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Heterogeneous chemistry of HONO and surface exchange
(2013)
- Nitrous acid (HONO) is an important precursor of OH radicals, which are the key oxidizing species in the atmosphere and are therefore called the detergent of the atmosphere. Despite the importance of HONO for atmospheric chemistry and about 30 years of detailed research the exact formation mechanisms of both day- and night-time formation remain unclear. The main formation pathways discussed to date are heterogeneous reactions with nitrogen dioxide as the HONO precursor or microbiological activity in soil. As the ground surface is a major source of HONO, the vertical distribution of HONO is very sensitive to the extent of vertical mixing. Additionally, some uncertainty in comparing laboratory and field measurements might be caused by the not yet clarified role of relative humidity and surface wetness on HONO formation and deposition, respectively. These influences have been investigated in field measurements in the present study. For HONO measurements, LOng Path Absorption Photometers (LOPAPs) have been deployed. During the Diel Oxidant Mechanism In relation to Nitrogen Oxides (DOMINO) campaign, HONO and other reactive trace gases were measured above a pine forest in south west Spain. In line with all recently published work, this study also found a substantial daytime formation of HONO. This so-called additional daytime source or unknown source was found to be slightly correlated (r² = 0.16) with actinic flux. Normalizing this unknown source to nitrogen dioxide mixing ratios improved the correlation (r² = 0.38), which indicates an influence of nitrogen dioxide availability. The coefficient of determination improved further to 0.47 by restricting the data to clear days and rejecting data from advection events. Thus, a fraction of the unknown source might be explained by light-induced nitrogen dioxide conversion but other factors have to be taken into account. Two processes of light-induced nitrogen dioxide conversion, proposed by recent laboratory studies, were shown to be negligible for the semirural conditions during our study. HONO photolysis was found to be the most important primary OH-radical source during DOMINO, contributing 20 % more OH than ozone photolysis integrated over the day. Vertical exchange of HONO was studied at the “Waldstein-Weidenbrunnen” field site of the University of Bayreuth in the Fichtelgebirge Mountains in south east Germany. The simultaneous HONO measurements in and above a forest canopy highlighted the importance of turbulent exchange for the vertical distribution of HONO mixing ratios. The so-called coupling regimes of the forest (with the air layers above) were found to be a very useful micrometeorological concept to study vertical differences of mixing ratios in a forest. They denote which parts of the forest are coupled to the air layer above the canopy and thus take part in turbulent exchange of energy and matter. With this coupling tool it was possible to explain vertical mixing ratio differences by different sources and sinks and the magnitude of the difference by the intensity of vertical exchange. Studying the vertical mixing ratio differences of HONO, an unexpected result was that during late morning and around noon they were close to zero. As the lifetime of HONO below canopy of about 250 to 300 min was a factor of 25 to 30 longer than that above canopy of about 10 min, large mixing ratio differences would have been expected. The lack of these differences could be explained by efficient vertical mixing, which was indicated by a full coupling of the forest or a coupling by sweeps and only intermittent decoupling of the subcanopy during these periods. Around sunset, the whole forest became decoupled from the air layers above. This caused a steep increase in mixing ratio differences up to about 170 ppt due to a faster increase below canopy, indicating local formation below the canopy. HONO and RH are correlated due to their diurnal cycles which are mainly caused by radiation. This diurnal contribution has to be removed from the respective signals in order to extract correlations on other timescales. Singular System Analysis, a tool for time series analysis, has been applied successfully to remove diurnal variations and long-term trends from the HONO and RH time series. Correlations of the higher frequency contributions of the remaining signals were poor but slightly positive. The HONO mixing ratios increase exponentially with RH from about 25 % RH to about 70 % RH. No clear correlation was found between around 70 and 95 % RH. Above 95 % RH, HONO mixing ratios decreased due to HONO uptake in droplets and liquid films. These features are in line with previously proposed mechanisms for interactions of water and HONO on surfaces. The study highlighted the need to assess turbulent transport and surface properties in addition to chemistry for understanding the heterogeneous reactions and processes forming HONO.
