ArticleProceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America2022
Sunlight can convert atmospheric aerosols into a glassy solid state and modify their environmental impacts.
Article in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, 2022. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 11 papers.
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The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
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Who cites it
11 citing papers in PubMed, 49 citations in OpenAlex.
- Slow bleaching of water-insoluble brown carbon from biomass burning: Implication for direct radiative effect.Science advances · 2026Article
- Pre-existing particle composition controls the initial viscosity and aging of α-pinene-derived secondary organic aerosol.Environmental science: atmospheres · 2026Article
- Dynamic Evolution of Mass and Physical Properties of Atmospheric Organic Aerosol Under Solar Irradiance.Environmental science & technology · 2026Article
- Sunlight can turn smoldering pine wood smoke into a glass.NPJ clean air · 2026Article
- Multiphase Ozone Oxidation of Catechol and Its Products after OH- and Light-Driven Processing.ACS earth & space chemistry · 2025Article
- Photosensitized Decay of Levoglucosan in Biomass Burning Aerosol Particles.Environmental science & technology · 2025Article
- Influence of Relative Humidity and Seed Particles on Molecular Composition of α‑Pinene Secondary Organic Aerosol.ACS ES&T air · 2025Article
- Multiphase Processing of the Water-Soluble and Insoluble Phases of Biomass Burning Organic Aerosol.ACS ES&T air · 2025Article
- Photochemical Degradation of Iron Citrate in Anoxic Viscous Films Enhanced by Redox Cascades.ACS earth & space chemistry · 2025Article
- Quantifying and Modeling the Impact of Phase State on the Ice Nucleation Abilities of 2-Methyltetrols as a Key Component of Secondary Organic Aerosol Derived from Isoprene Epoxydiols.Environmental science & technology · 2024Article
- Estimation of the Volatility and Apparent Activity Coefficient of Levoglucosan in Wood-Burning Organic Aerosols.Environmental science & technology letters · 2024Article
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
7 authors at 2 institutions in 3 countries.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
Secondary organic aerosol (SOA) plays a critical, yet uncertain, role in air quality and climate. Once formed, SOA is transported throughout the atmosphere and is exposed to solar UV light. Information on the viscosity of SOA, and how it may change with solar UV exposure, is needed to accurately predict air quality and climate. However, the effect of solar UV radiation on the viscosity of SOA and the associated implications for air quality and climate predictions is largely unknown. Here, we report the viscosity of SOA after exposure to UV radiation, equivalent to a UV exposure of 6 to 14 d at midlatitudes in summer. Surprisingly, UV-aging led to as much as five orders of magnitude increase in viscosity compared to unirradiated SOA. This increase in viscosity can be rationalized in part by an increase in molecular mass and oxidation of organic molecules constituting the SOA material, as determined by high-resolution mass spectrometry. We demonstrate that UV-aging can lead to an increased abundance of aerosols in the atmosphere in a glassy solid state. Therefore, UV-aging could represent an unrecognized source of nuclei for ice clouds in the atmosphere, with important implications for Earth's energy budget. We also show that UV-aging increases the mixing times within SOA particles by up to five orders of magnitude throughout the troposphere with important implications for predicting the growth, evaporation, and size distribution of SOA, and hence, air pollution and climate.
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Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.