobesbergerORCiDGND, Catherine E. Scott, John H. Seinfeld, Mikko SipiläORCiD, Gerhard Steiner, Yuri Stozhkov, Frank StratmannORCiDGND, Antonio Tomé, Annele Virtanen, Alexander L. VogelORCiDGND, Andrea Christine WagnerGND, Paul E. Wagner, Ernest Weingartner, Daniela WimmerORCiDGND, Paul M. WinklerORCiD, Penglin Ye, Xuan Zhang, Armin HanselORCiD, Josef Dommen, Neil McPherson DonahueORCiDGND, Douglas R. WorsnopORCiD, Urs BaltenspergerORCiDGND, Markku KulmalaORCiDGND, Kenneth S. Carslaw, Joachim CurtiusORCiD
URN:urn:nbn:de:hebis:30:3-516016
DOI:https://doi.org/10.1038/nature17953
ISSN:1476-4687
ISSN:0028-0836
Pubmed Id:https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/27225125
Parent Title (English):Nature
Publisher:Nature Publ. Group
Place of publication:London [u. a.]
Document Type:Article
Language:English
Year of Completion:2016
Date of first Publication:2016/05/25
Publishing Institution:Universitätsbibliothek Johann Christian Senckenberg
Release Date:2019/11/04
Tag:Atmospheric chemistry; Climate-change impacts
Volume:533
Page Number:20
First Page:521
Last Page:526
Note:
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0) licence. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article’s Creative Commons licence, unless indicated otherwise in the credit line; if the material is not included under the Creative Commons licence, users will need to obtain permission from the licence holder to reproduce the material. To view a copy of this licence, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/.
HeBIS-PPN:455706743
Institutes:Geowissenschaften / Geographie / Geowissenschaften
Dewey Decimal Classification:5 Naturwissenschaften und Mathematik / 55 Geowissenschaften, Geologie / 550 Geowissenschaften
Sammlungen:Universitätspublikationen
Licence (German):License LogoCreative Commons - Namensnennung 4.0