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<front>
<journal-meta>
<journal-id journal-id-type="publisher">EGUsphere</journal-id>
<journal-title-group>
<journal-title>EGUsphere</journal-title>
<abbrev-journal-title abbrev-type="publisher">EGUsphere</abbrev-journal-title>
<abbrev-journal-title abbrev-type="nlm-ta">EGUsphere</abbrev-journal-title>
</journal-title-group>
<issn pub-type="epub"></issn>
<publisher><publisher-name>Copernicus Publications</publisher-name>
<publisher-loc>Göttingen, Germany</publisher-loc>
</publisher>
</journal-meta>
<article-meta>
<article-id pub-id-type="doi">10.5194/egusphere-2025-5732</article-id>
<title-group>
<article-title>Explainable Machine Learning diagnosis of Ozone Formation Sensitivity in China: Spatiotemporal Evolution and Driver Attribution</article-title>
</title-group>
<contrib-group><contrib contrib-type="author" xlink:type="simple"><name name-style="western"><surname>Lin</surname>
<given-names>Jinglan</given-names>
</name>
<xref ref-type="aff" rid="aff1">
<sup>1</sup>
</xref>
</contrib>
<contrib contrib-type="author" xlink:type="simple"><name name-style="western"><surname>Wu</surname>
<given-names>Liqing</given-names>
</name>
<xref ref-type="aff" rid="aff2">
<sup>2</sup>
</xref>
</contrib>
<contrib contrib-type="author" xlink:type="simple"><name name-style="western"><surname>Chen</surname>
<given-names>Chujun</given-names>
</name>
<xref ref-type="aff" rid="aff1">
<sup>1</sup>
</xref>
</contrib>
<contrib contrib-type="author" xlink:type="simple"><name name-style="western"><surname>Wu</surname>
<given-names>Yongkang</given-names>
</name>
<xref ref-type="aff" rid="aff1">
<sup>1</sup>
</xref>
</contrib>
<contrib contrib-type="author" xlink:type="simple"><name name-style="western"><surname>Lin</surname>
<given-names>Rui</given-names>
</name>
<xref ref-type="aff" rid="aff3">
<sup>3</sup>
</xref>
</contrib>
<contrib contrib-type="author" xlink:type="simple"><name name-style="western"><surname>Wang</surname>
<given-names>Xuemei</given-names>
</name>
<xref ref-type="aff" rid="aff1">
<sup>1</sup>
</xref>
</contrib>
<contrib contrib-type="author" xlink:type="simple"><name name-style="western"><surname>Chen</surname>
<given-names>Weihua</given-names>
<ext-link>https://orcid.org/0000-0002-8153-0286</ext-link>
</name>
<xref ref-type="aff" rid="aff1">
<sup>1</sup>
</xref>
</contrib>
</contrib-group><aff id="aff1">
<label>1</label>
<addr-line>College of Environmental and Climate, Jinan University, Guangzhou, 510632, P.R. China</addr-line>
</aff>
<aff id="aff2">
<label>2</label>
<addr-line>College of Ocean and Meteorology, Guangdong Ocean University, Zhanjiang, 524000, P.R. China</addr-line>
</aff>
<aff id="aff3">
<label>3</label>
<addr-line>High Performance Computing Department, National Supercomputing Center in Shenzhen, Shenzhen, 518000, P.R. China</addr-line>
</aff>
<pub-date pub-type="epub">
<day>17</day>
<month>12</month>
<year>2025</year>
</pub-date>
<volume>2025</volume>
<fpage>1</fpage>
<lpage>27</lpage>
<permissions>
<copyright-statement>Copyright: &#x000a9; 2025 Jinglan Lin et al.</copyright-statement>
<copyright-year>2025</copyright-year>
<license license-type="open-access">
<license-p>This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License. To view a copy of this licence, visit <ext-link ext-link-type="uri"  xlink:href="https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/">https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/</ext-link></license-p>
</license>
</permissions>
<self-uri xlink:href="https://egusphere.copernicus.org/preprints/2025/egusphere-2025-5732/">This article is available from https://egusphere.copernicus.org/preprints/2025/egusphere-2025-5732/</self-uri>
<self-uri xlink:href="https://egusphere.copernicus.org/preprints/2025/egusphere-2025-5732/egusphere-2025-5732.pdf">The full text article is available as a PDF file from https://egusphere.copernicus.org/preprints/2025/egusphere-2025-5732/egusphere-2025-5732.pdf</self-uri>
<abstract>
<p>Accurate diagnosis of ozone (O&lt;sub&gt;3&lt;/sub&gt;) formation sensitivity (OFS) is crucial for effective control strategies, but a long-term, observation-based, interpretable assessment disentangling the roles of meteorology and emissions at the national scale is lacking. This study integrates OMI tropospheric columns of nitrogen dioxide (NO&lt;sub&gt;2&lt;/sub&gt;) and formaldehyde (HCHO) from 2005 to 2023, using the HCHO/NO&lt;sub&gt;2&lt;/sub&gt; ratio (FNR) as a proxy to track the spatiotemporal evolution of OFS in China. We develop an explainable machine learning framework coupling Random Forest (RF) and SHapley Additive exPlanations (SHAP) to quantify the contributions of meteorology and emissions at regional scales. Our findings reveal a policy-driven phase reversal in OFS: from 2005 to 2012, rising NO&lt;sub&gt;2&lt;/sub&gt; columns shifted much of China from NO&lt;sub&gt;&lt;em&gt;x&lt;/em&gt;&lt;/sub&gt;-limited to VOC-limited or transitional regimes. Post-2013, the Clean Air Actions led to a decline in NO&lt;sub&gt;2&lt;/sub&gt; and a modest increase in HCHO, triggering a nationwide return to NO&lt;sub&gt;&lt;em&gt;x&lt;/em&gt;&lt;/sub&gt;-limited conditions, especially in eastern China. Regionally, the Sichuan Basin (SCB) remained NO&lt;sub&gt;&lt;em&gt;x&lt;/em&gt;&lt;/sub&gt;-limited, the Pearl River Delta (PRD) transitioned rapidly to NO&lt;sub&gt;&lt;em&gt;x&lt;/em&gt;&lt;/sub&gt;-limited, and the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei (BTH), Yangtze River Delta (YRD), and Fenwei Plain (FWP) showed gradual shifts from VOC- to NO&lt;sub&gt;&lt;em&gt;x&lt;/em&gt;&lt;/sub&gt;-limited regimes. SHAP analysis identifies temperature and surface shortwave radiation as dominant meteorological drivers, while emission patterns vary regionally: non-methane volatile organic compounds (NMVOCs) dominate in BTH, NO&lt;sub&gt;&lt;em&gt;x&lt;/em&gt;&lt;/sub&gt; in PRD, and carbon monoxide (CO) amplifies radical cycling in FWP, YRD, and SCB. These results support a &amp;ldquo;climate-dominated, emission-modulated&amp;rdquo; framework for OFS restructuring, offering a transferable diagnostic tool for differentiated O&lt;sub&gt;3&lt;/sub&gt; control strategies.</p>
</abstract>
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<funding-group>
<award-group id="gs1">
<funding-source>National Key Research and Development Program of China</funding-source>
<award-id>2023YFC3706205</award-id>
</award-group>
<award-group id="gs2">
<funding-source>National Natural Science Foundation of China</funding-source>
<award-id>42375109</award-id>
<award-id>42405103</award-id>
</award-group>
</funding-group>
</article-meta>
</front>
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