Articles | Volume 19, issue 3
https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-19-1767-2019
https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-19-1767-2019
Research article
 | 
08 Feb 2019
Research article |  | 08 Feb 2019

Retrieving the age of air spectrum from tracers: principle and method

Aurélien Podglajen and Felix Ploeger

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AR: Author's response | RR: Referee report | ED: Editor decision
AR by Aurélien Podglajen on behalf of the Authors (26 Dec 2018)  Author's response    Manuscript
ED: Referee Nomination & Report Request started (11 Jan 2019) by Federico Fierli
RR by Anonymous Referee #1 (11 Jan 2019)
ED: Publish as is (11 Jan 2019) by Federico Fierli
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Short summary
The age spectrum (distribution of transit times) provides a compact description of transport from the surface to a given point in the atmosphere. It also determines the surface-emitted tracer content of an air parcel. We propose a method to invert this relation in order to retrieve age spectra from tracer concentrations and demonstrate its feasibility in idealized and model setups. Applied to observations, the approach might help to better constrain atmospheric transport timescales.
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