AMAZE (AMazonian Aerosol characteriZation Experiment)

Manaus, Brazil, Jan - Mar 2008

A field project in the tropical rain forest, north-west of Manaus (Brazil). The objective was to investigate the cloud nucleating ability of pristine aerosol over a tropical rain forest. We used a particle inlet mounted at 45m altitude (over the forest canopy) to sample aerosol particles. These particles were be analyzed in situ with mass spectrometers, CCN counters, optical particle counters and other devices in a measurement container on the ground.

Cooperation with:
Scot Martin (Harvard University, Cambridge, U.S.), Paolo Artaxo (Univ. Sao Paulo), Meinrat O. Andreae, Uli Pöschl, (MPI-C Mainz, Germany), Toni Prenni (Colorado State University, Fort Collins, U.S.), Jose Jimenez (University of Colorado, Boulder, U.S.),  Alex Gunther (NCAR, Boulder), Ali Wiedensohler, Dietrich Althausen (IfT, Leipzig, Germany), Yinon Rudich (Weizmann Institute, Rehovot, Israel), Eric Swietlicki (Lund University, Sweden)

Instruments
HR-ToF-AMS (from the Instrumental Aerosol Analytics group), Grimm OPC, WELAS, TSI CPC

People involved:
J. Schneider, S. Borrmann, M. Flores, M. Brands, S. Zörn, T. Böttger

Results:
Chen, Q., D.K. Farmer, J. Schneider, S.R. Zorn, C.L. Heald, T.G. Karl, A. Guenther, J.D. Allan, N. Robinson, H. Coe, J.R. Kimmel, T. Pauliquevis, S. Borrmann, U. Pöschl, M.O. Andreae, P. Artaxo, J.L. Jimenez, and S.T. Martin, Mass Spectral Characterization of Submicron Biogenic Organic Particles in the Amazon Basin,  Geophys. Res. Lett., 36, L20806, doi:10.1029/2009GL039880, 2009.

Martin, S.T.,  M. O. Andreae, D. Althausen, P. Artaxo, H. Baars, S. Borrmann, Q. Chen, D. K. Farmer, A. Guenther, S. S. Gunthe, J. L. Jimenez, T. Karl, K. Longo, A. Manzi, T. Müller, T. Pauliquevis, M. D. Petters, A. J. Prenni, U. Pöschl, L. V. Rizzo, J. Schneider, J. N. Smith, E. Swietlicki, J. Tota, J. Wang, A. Wiedensohler, and S. R. Zorn
Atmos. Chem. Phys., 10, 11415-11438, 2010.

Pöschl, U., S.T. Martin, B. Sinha, Q. Chen, S.S. Gunthe, J.A. Huffman, S. Borrmann, D.K. Farmer, R.M. Garland, G. Helas, J.L. Jimenez, S.M. King, A. Manzi, E. Mikhailov, T. Pauliquevis, M.D. Petters, A.J. Prenni, P. Roldin, D. Rose, J. Schneider, H. Su, S.R. Zorn, P. Artaxo, M. O. Andreae, Rainforest aerosols as biogenic nuclei of clouds and precipitation in the Amazon, Science, 329, 1513-1516, 2010.

Schneider, J., Freutel, F., Zorn, S. R., Chen, Q., Farmer, D. K., Jimenez, J. L., Martin, S. T., Artaxo, P., Wiedensohler, A., and Borrmann, S.: Mass-spectrometric identification of primary biological particle markers: indication for low abundance of primary biological material in the pristine submicron aerosol of Amazonia, Atmos. Chem. Phys., 11, 11415-11429, doi:10.5194/acp-11-11415-2011, 2011.

Further info:
Inofficial campaign blog