Effect of ammonium salts on the photochemical degradation of iron containing organic aerosol

Author(s):  
Ulrich Krieger ◽  
Nir Bluvshtein ◽  
Jing Dou

<p>Formation of organic aerosol by oxidation of gas phase compounds has been intensely studied, and is much better understood than the aerosol ageing transformations during the lifetime of organic aerosol. Aerosol ageing influences how those aerosol particles affect climate and human health and is still not well constrained in current models.</p><p>Photochemistry in the condensed phase is an important mechanism responsible for ageing of organic aerosol. In the lower troposphere, where UV light intensity with sufficiently low wavelength to directly photolyze aerosol components is low, indirect photochemistry (catalyzing redox processes of non-absorbing molecules) is especially relevant. Recently we studied transition metal complex photochemistry in single particles levitated in an electrodynamic balance. In particular, we investigated the aqueous iron(III)-citrate/citric acid system and found that irradiation at 473 nm led to rapid and significant degradation of the citric acid. Up to 80% of the initial particle mass was partitioned to the gas phase with the degradation rate depending on kinetic transport limitations of oxygen. These kinetic limitations arise are influenced strongly by the relative humidity dependence of particle viscosity where water acts as a plasticizer.</p><p>Here we will report on photochemical degradation experiments adding various salts in different (ammonium sulfate, ammonium bisulfate, etc.) to the reference system iron(III)-citrate/citric acid. Preliminary experiments suggest that pH of the aerosol particle influences the degradation rate in this system significantly.</p>

2021 ◽  
Vol 21 (1) ◽  
pp. 315-338
Author(s):  
Jing Dou ◽  
Peter A. Alpert ◽  
Pablo Corral Arroyo ◽  
Beiping Luo ◽  
Frederic Schneider ◽  
...  

Abstract. Iron(III) carboxylate photochemistry plays an important role in aerosol aging, especially in the lower troposphere. These complexes can absorb light over a broad wavelength range, inducing the reduction of iron(III) and the oxidation of carboxylate ligands. In the presence of O2, the ensuing radical chemistry leads to further decarboxylation, and the production of .OH, HO2., peroxides, and oxygenated volatile organic compounds, contributing to particle mass loss. The .OH, HO2., and peroxides in turn reoxidize iron(II) back to iron(III), closing a photocatalytic cycle. This cycle is repeated, resulting in continual mass loss due to the release of CO2 and other volatile compounds. In a cold and/or dry atmosphere, organic aerosol particles tend to attain highly viscous states. While the impact of reduced mobility of aerosol constituents on dark chemical reactions has received substantial attention, studies on the effect of high viscosity on photochemical processes are scarce. Here, we choose iron(III) citrate (FeIII(Cit)) as a model light-absorbing iron carboxylate complex that induces citric acid (CA) degradation to investigate how transport limitations influence photochemical processes. Three complementary experimental approaches were used to investigate kinetic transport limitations. The mass loss of single, levitated particles was measured with an electrodynamic balance, the oxidation state of deposited particles was measured with X-ray spectromicroscopy, and HO2. radical production and release into the gas phase was observed in coated-wall flow-tube experiments. We observed significant photochemical degradation with up to 80 % mass loss within 24 h of light exposure. Interestingly, we also observed that mass loss always accelerated during irradiation, resulting in an increase of the mass loss rate by about a factor of 10. When we increased relative humidity (RH), the observed particle mass loss rate also increased. This is consistent with strong kinetic transport limitations for highly viscous particles. To quantitatively compare these experiments and determine important physical and chemical parameters, a numerical multilayered photochemical reaction and diffusion (PRAD) model was developed that treats chemical reactions and the transport of various species. The PRAD model was tuned to simultaneously reproduce all experimental results as closely as possible and captured the essential chemistry and transport during irradiation. In particular, the photolysis rate of FeIII, the reoxidation rate of FeII, HO2. production, and the diffusivity of O2 in aqueous FeIII(Cit) ∕ CA system as function of RH and FeIII(Cit) ∕ CA molar ratio could be constrained. This led to satisfactory agreement within model uncertainty for most but not all experiments performed. Photochemical degradation under atmospheric conditions predicted by the PRAD model shows that release of CO2 and repartitioning of organic compounds to the gas phase may be very important when attempting to accurately predict organic aerosol aging processes.


