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Atmospheric chemistry

Thwarting the seeds of clouds

Nature volume 461, pages 353–354 (2009)Cite this article

Atmospheric oxidation of hydrocarbons emitted from plants leads to the formation of aerosol particles that affect cloud properties. Contrary to what was thought, this process might add to global warming.

The number of CCN in the atmosphere affects the properties of clouds, which in turn affect climate. In particular, clouds formed at higher CCN concentrations have more and smaller drops than those formed at lower concentrations, and so reflect more sunlight and are longer-lived — effects that, at the global scale, enhance the planetary cooling that counteracts some of the warming caused by greenhouse gases1. On page 381 of this issue, Kiendler-Scharr et al.2 explore the interplay between terpenes (organic compounds) emitted from boreal forests, atmospheric oxidants and CCN. They conclude that this interplay could lead to higher global temperatures through a climate feedback mechanism that is currently predicted to slow the rate of warming.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Paul J. Ziemann is at the Air Pollution Research Center and the Department of Environmental Sciences, University of California, Riverside, California 92521, USA. pziemann@ucr.edu,

    Paul J. Ziemann

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  1. Paul J. Ziemann
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Ziemann, P. Thwarting the seeds of clouds. Nature 461, 353–354 (2009). https://doi.org/10.1038/461353a

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