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  • Heterogeneous sulfate aerosol formation mechanisms during wintertime Chinese haze events: air quality model assessment using observations of sulfate oxygen isotopes in Beijing
Title: Heterogeneous sulfate aerosol formation mechanisms during wintertime Chinese haze events: air quality model assessment using observations of sulfate oxygen isotopes in Beijing
Abstract. Air quality models have not been able to reproduce the magnitude of theobserved concentrations of fine particulate matter (PM2.5) duringwintertime Chinese haze events. The discrepancy has been at least partlyattributed to low biases in modeled sulfate production rates, due to the lackof heterogeneous sulfate production on aerosolsin the models. In this study, we explicitly implement four heterogeneous sulfate formationmechanisms into a regional chemical transport model, in addition togas-phase and in-cloud sulfate production. We compare the model results withobservations of sulfate concentrations and oxygen isotopes, Δ17O(SO42-), in the winter of 2014–2015, the latter of whichis highly sensitive to the relative importance of different sulfateproduction mechanisms. Model results suggest that heterogeneous sulfateproduction on aerosols accounts for about 20 % of sulfate production inclean and polluted conditions, partially reducing the modeled low bias insulfate concentrations. Model sensitivity studies in comparison with theΔ17O(SO42-) observations suggest that heterogeneoussulfate formation is dominated by transition metal ion-catalyzed oxidation of SO2.  more » « less
Award ID(s):
1644998 1645062
PAR ID:
10138609
Author(s) / Creator(s):
; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ; ;
Date Published:
Journal Name:
Atmospheric Chemistry and Physics
Volume:
19
Issue:
9
ISSN:
1680-7324
Page Range / eLocation ID:
6107 to 6123
Format(s):
Medium: X
Sponsoring Org:
National Science Foundation
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