ACP Atmospheric Chemistry and Physics ACP 1680-7324 Copernicus GmbH Göttingen, Germany 10.5194/acp-4-1925-2004 Heterogeneous freezing of single sulfuric acid solution droplets: laboratory experiments utilizing an acoustic levitator Ettner M. 1 Mitra S. K. 1 Borrmann S. 1 2 Institute for Atmospheric Physics, Johannes Gutenberg-University, Mainz, Germany Max Planck Institute for Chemistry, Mainz, Germany 29 09 2004 4 7 1925 1932 This is an open-access article ditributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited. This article is available from http://www.atmos-chem-phys.net/4/1925/2004/acp-4-1925-2004.html The full text article is available as a PDF file from http://www.atmos-chem-phys.net/4/1925/2004/acp-4-1925-2004.pdf

The heterogeneous freezing temperatures of single binary sulfuric acid solution droplets were measured in dependency of acid concentration down to temperatures as low as -50°C. In order to avoid influence of supporting substrates on the freezing characteristics, a new technique has been developed to suspend the droplet by means of an acoustic levitator. The droplets contained immersed particles of graphite, kaolin or montmorillonite in order to study the influence of the presence of such contamination on the freezing temperature. The radii of the suspended droplets spanned the range between 0.4 and 1.1mm and the concentration of the sulfuric acid solution varied between 5 and 14 weight percent. The presence of the particles in the solution raises the freezing temperature with respect to homogeneous freezing of these solution droplets. The pure solution droplets can be supercooled up to 40 degrees below the ice-acid solution thermodynamic equilibrium curve. Depending on the concentration of sulfuric acid and the nature of the impurity the polluted droplets froze between -11°C and -35°C. The new experimental set-up, combining a deep freezer with a movable ultrasonic levitator and suitable optics, proved to be a useful approach for such investigations on individual droplets.