Skip to main content

Thank you for visiting nature.com. You are using a browser version with limited support for CSS. To obtain the best experience, we recommend you use a more up to date browser (or turn off compatibility mode in Internet Explorer). In the meantime, to ensure continued support, we are displaying the site without styles and JavaScript.

  • Letter
  • Published:

Brownness of organics in aerosols from biomass burning linked to their black carbon content

Nature Geoscience volume 7, pages 647–650 (2014)Cite this article

Subjects

Abstract

Atmospheric particulate matter plays an important role in the Earth’s radiative balance. Over the past two decades, it has been established that a portion of particulate matter, black carbon, absorbs significant amounts of light and exerts a warming effect rivalling that of anthropogenic carbon dioxide1,2. Most climate models treat black carbon as the sole light-absorbing carbonaceous particulate. However, some organic aerosols, dubbed brown carbon and mainly associated with biomass burning emissions3,4,5,6, also absorbs light7. Unlike black carbon, whose light absorption properties are well understood8, brown carbon comprises a wide range of poorly characterized compounds that exhibit highly variable absorptivities, with reported values spanning two orders of magnitude3,4,5,6,9,10. Here we present smog chamber experiments to characterize the effective absorptivity of organic aerosol from biomass burning under a range of conditions. We show that brown carbon in emissions from biomass burning is associated mostly with organic compounds of extremely low volatility11. In addition, we find that the effective absorptivity of organic aerosol in biomass burning emissions can be parameterized as a function of the ratio of black carbon to organic aerosol, indicating that aerosol absorptivity depends largely on burn conditions, not fuel type. We conclude that brown carbon from biomass burning can be an important factor in aerosol radiative forcing.

This is a preview of subscription content, access via your institution

Access options

Buy this article

  • Purchase on Springer Link
  • Instant access to full article PDF
Buy now

Prices may be subject to local taxes which are calculated during checkout

Figure 1: Dependence of kOA and DRF on BC-to-OA ratio.
Figure 2: Contribution of different OA components to light absorption.

Similar content being viewed by others

References

  1. Ramanathan, V. & Carmichael, G. Global and regional climate changes due to black carbon. Nature Geosci. 1, 221–227 (2008).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  2. Bond, T. C. et al. Bounding the role of black carbon in the climate system: A scientific assessment. J. Geophys. Res. Atmos. 118, 5380–5552 (2013).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  3. Kirchstetter, T. W. & Novakov, T. Evidence that the spectral dependence of light absorption by aerosols is affected by organic carbon. J. Geophys. Res. 109, 1–12 (2004).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  4. Chen, Y. & Bond, T. C. Light absorption by organic carbon from wood combustion. Atmos. Chem. Phys. 10, 1773–1787 (2010).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  5. Lack, D. A., Langridge, J. M., Bahreini, R., Cappa, C. D. & Middlebrook, A. M. Brown carbon and internal mixing in biomass burning particles. Proc. Natl Acad. Sci. USA 109, 14802–14807 (2012).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  6. Saleh, R. et al. Absorptivity of brown carbon in fresh and photo-chemically aged biomass-burning emissions. Atmos. Chem. Phys. 13, 7683–7693 (2013).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  7. Andreae, M. O., Gelencs, A., Box, P. O. & Veszpr, H. Black carbon or brown carbon? The nature of light-absorbing carbonaceous aerosols. Atmos. Chem. Phys. 6, 3131–3148 (2006).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  8. Bond, T. C. & Bergstrom, R. W. Light absorption by carbonaceous particles: An investigative review. Aerosol Sci. Technol. 39, 1–41 (2005).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  9. Alexander, D. T. L., Crozier, P. A & Anderson, J. R. Brown carbon spheres in East Asian outflow and their optical properties. Science 321, 833–836 (2008).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  10. Chakrabarty, R. K. et al. Brown carbon in tar balls from smoldering biomass combustion. Atmos. Chem. Phys. 10, 6363–6370 (2010).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  11. Donahue, N. M., Kroll, J. H., Pandis, S. N. & Robinson, A. L. A two-dimensional volatility basis set—Part 2: Diagnostics of organic-aerosol evolution. Atmos. Chem. Phys. 12, 615–634 (2012).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  12. Bond, T. C. A technology-based global inventory of black and organic carbon emissions from combustion. J. Geophys. Res. 109, 1–43 (2004).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  13. Myhre, G. et al. Radiative forcing of the direct aerosol effect from AeroCom Phase II simulations. Atmos. Chem. Phys. 13, 1853–1877 (2013).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  14. Feng, Y., Ramanathan, V. & Kotamarthi, V. R. Brown carbon: A significant atmospheric absorber of solar radiation? Atmos. Chem. Phys. 13, 8607–8621 (2013).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  15. Wiedinmyer, C. et al. The Fire INventory from NCAR (FINN): A high resolution global model to estimate the emissions from open burning. Geosci. Model Dev. 4, 625–641 (2011).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  16. Jacobson, M. Z. Investigating cloud absorption effects: Global absorption properties of black carbon, tar balls, and soil dust in clouds and aerosols. J. Geophys. Res. 117, D06205 (2012).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  17. Cappa, C. D. et al. Radiative absorption enhancements due to the mixing state of atmospheric black carbon. Science 337, 1078–1081 (2012).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  18. Adachi, K., Chung, S. H. & Buseck, P. R. Shapes of soot aerosol particles and implications for their effects on climate. J. Geophys. Res. 115, 1–9 (2010).