2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jing Dou ◽  
Peter A. Alpert ◽  
Pablo Corral Arroyo ◽  
Beiping Luo ◽  
Frederic Schneider ◽  
...  

Abstract. Iron(III) carboxylate photochemistry plays an important role in aerosol aging, especially in the lower troposphere. These complexes can absorb light over a broad wavelength range, inducing the reduction of iron(III) and the oxidation of carboxylate ligands. In the presence of O2, ensuing radical chemistry leads to further decarboxylation, and the production of ·OH, HO2·, peroxides, and oxygenated volatile organic compounds, contributing to particle mass loss. The ·OH, HO2·, and peroxides in turn re-oxidize iron(II) back to iron(III), closing a photocatalytic cycle. This cycle is repeated resulting in continual mass loss due to the release of CO2 and other volatile compounds. In a cold and/or dry atmosphere, organic aerosol particles tend to attain highly viscous states. While the impact of reduced mobility of aerosol constituents on dark chemical reactions has received substantial attention, studies on the effect of high viscosity on photochemical processes are scarce. Here, we choose iron(III)-citrate (FeIII(Cit)) as a model light absorbing iron carboxylate complex that induces citric acid (CA) degradation to investigate how transport limitations influence photochemical processes. Three complementary experimental approaches were used to investigate kinetic transport limitations. The mass loss of single, levitated particles was measured with an electrodynamic balance, the oxidation state of deposited particles was measured with X-ray spectromicroscopy, and HO2· radical production and release into the gas phase was observed in coated wall flow tube experiments. To quantitatively compare these experiments and determine important physical and chemical parameters, a numerical multi-layered photochemical reaction and diffusion (PRAD) model that treats chemical reactions and transport of various species was developed. We observed significant photochemical degradation, with up to 80 % mass loss within 24 hours of light exposure. Interestingly, we also observed that mass loss always accelerated during irradiation, resulting in an increase of the mass loss rate by about a factor of 10. When we increased relative humidity, the observed particle mass loss rate also increased. This is consistent with strong kinetic transport limitations for highly viscous particles. The PRAD model was tuned to reproduce all experimental results and captured the essential chemistry and transport during irradiation. In particular, the photolysis rate of FeIII, the re-oxidation rate of FeII, HO2· production, and the diffusivity of O2 in aqueous FeIII(Cit)/CA system as function of relative humidity and FeIII(Cit) / CA molar ratio could be constrained. Photochemical degradation under atmospheric conditions predicted by the PRAD model shows that release of CO2 and re-partitioning of organic compounds to the gas phase may be very significant to accurately predict organic aerosol aging processes.


2007 ◽  
Vol 7 (1) ◽  
pp. 2091-2132 ◽  
Author(s):  
C. Stenby ◽  
U. Pöschl ◽  
P. von Hessberg ◽  
M. Bilde ◽  
O. J. Nielsen ◽  
...  

