Impacts of meteoric sulfur in the Earth's atmosphere

Abstract

AbstractA meteoric sulfur input function and a sulfur ion chemistry scheme have been incorporated into a chemistry‐climate model, in order to study the speciation of sulfur between the stratosphere and the thermosphere (~20–120 km) and the impact of the sulfur input from ablation of cosmic dust. The simulations have been compared to rocket observations of SO+ between 85 and 110 km, MIPAS observations of SO2 between 20 and 45 km, and stratospheric balloon‐borne measurements of H2SO4 vapor and sulfate aerosol. These observations constrain the present‐day global flux of meteoric sulfur to ≤1.0 t S d−1, i.e., 2 orders of magnitude smaller than the flux of S into the stratosphere from OCS photooxidation and explosive volcanic SO2 injection. However, the meteoric sulfur flux is strongly focused into the polar vortices by the meridional circulation, and therefore, the contribution of SO2 of meteoric origin to the polar upper stratosphere during winter is substantial (~ 30% at 50 km for a flux of 1.0 t S d−1). The Antarctic spring sulfate aerosol layer is found to be very sensitive to a moderate increase of the input rate of meteoric sulfur, showing a factor of 2 enhancement in total sulfate aerosol number density at 30 km for an input of 3.0 t S d−1. The input rate estimate of 1.0 t S d−1 suggests an enrichment of sodium relative to sulfur of 2.7 ± 1.5 and is consistent with a total cosmic dust input rate of 44 t d−1.