Completed Research Projects (Centre for Atmospheric Science

ACES

Aerosol Coupling in the Earth System (ACES) is a combined field measurement, laboratory and modelling study of the formation, evolution and impact of biogenic secondary organic aerosol, formed from biogenic volatile organic compound emissions from tropical forests.

ACTIVE

ACTIVE combines field measurements and a range of modelling tools at different scales to address the question of what determines the composition of the upper tropical troposphere.

ADIENT

ADIENT is a consortium project to investigate the direct effect of pollution aerosols, it is part of the NERC APPRAISE Directed Programme.

APPRAISE-CLOUDS

APPRAISE-CLOUDS is a consortium project to investigate the indirect effect of pollution aerosols, it is part of the NERC APPRAISE Directed Programme.

CityFlux

Most air pollution in European cities comes from traffic. These particles include things like fine oily mists from vehicle exhausts and flecks of dust from tyre, brake and road wear. Numerous studies have shown that these particles have the greatest effect on our health.

CLACE4

The CLACE 4 project was an investigation of cloud and aerosol interaction in mixed phase clouds in the free troposphere, at a site (Jungfraujoch) which was sometimes influenced by pollution from the boundary layer.

COBRA

Impact of combined iodine and bromine release on the Arctic atmosphere (COBRA-IPY). A consortium project to attempt to characterise the sources and mechanisms involved in the release of these species, and to study their effects in the Arctic atmosphere.

COMPAS

The objective of COMPAS is to investigate the extent to which biological material in the Sea Surface MicroLayer can affect the properties of atmospheric marine aerosol particles through its impact on their water affinity and cloud nucleating properties.

COPS

The core objective of the COPS project is understanding the precipitation produced in orographic convection and improving the ability to accurately forcast such precipitation.

CSIP

The Convective Storm Initiation Project (CSIP) was set up to improve the spatial and temporal accuracy of forecasting of high precipitation events, by making measurements on scales specifically relevant to model development.

EMERALD

The EMERALD projects were airborne measurement campaigns designed to study dynamical, microphysical and infra-red radiative properties of cirrus clouds, using both in-situ and remote measurement techniques.

EUCAARI

The European Integrated project on Aerosol Cloud Climate and Air Quality Interactions, EUCAARI, brings together the leading European research groups, state-of-the-art infrastructure and key players from third countries to investigate the role of aerosol on climate and air quality.

Holme Moss

The aim of Holme Moss PROCLOUD experiment in March 1999 was to investigate interactions of the Manchester urban plume with a hill cap cloud which forms at the summit of Holme Moss located to the east of the city.

MAP

MAP will focus on the newly identified aerosol formation mechanisms involving iodine oxides, for secondary aerosol production, and the primary production of marine organic matter aerosols produced by plankton and transferred to the atmosphere via the bubble bursting process at the ocean surface.

Multiscale Chemical Composition of Carbonaceous particles and Coatings (MC4)

MC4 is improving our understanding of BC mixing state by deploying new instruments, the single particle soot photometer and the soot particle aerosol mass spectrometer, together with established aerosol absorption measurement methods in the laboratory and field to measure ambient and artificial BC particles.

New Particles in the Atmosphere

This project examines two examples of homogeneous nucleation that occur in very different regions of the atmosphere: iodine oxide particles, which form in the marine boundary layer; and meteoric smoke particles, which form in the middle atmosphere.

NitroEurope

NitroEurope (NEU) is a project for integrated European research into the nitrogen cycle.

OP3

Oxidant and particle photochemical processes above a South-East Asian tropical rain forest. The project is based in Danum Valley Conservation Area, Sabah, Malaysia (Borneo) during spring and summer 2008.

PUMA

The PUMA project involved intensive measurement campaigns in the Summer of 1999 and Winter of 1999/2000, in which a wide variety of air pollutants were measured in and around the UK West Midlands conurbation.

QUEST

This project studies the role of surface processes on atmospheric oxidizing capacity and aerosol loading, building on an initiative already underway between the Met Office and the NERC Centres for Atmospheric Science (NCAS) to develop a new community model, UKCA, to study the interaction between climate and composition (gas phase composition and aerosols).

RHAMBLE

RHaMBLe is an integrated programme aiming to quantify impacts of marine halogen emissions on atmospheric composition by the direct observation of a range of reactive halogen species (RHS) in the marine atmosphere.

RONOCO

RONOCO addresses the role of night time atmospheric chemistry using a combined programme of instrument development, airborne measurement, detailed process modelling, and regional and global modelling.

SCAR

The objective of SCAR was to measure these turbulent eddies, along with concentrations of airborne pollutants within a street canyon, and to use this data to calculate the rate at which aerosol particles are ventilated from the canyon space.

VAST IMPROVEMENT

This project seeks to conduct a range of detailed laboratory measurements, using well-established techniques, on key parameters which at the present time critically compromise the predictive capability of state of the art models of multicomponent aerosol behaviour.

VOCALS

The ambition of VOCALS-UK is to reduce uncertainties in current and future climate projections, especially those associated with marine stratocumulus and coupled ocean-atmosphere processes, through a combination of field measurements and modelling activities.