Development of balloon-borne impactor payload for profiling free tropospheric aerosol. Issue 3 (4th March 2019)

• Record Type: Journal Article
• Authors: Sinha, P. R.; Nagendra, N.; Manchanda, R. K.; Ojha, D. K.; Kumar, B. Suneel; Koli, S. K.; Trivedi, D. B.; Lodha, R. K.; Sahu, L. K.; Sreenivasan, S.
• Is Part Of: Aerosol science and technology. Volume 53:Issue 3(2019)
• Page Start: 231
• Page End: 243
• Publication Date: 2019-03-04
• Subjects: Aerosols -- Periodicals; Aerosol Propellants -- Periodicals; Aerosols -- Periodicals; 660.294515
• DOI: 10.1080/02786826.2018.1546045
• Languages: English
• ISSNs: 0278-6826

Abstract

Abstract: Size-segregated aerosol vertical profiles in the troposphere are critically important for source attribution, transformation processes, atmospheric stability, and radiative forcing. For the first time, the development of a 6-stage impactor for real-time balloon-borne measurements of size-segregated (cutoff diameter [ D ae ]: 0.15–5 µm) aerosol mass concentrations in the free troposphere was tested during spring 2016 over Hyderabad, India, is presented. Total aerosol mass concentrations obtained with the 6-stage impactor ( M TI ) and a co-located optical particle counter ( M TOPC ) measurements at the surface under ambient conditions agreed to within 15%. The effect of aerosol particle growth on the M TI data are assessed using an urban aerosol particle model by scaling mass concentration of water-soluble (hydrophilic) aerosol particles at ambient relative humidity (RH) to that at RH = 50%. An overall uncertainty of the measurement of the M TI was estimated to be about 19%. The altitude variation of size-segregated mass concentrations of aerosol particles along with thermodynamic variables depicted convectively well-mixed layer extending up to about 4.5 km within which aerosol particles showed two distinct layers, one at ∼2 km and another at about 4.5 km. The size-resolved air samples containing aerosol particles collected using the balloon-borne 6-stage impactor will be useful for their chemical characterization and also long-range transport studies. Copyright © 2019 American Association for Aerosol Research