R. Arimoto et al., MASS-PARTICLE SIZE DISTRIBUTIONS OF ATMOSPHERIC DUST AND THE DRY DEPOSITION OF DUST TO THE REMOTE OCEAN, JOURNAL OF GEOPHYSICAL RESEARCH-ATMOSPHERES, 102(D13), 1997, pp. 15867-15874
Size-separated mineral aerosol samples were collected and analyzed to
investigate the relationships between the mass-particle size distribut
ions (MSDs) of dust particles and the dust loadings in the atmosphere,
The data also were used to assess the changes in the MSDs of dust in
relation to transport processes and especially the associated effects
on dry deposition. Atmospheric dust concentrations, as indicated by al
uminum or scandium, in samples collected from three sites in the remot
e North Atlantic were higher than those in samples collected during a
cruise in the North Pacific on board the R/V Moana Wave. However, the
mass median diameters (MMDs) for the North Pacific samples were both l
arger on average (similar to 3 mu m versus similar to 2 mu m aerodynam
ic equivalent diameter) and more variable than those from the North At
lantic; this difference was attributed to wet conditions and particle
aggregation over the North Pacific. In addition, for the ensemble of a
ll samples the geometric standard deviations of the mass-particle size
distributions, which are analogous to the sorting values used to char
acterize sedimentary materials, tended to vary inversely and nonlinear
ly with the mass median diameters. Model-derived dry deposition veloci
ties for the samples were at most weakly related to either the dust co
ncentrations or the MMDs. However, the dry deposition velocities for t
wo subsets of samples were correlated with the geometric standard devi
ations of the distributions; this is further evidence that the mass fl
ux of dust via dry deposition can be controlled by a relatively small
fraction of aerodynamically large particles.