Abundant nitrogenous secondary organic aerosol formation accelerated by cloud processing
Jefferson Zhe Liu, Bao Zhu, Chao Zhu, Ting Ruan, Jiarong Li, Hui Chen, Qing Li, Xiaofei Wang, Lin Wang, Yujing Mu, Jeffrey L. Collett, C. George, Yan Wang, Xinfeng Wang, Jixin Su, Shaocai Yu, Abdewahid Mellouki, Jianmin Chen, Guibin Jiang
Abstract
Nitrogenous organic (CHON), crucial for secondary organic aerosol (SOA), forms through poorly studied mechanisms in clouds. Our study explores CHON transformation during cloud processes (CPs). These processes play a vital role in enhancing the variety of CHONs, leading to the formation of CHONs with oxygen atom counts ranging from 1 to 10 and double bond equivalent (DBE) values spanning from 2 to 10. We proposed that the CHONs formed during CPs are formed through aqueous phase reactions with CHO compound precursors via nucleophilic attacks by NH 3 . This scheme can be account for roughly three-quarters of the CHONs by number in cloud water, and near two-thirds of all CHONs are formed through reactions between NH 3 and carbonyl-containing biogenic volatile organic compound (BVOC) ozonolysis intermediates. This study provides the first insights into the evolution of CHONs during CPs and reveals the significant roles of CPs in the formation of CHONs.