Humidity Dependent Extinction of Clay Aerosols

Aerosols play an important role in the Earth’s radiative balance by directly scattering and absorbing radiation. The magnitude of aerosol forcing can be altered by changes in relative humidity which cause aerosol size, shape and refractive index to vary. To quantify these effects, a custom cavity ring down instrument operated at 532 nm with two sample channels measures aerosols extinction under dry conditions and at elevated humidity. The optical growth, fRH(ext), is determined as a ratio of the extinction cross section at high relative humidity to that under dry conditions. Three key clay components of mineral dust and mixtures of clay components with ammonium sulfate are investigated using this method. Experimentally obtained optical growth is compared with physical growth factors from the literature and our work determined using several different techniques. Further, Mie theory calculations based on published optical constants are compared with experimental results. Differences between theory and experiment will be discussed.