Publication Date:
2008-09-06
Description:
Aerosols serve as cloud condensation nuclei (CCN) and thus have a substantial effect on cloud properties and the initiation of precipitation. Large concentrations of human-made aerosols have been reported to both decrease and increase rainfall as a result of their radiative and CCN activities. At one extreme, pristine tropical clouds with low CCN concentrations rain out too quickly to mature into long-lived clouds. On the other hand, heavily polluted clouds evaporate much of their water before precipitation can occur, if they can form at all given the reduced surface heating resulting from the aerosol haze layer. We propose a conceptual model that explains this apparent dichotomy.〈br /〉〈span class="detail_caption"〉Notes: 〈/span〉Rosenfeld, Daniel -- Lohmann, Ulrike -- Raga, Graciela B -- O'Dowd, Colin D -- Kulmala, Markku -- Fuzzi, Sandro -- Reissell, Anni -- Andreae, Meinrat O -- New York, N.Y. -- Science. 2008 Sep 5;321(5894):1309-13. doi: 10.1126/science.1160606.〈br /〉〈span class="detail_caption"〉Author address: 〈/span〉Institute of Earth Sciences, Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Jerusalem 91904, Israel. daniel.rosenfeld@huji.ac.il〈br /〉〈span class="detail_caption"〉Record origin:〈/span〉 〈a href="http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/18772428" target="_blank"〉PubMed〈/a〉
Print ISSN:
0036-8075
Electronic ISSN:
1095-9203
Topics:
Biology
,
Chemistry and Pharmacology
,
Computer Science
,
Medicine
,
Natural Sciences in General
,
Physics
Permalink