Abstract. The temperature dependence of secondary organic aerosol (SOA) formation from ozonolysis of β-pinene was studied in a flow reactor at 263 K–303 K and 1007 hPa under dry and humid conditions (0% and 26%–68% relative humidity, respectively). The observed SOA yields were of similar magnitude as predicted by a two-product model based on detailed gas phase chemistry (Jenkin, 2004), reaching maximum values of 0.18–0.39 at high particle mass concentrations (Mo). Under dry conditions, however, the measurement data exhibited significant oscillatory deviations from the predicted linear increase with inverse temperature (up to 50% at high Mo). Under humid conditions the SOA yield exhibited a linear decrease with inverse temperature, which is opposite to modelled temperature dependence and implies that the model substantially overestimates the yield at low temperatures and underestimates it at high temperatures (deviations up to 80% at high Mo). For the atmospherically relevant concentration level of Mo=10 μg m−3 and temperature range 263 K–293 K, the results from humid experiments in this study indicate that the SOA yield of β-pinene ozonolysis may be well represented by an average value of 0.15 with an uncertainty estimate of ±0.05. When fitting the measurement data with a two-product model, both the partitioning coefficients (Kom,i) and the stoichiometric yields (αi) of the low-volatile and semi-volatile model species were found to vary with temperature. The results indicate that not only the reaction product vapour pressures but also the relative contributions of different gas-phase or multiphase reaction channels are strongly dependent on temperature and the presence of water vapour. In fact, the oscillatory positive temperature dependence observed under dry conditions and the negative temperature dependence observed under humid conditions indicate that the SOA yield is governed much more by the temperature and humidity dependence of the involved chemical reactions than by vapour pressure temperature dependencies. We suggest that the elucidation and modelling of SOA formation need to take into account the effects of temperature and humidity on the pathways and kinetics of the involved chemical reactions as well as on the gas-particle partitioning of the reaction products.


2012 ◽  
Vol 12 (2) ◽  
pp. 1083-1100 ◽  
Author(s):  
W. Trivitayanurak ◽  
P. I. Palmer ◽  
M. P. Barkley ◽  
N. H. Robinson ◽  
H. Coe ◽  
...  

Abstract. We use a nested version of the GEOS-Chem global 3-D chemistry transport model to better understand the composition and variation of aerosol over Borneo and the broader Southeast Asian region in conjunction with aircraft and satellite observations. Our focus on Southeast Asia reflects the importance of this region as a source of reactive organic gases and aerosols from natural forests, biomass burning, and food and fuel crops. We particularly focus on July 2008 when the UK BAe-146 research aircraft was deployed over northern Malaysian Borneo as part of the ACES/OP3 measurement campaign. During July 2008 we find using the model that Borneo (defined as Borneo Island and the surrounding Indonesian islands) was a net exporter of primary organic aerosol (42 kT) and black carbon aerosol (11 kT). We find only 13% of volatile organic compound oxidation products partition to secondary organic aerosol (SOA), with Borneo being a net exporter of SOA (15 kT). SOA represents approximately 19% of the total organic aerosol over the region. Sulphate is mainly from aqueous-phase oxidation (68%), with smaller contributions from gas-phase oxidation (15%) and advection into the regions (14%). We find that there is a large source of sea salt, as expected, but this largely deposits within the region; we find that dust aerosol plays only a relatively small role in the aerosol burden. In contrast to coincident surface measurements over Northern Borneo that find a pristine environment with evidence for substantial biogenic SOA formation we find that the free troposphere is influenced by biomass burning aerosol transported from the northwest of the Island and further afield. We find several transport events during July 2008 over Borneo associated with elevated aerosol concentrations, none of which coincide with the aircraft flights. We use MODIS aerosol optical depths (AOD) data and the model to put the July campaign into a longer temporal perspective. We find that Borneo is where the model has the least skill at reproducing the data, where the model has a negative bias of 76% and only captures 14% of the observed variability. This model performance reflects the small-scale island-marine environment and the mix of aerosol species, with the model showing more skill at reproducing observed AOD over larger continental regions such as China where AOD is dominated by one aerosol type. The model shows that AOD over Borneo is approximately evenly split between organic and sulphate aerosol with sea salt representing 10–20% during May–September; we find a similar breakdown over continental Southeast Asia but with less sea salt aerosol and more dust aerosol. In contrast, East China AOD is determined mainly by sulphate aerosol and a seasonal source of dust aerosol, as expected. Realistic sensitivity runs, designed to test our underlying assumptions about emissions and chemistry over Borneo, show that model AOD is most sensitive to isoprene emissions and organic gas-phase partitioning but all fail to improve significantly upon the control model calculation. This emphasises the multi-faceted dimension of the problem and the need for concurrent and coordinated development of BVOC emissions, and BVOC chemistry and organic aerosol formation mechanisms.


