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ORIGINAL RESEARCH article

Front. Earth Sci.
Sec. Atmospheric Science
Volume 12 - 2024 | doi: 10.3389/feart.2024.1498777

Untangling the Inhibitory Effect of Polluted Dust on Weak Precipitation Based on Raindrop Size Distribution Observation

Provisionally accepted
Xiangshan Xie Xiangshan Xie 1,2Wei Wang Wei Wang 1,2*Baolong Shi Baolong Shi 3*Lili Xu Lili Xu 1,2*Neng Ruan Neng Ruan 1,2*Quan Yuan Quan Yuan 1,2*Jinyan Wang Jinyan Wang 3*
  • 1 Yueyang Meteorological Bureau of Hunan Province, Yueyang, China
  • 2 The Key Laboratory of Meteorological Disaster Prevention and Mitigation of Hunan Province, Changsha, China
  • 3 Key Laboratory of Arid Climatic Changing and Reducing Disaster of Gansu Province, College of Atmospheric Sciences, Lanzhou University, Lanzhou, China

The final, formatted version of the article will be published soon.

    As one of the most abundant and widely distributed aerosols in the troposphere, dust aerosols act as condensation nucleus to alter the life cycle of clouds and precipitation, thus affecting weather and climate. However, the exact effect of dust aerosols on precipitation, specifically polluted dust, remains to be fully understood and warrants further exploration. Based on MERRA-2 data, the study investigates the impact of polluted dust aerosols on cloud microphysical processes and their influence on weak precipitation. And Based on raindrop size distribution data in Pudong, Shanghai, China, from 2021 to 2022, two precipitation episodes with polluted dust are taken as examples to clarify the mechanism of the inhibition of polluted dust on weak precipitation. Compared to the dust-free precipitation event, the average concentration of small raindrops increased by 13.8%, while that of large raindrops decreased by 19.2% in polluted dust precipitation event. This may be attributed to the participation of polluted dust aerosols in cloud microphysical processes, which led to the suppression of precipitation efficiency and the significant reduction of large raindrop concentration. However, anthropogenic aerosols have the opposite effect in convective precipitation. It is found that, compared with clean conditions, the average concentration of small raindrops in stratiform precipitation decreases by 63.5%, whereas that of large raindrops in convective precipitation increases by 8.04 times under high pollution conditions. These findings highlight the inhibition effect of polluted dust aerosols on weak precipitation and the promotion effect of anthropogenic aerosols on convective precipitation, which can provide scientific insights for weather and climate prediction.

    Keywords: Aerosols, Polluted dust, Anthropogenic Aerosols, Raindrop size distribution, precipitation

    Received: 19 Sep 2024; Accepted: 23 Dec 2024.

    Copyright: © 2024 Xie, Wang, Shi, Xu, Ruan, Yuan and Wang. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.

    * Correspondence:
    Wei Wang, Yueyang Meteorological Bureau of Hunan Province, Yueyang, China
    Baolong Shi, Key Laboratory of Arid Climatic Changing and Reducing Disaster of Gansu Province, College of Atmospheric Sciences, Lanzhou University, Lanzhou, China
    Lili Xu, Yueyang Meteorological Bureau of Hunan Province, Yueyang, China
    Neng Ruan, Yueyang Meteorological Bureau of Hunan Province, Yueyang, China
    Quan Yuan, The Key Laboratory of Meteorological Disaster Prevention and Mitigation of Hunan Province, Changsha, China
    Jinyan Wang, Key Laboratory of Arid Climatic Changing and Reducing Disaster of Gansu Province, College of Atmospheric Sciences, Lanzhou University, Lanzhou, China

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