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Estimates of AOD Trends (2002 – 2012) over the World’s Major Cities based on the MERRA Aerosol ReanalysisNASA's Global Modeling and Assimilation Office has extended the Modern-Era Retrospective Analysis for Research and Application (MERRA) tool with five atmospheric aerosol species (sulfates, organic carbon, black carbon, mineral dust and sea salt). This inclusion of aerosol reanalysis data is now known as MERRAero. This study analyses a ten-year period (July 2002 - June 2012) MERRAero aerosol reanalysis applied to the study of aerosol optical depth (AOD) and its trends for the aforementioned aerosol species over the world's major cities (with a population of over 2 million inhabitants). We found that a proportion of various aerosol species in total AOD exhibited a geographical dependence. Cities in industrialized regions (North America, Europe, central and eastern Asia) are characterized by a strong proportion of sulfate aerosols. Organic carbon aerosols are dominant over cities which are located in regions where biomass burning frequently occurs (South America and southern Africa). Mineral dust dominates other aerosol species in cities located in proximity to the major deserts (northern Africa and western Asia). Sea salt aerosols are prominent in coastal cities but are dominant aerosol species in very few of them. AOD trends are declining over cities in North America, Europe and Japan, as a result of effective air quality regulation. By contrast, the economic boom in China and India has led to increasing AOD trends over most cities in these two highly-populated countries. Increasing AOD trends over cities in the Middle East are caused by increasing desert dust.
Document ID
20140017084
Acquisition Source
Goddard Space Flight Center
Document Type
Technical Memorandum (TM)
Authors
Simon Provencal
(Université Laval Québec, Quebec, Canada)
Pavel Kishcha
(Tel Aviv University Tel Aviv, Israel)
Emily Elhacham
(Tel Aviv University Tel Aviv, Israel)
Arlindo M da Silva
(Goddard Space Flight Center Greenbelt, Maryland, United States)
Pinhas Alpert
(Tel Aviv University Tel Aviv, Israel)
Max J Suarez
(Universities Space Research Association Columbia, Maryland, United States)
Date Acquired
December 8, 2014
Publication Date
March 1, 2014
Subject Category
Environment Pollution
Report/Patent Number
NASA/TM-2014-104606 Vol. 32
GSFC-E-DAA-TN16606
Funding Number(s)
CONTRACT_GRANT: NNG11HP16A
Distribution Limits
Public
Copyright
Public Use Permitted.
Keywords
AOD
MERRAero
GMAO
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