Stochastic algorithm and numerical simulation for drop scavenging of aerosols

Abstract

The time evolution of aerosol size distribution during precipitation, which is founded mathematically by general dynamic equation (GDE) for wet removal, describes quantitatively the process of aerosol wet scavenging. The equation depends on aerosol size distribution, raindrop size distribution and the complicated model of scavenging co-efficient which is induced by taking account of the important wet removal mechanisms such as Brownian diffusion, interception and inertial impaction. Normal numerical methods can hardly solve GDE, which is a typical partially integro-differential equation. A new multi-Monte Carlo method was introduced to solve GDE for wet removal, and then was used to simulate the wet scavenging of aerosols in the real atmospheric environment. The results of numerical simulation show that, the smaller lognormal raindrop size distribution and lognormal initial aerosol size distribution, the smaller geometric mean diameter or geometric standard deviation of raindrops can help scavenge small aerosols and intermediate size aerosols better, though large aerosols are prevented from being collected in some ways.