    Google Scholar 

  19. China, S., Mazzoleni, C., Gorkowski, K., Aiken, A. C. & Dubey, M. K. Morphology and mixing state of individual freshly emitted wildfire carbonaceous particles. Nature Commun. 4, 2122 (2013).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  20. Bond, T. C., Habib, G. & Bergstrom, R. W. Limitations in the enhancement of visible light absorption due to mixing state. J. Geophys. Res. 111, 1–13 (2006).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  21. Lack, D. A. & Cappa, C. D. Impact of brown and clear carbon on light absorption enhancement, single scatter albedo and absorption wavelength dependence of black carbon. Atmos. Chem. Phys. 10, 4207–4220 (2010).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  22. Akagi, S. K. et al. Emission factors for open and domestic biomass burning for use in atmospheric models. Atmos. Chem. Phys. 11, 4039–4072 (2011).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  23. May, A. A. et al. Gas-particle partitioning of primary organic aerosol emissions: (3) Biomass burning. J. Geophys. Res. 118, 11327–11338 (2013).

    Google Scholar 

  24. Dinar, E. et al. The complex refractive index of atmospheric and model humic-like substances (HULIS) retrieved by a cavity ring down aerosol spectrometer (CRD-AS). Faraday Discuss. 137, 279–295 (2008).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  25. Hennigan, C. J. et al. Chemical and physical transformations of organic aerosol from the photo-oxidation of open biomass burning emissions in an environmental chamber. Atmos. Chem. Phys. 11, 7669–7686 (2011).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  26. Bohren, C. F. & Huffman, D. R. Absorption and Scattering of Light by Small Particles (Wiley, 1983).

    Google Scholar 

Download references

Acknowledgements

FLAME 4 and R.J.Y. were supported by NSF grant ATM-0936321. S.L., A.C.A. and M.K.D. thank DOE’s ASR programme F265 for financial support. Carnegie Mellon University team thanks DOE’s ASR programme (ER65296) and NSF (AGS-1256042) for financial support. The authors also thank the Fire Science Laboratory Staff and other FLAME 4 team members.

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Center for Atmospheric Particle Studies, Carnegie Mellon University, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania 15213, USA

    Rawad Saleh, Ellis S. Robinson, Daniel S. Tkacik, Adam T. Ahern, Ryan C. Sullivan, Albert A. Presto, Neil M. Donahue & Allen L. Robinson

  2. Earth and Environmental Sciences, Los Alamos National Laboratory, Los Alamos, New Mexico 87545, USA

    Shang Liu, Allison C. Aiken & Manvendra K. Dubey

  3. Department of Chemistry, University of Montana, Missoula, Montana 59812, USA

    Robert J. Yokelson

Authors
  1. Rawad Saleh
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  2. Ellis S. Robinson
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  3. Daniel S. Tkacik
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  4. Adam T. Ahern
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  5. Shang Liu
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  6. Allison C. Aiken
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  7. Ryan C. Sullivan
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  8. Albert A. Presto
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  9. Manvendra K. Dubey
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  10. Robert J. Yokelson
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  11. Neil M. Donahue
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  12. Allen L. Robinson
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Contributions

R.S. performed the data analysis and wrote the manuscript. R.S., A.L.R., N.M.D., R.C.S. and A.A.P. designed the experiments. E.S.R., A.T.A., D.S.T. and R.S. performed smog chamber experiments. A.L.R., A.A.P., R.C.S., A.T.A., D.S.T., E.S.R. and R.S. built the smog chamber experimental set-up. E.S.R. analysed SP2 and HR-AMS data. S.L. and A.C.A. collected and analysed PASS-3 data. R.J.Y. organized FLAME 4. All authors discussed the data and commented on the manuscript.

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Allen L. Robinson.

Ethics declarations

Competing interests

The authors declare no competing financial interests.

Supplementary information

Supplementary Information

Supplementary Information (PDF 1323 kb)

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Check for updates. Verify currency and authenticity via CrossMark

Cite this article

Saleh, R., Robinson, E., Tkacik, D. et al. Brownness of organics in aerosols from biomass burning linked to their black carbon content. Nature Geosci 7, 647–650 (2014). https://doi.org/10.1038/ngeo2220

Download citation

  • Received:

  • Accepted:

  • Published:

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/ngeo2220

This article is cited by

Search

Advanced search

Quick links

Nature Briefing Microbiology

Sign up for the Nature Briefing: Microbiology newsletter — what matters in microbiology research, free to your inbox weekly.

Get the most important science stories of the day, free in your inbox. Sign up for Nature Briefing: Microbiology