2011 ◽  
Vol 11 (21) ◽  
pp. 11055-11067 ◽  
Author(s):  
K. Salo ◽  
M. Hallquist ◽  
Å. M. Jonsson ◽  
H. Saathoff ◽  
K.-H. Naumann ◽  
...  

Abstract. The aim of this study was to investigate oxidation of SOA formed from ozonolysis of α-pinene and limonene by hydroxyl radicals. This paper focuses on changes of particle volatility, using a Volatility Tandem DMA (VTDMA) set-up, in order to explain and elucidate the mechanism behind atmospheric ageing of the organic aerosol. The experiments were conducted at the AIDA chamber facility of Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (KIT) in Karlsruhe and at the SAPHIR chamber of Forchungzentrum Jülich (FZJ) in Jülich. A fresh SOA was produced from ozonolysis of α-pinene or limonene and then aged by enhanced OH exposure. As an OH radical source in the AIDA-chamber the ozonolysis of tetramethylethylene (TME) was used while in the SAPHIR-chamber the OH was produced by natural light photochemistry. A general feature is that SOA produced from ozonolysis of α-pinene and limonene initially was rather volatile and becomes less volatile with time in the ozonolysis part of the experiment. Inducing OH chemistry or adding a new portion of precursors made the SOA more volatile due to addition of new semi-volatile material to the aged aerosol. The effect of OH chemistry was less pronounced in high concentration and low temperature experiments when lower relative amounts of semi-volatile material were available in the gas phase. Conclusions drawn from the changes in volatility were confirmed by comparison with the measured and modelled chemical composition of the aerosol phase. Three quantified products from the α-pinene oxidation; pinonic acid, pinic acid and methylbutanetricarboxylic acid (MBTCA) were used to probe the processes influencing aerosol volatility. A major conclusion from the work is that the OH induced ageing can be attributed to gas phase oxidation of products produced in the primary SOA formation process and that there was no indication on significant bulk or surface reactions. The presented results, thus, strongly emphasise the importance of gas phase oxidation of semi- or intermediate-volatile organic compounds (SVOC and IVOC) for atmospheric aerosol ageing.


2014 ◽  
Vol 2014 ◽  
pp. 1-7 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lin Deng ◽  
Zhiren Wu ◽  
Caiqian Yang ◽  
Yung-Li Wang

This study’s objective was to study the photodegradation of TCNM (trichloronitromethane) in water under UV light. The effects of light intensity, nitrate ions, chloride ions, humic acid, and pH on the photochemical degradation of TCNM were investigated under the irradiation of low pressure mercury lamp (λ= 254 nm, 12 W). The photodegradation rate of TCNM was found to increase with increasing the concentration of nitrate ions, chloride ions, humic acid, pH, and light intensity. The photodegradation of TCNM was examined at pH 6.0 with initial concentrations (C0) of TCNM at 10.0–200.0 µg/L. The overall rate of degradation of TCNM was modeled using a pseudofirst-order rate law. Finally, the proposed mechanism involved in the photodegradation of TCNM was also discussed by analysis. Results of this study can contribute to the development of new source control strategies for minimization of TCNM risk at drinking water and wastewater utilities.


2010 ◽  
Vol 10 (12) ◽  
pp. 30205-30277 ◽  
Author(s):  
M. Shrivastava ◽  
J. Fast ◽  
R. Easter ◽  
W. I. Gustafson ◽  
R. A. Zaveri ◽  
...  

