Size resolved mass concentration and elemental composition of atmospheric aerosols over the Eastern Mediterranean area

Abstract

Abstract.A Berner low pressure impactor was used to collect size-segregated aerosol samples at Finokalia, located on the north-eastern coast of Crete, Greece during July 2000 and January 2001. Several samples were also collected during the summer campaign aboard the research vessel "AEGAIEO" in the Aegean Sea. Gravimetric analysis and inversion techniques yielded daily PM1 and PM10 mass concentrations. The samples were also analysed by PIXE giving the elemental size distributions of Al, Si, K, Ca, Ti, Mn, Fe, Sr, S, Cl, Ni, V, Cu, Cr, Zn, and Pb. The crustal elements and sea-salt had a unimodal supermicron size distribution. Sulphur was found predominantly in submicron fractions. K, V, and Ni exhibited a bimodal distribution with a submicron mode produced by forest fires and oil combustion. The anthropogenic elements had broad and not well-defined distributions. The time series for PM1 and PM10 mass and elemental concentrations showed both daily and seasonal variation. Higher mass concentrations were observed during two incursions of Saharan dust, whilst higher concentrations of S, Cu, Zn, and Pb were encountered in samples collected in air masses arriving from northern Greece or the western coast of Turkey. Elevated concentrations of chlorine were found in samples with air masses either originating above the Atlantic Ocean and arriving at Finokalia via western Europe or recirculating over the western coast of the Black Sea.

Shipboard Measurements of Nitrogen Dioxide, Nitrous Acid, Nitric Acid and Ozone in the Eastern Mediterranean Sea

“…The "Aegeon" boat cruised in the Aegean Sea along selected routes determined by forward and back trajectory modelling, considering the sampling site in Crete to be the end point (Smolik et al 2003). The boat-measuring period was characterised by relatively constant meteorological conditions.…”

Size Distribution of Trace Elements and Major Ions in the Eastern Mediterranean Atmosphere

“…There had been substantial improvements in the database for composition of atmospheric particles and precipitation, both in the western and eastern Mediterranean basins, but there are only few studies for size distributions of atmospheric particles and pollutants associated with them (Dulac et al, 1989(Dulac et al, , 1992Sellegri et al, 2001;Masmoudi et al, 2002Masmoudi et al, , 2003Bardouki et al, 2003;Smolik et al 2003), which is essential for dry deposition calculations for particles.…”

Long Term Flux of Saharan Dust to the Aegean Sea around the Attica Region, Greece

“…The size distribution appeared to have two peaks: one in the fine size fraction with Mass Median Aerodynamic Diameter (MMAD) equal to 0.41 µm and standard deviation of 1.47, and one in the coarse size fraction with MMAD equal to 5.00 µm and standard deviation of 2.45. According to the literature in the area (Smolık et al, 2003;Gerasopoulos et al, 2007), the dust mostly contributes to the coarse size fraction, whereas anthropogenic sources mostly contribute to the fine size fraction. Thus, the modal characteristics of the coarse mode were used for the calculation of the dry deposition velocity (d p = MMAD) and dust deposition flux.…”

“…To calculate the total deposition during the days with Sahara dust events, a mean mass size distribution of ambient aerosol was used, based on size distribution measurements performed in previous studies (Smolık et al, 2003;Athanasopoulou et al, 2010). The measurements for the study of Athanasopoulou et al (2010) were conducted at the same sampling site, in Ag.…”

“…Paraskevi, Attica. The measurement campaign in Smolık et al (2003) took place at the Mediterranean marine background site of Finokalia, Crete. Measurements of size distributions are sparse but the characteristics of dust transport in these cases is very similar.…”