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Reaction rate constants for the reaction of n-dodecane with hydroxyl radicals were measured as a function of temperature between 283 and 303 K, using the relative rate method in the CESAM chamber (...

In order to predict the amount of secondary organic aerosol formed by heterogeneous processing of methylglyoxal, uptake coefficients (γ) and estimates of uptake reversibility are needed. Here, uptake coefficients are extracted from chamber studies involving ammonium sulfate and glycine seed aerosol at high relative humidity (RH ≥ 72%). Methylglyoxal uptake coefficients on prereacted glycine aerosol particles had a strong dependence on RH, increasing from γ = 0.4 × 10–3 to 5.7 × 10–3 between 72 and 99% RH. Continuous methylglyoxal losses were also observed in the presence of aqueous ammonium sulfate at 95% RH (γAS,wet = 3.7 ± 0.8 × 10–3). Methylglyoxal uptake coefficients measured at ≥95% RH are larger than those reported for glyoxal on nonacidified, aqueous aerosol surfaces at 90% RH. Slight curvature in first-order uptake plots suggests that methylglyoxal uptake onto aqueous aerosol surfaces is not entirely irreversible after 20 min. Methylglyoxal uptake by cloud droplets was rapid and largely reversible...

Pyruvic acid is an atmospherically abundant α-keto-acid that degrades efficiently from the troposphere via gas-phase photolysis. To explore conditions relevant to the environment, 2–12 ppm pyruvic acid is irradiated by a solar simulator in the environmental simulation chamber, CESAM. The combination of the long path length available in the chamber and its low surface area to volume ratio allows us to quantitatively examine the quantum yield and photochemical products of pyruvic acid. Such details are new to the literature for the low initial concentrations of pyruvic acid employed here. We determined photolysis quantum yields of ϕobsN2 = 0.84 ± 0.1 in nitrogen and ϕobsAir = 3.2 ± 0.5 in air, which are higher than those reported by previous studies that used higher partial pressures of pyruvic acid. The quantum yield greater than unity in air is due to secondary chemistry, driven by O2, that emerges under the conditions in these experiments. The low concentration of pyruvic acid and the resulting oxygen ef...

Knowing the ozone absorption cross sections in the ultraviolet and infrared spectral range, with an accuracy of better than 1%, is of the utmost importance for atmospheric remote-sensing applications. For this reason, various ozone intensity intercomparisons and measurements have been published these last years. However, the corresponding results proved not to be consistent and thus have raised a controversial discussion in the community of atmospheric remote-sensing. This study, where great care has been taken to avoid any possible error, reports a new laboratory intercomparison of the ozone absorption coefficients in the mid-infrared (10 μm) and ultraviolet (300-350 nm) spectral regions. It gives a new piece of information to the puzzling problem concerning the ozone IR and UV cross sections and confirms that the IR and UV cross sections recommended in the literature are in disagreement of about 4%.