Abstract. The Weather Research and Forecasting model coupled with chemistry (WRF-Chem) is modified to include a volatility basis set (VBS) treatment of secondary organic aerosol formation. The VBS approach, coupled with SAPRC-99 gas-phase chemistry mechanism, is used to model gas-particle partitioning and multiple generations of gas-phase oxidation of organic vapors. In addition to the detailed 9-species VBS, a simplified mechanism using 2 volatility species (2-species VBS) is developed and tested for similarity to the 9-species VBS in terms of both mass and oxygen-to-carbon ratios of organic aerosols in the atmosphere. WRF-Chem results are evaluated against field measurements of organic aerosols collected during the MILAGRO 2006 campaign in the vicinity of Mexico City. The simplified 2-species mechanism reduces the computational cost by a factor of 2 as compared to 9-species VBS. Both ground site and aircraft measurements suggest that the 9-species and 2-species VBS predictions of total organic aerosol mass as well as individual organic aerosol components including primary, secondary, and biomass burning are comparable in magnitude. In addition, oxygen-to-carbon ratio predictions from both approaches agree within 25%, providing evidence that the 2-species VBS is well suited to represent the complex evolution of organic aerosols. Model sensitivity to amount of anthropogenic semi-volatile and intermediate volatility (S/IVOC) precursor emissions is also examined by doubling the default emissions. Both the emission cases significantly under-predict primary organic aerosols in the city center and along aircraft flight transects. Secondary organic aerosols are predicted reasonably well along flight tracks surrounding the city, but are consistently over-predicted downwind of the city. Also, oxygen-to-carbon ratio predictions are significantly improved compared to prior studies by adding 15% oxygen mass per generation of oxidation; however, all modeling cases still under-predict these ratios downwind as compared to measurements, suggesting a need to further improve chemistry parameterizations of secondary organic aerosol formation.


2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ariana Gray Bé ◽  
Hilary M. Chase ◽  
Liu, Yangdongliu ◽  
Mary Alice Upshur ◽  
Zhang, Yue ◽  
...  

<p>By integrating organic synthesis, secondary organic aerosol synthesis and collection, DFT calculations, and vibrational sum frequency generation spectroscopy, we identify close spectral matches between the surface vibrational spectra of β-caryophyllene-derived secondary organic material and those of β-caryophyllene aldehyde and β-caryophyllonic acid at various interfaces. Combined with the record high surface tension depression described previously for these same oxidation products, we discuss possibilities for an intrinsically chemical origin for cloud activation by terpene-derived surfactants. Although the present study does not unequivocally identify the synthesized and analyzed oxidation products on the β-caryophyllenederived SOM surfaces, these two compounds appear to be the most surface active out of the series, and have also been foci of previous β-caryophyllene field and laboratory studies.</p><p>An orientation analysis by phase-resolved SFG spectroscopy reveals a “pincer-like” configuration of the β-caryophyllene oxidation products, albeit on a model quartz surface, that somewhat resembles the orientation of inverse double-tailed surfactants at the surfaces biological systems. The structural information suggests that the less polar moiety of a surface-localized oxidation product, such as those studied here, may be the first site-of-contact for a gas-phase molecule approaching an SOA particle containing surface-active β-caryophyllene oxidation products.</p>


2021 ◽  
Vol 21 (6) ◽  
pp. 5137-5149 ◽  
Author(s):  
Manpreet Takhar ◽  
Yunchun Li ◽  
Arthur W. H. Chan

Abstract. Cooking emissions account for a major fraction of urban organic aerosol. It is therefore important to understand the atmospheric evolution in the physical and chemical properties of organic compounds emitted from cooking activities. In this work, we investigate the formation of secondary organic aerosol (SOA) from oxidation of gas-phase organic compounds from heated cooking oil. The chemical composition of cooking SOA is analyzed using thermal desorption–gas chromatography–mass spectrometry (TD–GC–MS). While the particle-phase composition of SOA is a highly complex mixture, we adopt a new method to achieve molecular speciation of the SOA. All the GC-elutable material is classified by the constituent functional groups, allowing us to provide a molecular description of its chemical evolution upon oxidative aging. Our results demonstrate an increase in average oxidation state (from −0.6 to −0.24) and decrease in average carbon number (from 5.2 to 4.9) with increasing photochemical aging of cooking oil, suggesting that fragmentation reactions are key processes in the oxidative aging of cooking emissions within 2 d equivalent of ambient oxidant exposure. Moreover, we estimate that aldehyde precursors from cooking emissions account for a majority of the SOA formation and oxidation products. Overall, our results provide insights into the atmospheric evolution of cooking SOA, a majority of which is derived from gas-phase oxidation of aldehydes.


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