Multicomponent aerosol mass efficiency with various mixture types for polydispersed aerosol

Abstract

Based on the filter-sampled chemical composition data the seasonal variation of the optical properties of polydispersed aerosols, extinction, scattering, and absorption coefficient, are estimated for various types of aerosol mixtures. The mixtures considered in this study are the internal mixture, elemental carbon (EC)/non-EC external mixture, and fully external mixture. This study also evaluated the sensitivity of the aerosol optical properties for different size distributions. The results show that the extinction coefficient can be mostly accounted for scattering and generally shows a good agreement with each mixture type in this case study. However, the absorption coefficient shows a different tendency for internal and external mixtures. This study also shows that the aerosol optical properties vary as a function of particle diameter at the same composition and mass concentration. This means that mass extinction, scattering, and absorption efficiencies, which were considered as constants in general, should be reassessed and more specifically described as a function of particle size.