A one‐dimensional sectional model to simulate multicomponent aerosol dynamics in the marine boundary layer: 1. Model description

Abstract

A one‐dimensional, multicomponent sectional model has been developed to simulate the temporal and vertical variations of the aerosol size distribution and composition in the marine boundary layer (MBL). An important aspect of the model is its ability to handle the transport of aerosols in an atmosphere with humidity gradients with no numerical diffusion caused by the swelling and shrinking of the particles as they move through the humidity gradients. This is achieved by rewriting the aerosol general dynamical equation (GDE) in terms of dry radius thus transferring all variations in radius caused by temporal and spatial humidity variations to the rate coefficients appearing in the equations. The model then solves the new GDE in fixed dry size sections, with the humidity dependence of the processes now included in variable coefficients. This procedure also results in correct gradient transport. A limiting assumption is that the particles equilibrate instantaneously with the ambient water vapor. This assumption limits the maximum particle size which can be treated in the model to ambient (wet) radii less than about 30 μm. All processes currently believed to be important in shaping the MBL size distribution are included in the current version of the model. These include generation of sea‐salt aerosol at the ocean surface, nucleation of new particles, coagulation, growth due to condensation of gas‐phase reaction products, growth due to sulfate formation during cloud processing, precipitation scavenging, surface deposition, turbulent mixing, gravitational settling, and exchange with the free troposphere. Simple gas‐phase chemistry which includes the oxidation of dimethylsulfide and SO2 to sulfate is incorporated in the current version of the model.