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https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-2024-140
https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-2024-140
18 Jan 2024
 | 18 Jan 2024

Characterization of aerosol over the Eastern Mediterranean by polarization sensitive Raman lidar measurements during A-LIFE – aerosol type classification and type separation

Silke Groß, Volker Freudenthaler, Moritz Haarig, Albert Ansmann, Carlos Toledano, David Mateos, Petra Seibert, Rodanthi-Elisavet Mamouri, Argyro Nisantzi, Josef Gasteiger, Maximilian Dollner, Anne Tipka, Manuel Schöberl, Marilena Teri, and Bernadett Weinzierl

Abstract. Aerosols are key players in the Earth’s climate system with mineral dust being one major component of the atmospheric aerosol load. While former campaigns focused on investigating the properties and effects of rather pure mineral dust layers, the A-LIFE (Absorbing aerosol layers in a changing climate: aging, lifetime and dynamics) campaign in April 2017 aimed to characterize dust in complex aerosol mixtures. In this study we present ground-based lidar measurements that were performed at Limassol, Cyprus, in April 2017. During our measurement period, the measurement site was affected by complex mixtures of dust from different sources and pollution aerosols from local sources as well as long-range transported. We found mean values of the particle linear depolarization ratio and extinction-to-backscatter ratio (lidar ratio) of 0.27 ± 0.02 and 41 sr ± 5 sr at 355 nm and of 0.30 ± 0.02 and 39 sr ± 5 sr at 532 nm for Arabian dust, and of 0.27 ± 0.02 and 55 sr ± 8 sr at 355 nm and of 0.28 ± 0.02 and 53 sr ± 7 sr at 532 nm for Saharan dust. The values found for pollution aerosols of the particle linear depolarization ratio and the lidar ratio are 0.05 ± 0.02 at 355 nm and 0.04 ± 0.02 at 532 nm, and 65 sr ± 12 sr at 355 nm and 60 sr ± 16 sr at 532 nm, respectively. We use our measurements for aerosol typing and compare that to aerosol typing from sun photometer data, in-situ measurements and trajectory analysis. The different methods agree well for the derived aerosol type, but looking at the derived dust mass concentration from different methods, the trajectory analysis frequently underestimate high dust concentration that were found in major mineral dust events.

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Silke Groß, Volker Freudenthaler, Moritz Haarig, Albert Ansmann, Carlos Toledano, David Mateos, Petra Seibert, Rodanthi-Elisavet Mamouri, Argyro Nisantzi, Josef Gasteiger, Maximilian Dollner, Anne Tipka, Manuel Schöberl, Marilena Teri, and Bernadett Weinzierl

Status: closed

Comment types: AC – author | RC – referee | CC – community | EC – editor | CEC – chief editor | : Report abuse
  • RC1: 'Comment on egusphere-2024-140', Anonymous Referee #1, 01 Feb 2024
  • RC2: 'Comment on egusphere-2024-140', Anonymous Referee #2, 18 Feb 2024

Status: closed

Comment types: AC – author | RC – referee | CC – community | EC – editor | CEC – chief editor | : Report abuse
  • RC1: 'Comment on egusphere-2024-140', Anonymous Referee #1, 01 Feb 2024
  • RC2: 'Comment on egusphere-2024-140', Anonymous Referee #2, 18 Feb 2024
Silke Groß, Volker Freudenthaler, Moritz Haarig, Albert Ansmann, Carlos Toledano, David Mateos, Petra Seibert, Rodanthi-Elisavet Mamouri, Argyro Nisantzi, Josef Gasteiger, Maximilian Dollner, Anne Tipka, Manuel Schöberl, Marilena Teri, and Bernadett Weinzierl
Silke Groß, Volker Freudenthaler, Moritz Haarig, Albert Ansmann, Carlos Toledano, David Mateos, Petra Seibert, Rodanthi-Elisavet Mamouri, Argyro Nisantzi, Josef Gasteiger, Maximilian Dollner, Anne Tipka, Manuel Schöberl, Marilena Teri, and Bernadett Weinzierl

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Short summary
Aerosols contribute to the largest uncertainties in climate change predictions. Especially absorbing aerosols propose difficulties in our understanding. The eastern Mediterranean is a hot spot for aerosols with natural and anthropogenic contributions. We present lidar measurements performed during the A-LIFE field experiment to characterize aerosols and aerosol mixtures. We extend current classification and separation schemes and compare different classification schemes.