Nitrification of the lowermost stratosphere during the exceptionally cold Arctic winter 2015–2016

Braun, Marleen; Grooß, Jens-Uwe; Woiwode, Wolfgang; Johansson, Sören; Höpfner, Michael; Friedl-Vallon, Felix; Oelhaf, Hermann; Preusse, Peter; Ungermann, Jörn; Sinnhuber, Björn-Martin; Ziereis, Helmut; Braesicke, Peter

doi:https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-19-13681-2019

Articles | Volume 19, issue 21

https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-19-13681-2019

© Author(s) 2019. This work is distributed under
the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.

Special issue:

The Polar Stratosphere in a Changing Climate (POLSTRACC) (ACP/AMT...

https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-19-13681-2019

© Author(s) 2019. This work is distributed under
the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.

Articles | Volume 19, issue 21

Research article

|

11 Nov 2019

Research article |

| 11 Nov 2019

Nitrification of the lowermost stratosphere during the exceptionally cold Arctic winter 2015–2016

Marleen Braun, Jens-Uwe Grooß, Wolfgang Woiwode, Sören Johansson, Michael Höpfner, Felix Friedl-Vallon, Hermann Oelhaf, Peter Preusse, Jörn Ungermann, Björn-Martin Sinnhuber, Helmut Ziereis, and Peter Braesicke

Data sets

GLORIA Chemistry Mode temperature and trace gas retrievals from the POLSTRACC/GW-LCYCLEII/GWEX/SALSA campaigns 2015/2016 Sören Johansson, Wolfgang Woiwode, and Michael Höpfner https://doi.org/10.5445/IR/1000086506

Short summary

We analyse nitrification of the LMS in the Arctic winter 2015–2016 based on GLORIA measurements. Vertical cross sections of HNO₃ for several flights show complex fine–scale structures and enhanced values down to 9 km. The extent of overall nitrification is quantified based on HNO₃–O₃ correlations and reaches between 5 ppbv and 7 ppbv at potential temperature levels between 350 and 380 K. Further, we compare our result with the atmospheric model CLaMS.