Review
Geochemistry & Geophysics
Ines Tritscher, Michael C. Pitts, Lamont R. Poole, Simon P. Alexander, Francesco Cairo, Martyn P. Chipperfield, Jens-Uwe Grooss, Michael Hopfner, Alyn Lambert, Beiping Luo, Sergey Molleker, Andrew Orr, Ross Salawitch, Marcel Snels, Reinhold Spang, Wolfgang Woiwode, Thomas Peter
Summary: Polar stratospheric clouds play an important role in stratospheric ozone depletion at high latitudes. Spaceborne observations have advanced our understanding of PSC formation and related dynamical processes.
REVIEWS OF GEOPHYSICS
(2021)
Letter
Biodiversity Conservation
Paul W. Barnes, Janet F. Bornman, Krishna K. Pandey, Germar H. Bernhard, Alkiviadis F. Bais, Rachel E. Neale, Thomas Matthew Robson, Patrick J. Neale, Craig E. Williamson, Richard G. Zepp, Sasha Madronich, Stephen R. Wilson, Anthony L. Andrady, Anu M. Heikkila, Sharon A. Robinson
Summary: The Montreal Protocol and its Amendments have been highly effective in protecting the stratospheric ozone layer, reducing global warming, and preventing global increases in UV-B radiation. However, ongoing and projected changes in UV-B radiation and climate still pose threats to human health, ecosystems, and construction materials.
GLOBAL CHANGE BIOLOGY
(2021)
Article
Geosciences, Multidisciplinary
F. Robertson, L. E. Revell, H. Douglas, A. T. Archibald, O. Morgenstern, D. Frame
Summary: The year when total column ozone (TCO) returns to 1980 levels is commonly used to measure recovery from ozone-depleting substances. However, this metric fails to account for internal variability and the timing of significant TCO losses. Using the signal-to-noise (S/N) metric, this study investigates how TCO can return to pre-disturbance conditions. The findings suggest that TCO de-emerges before returning to its 1980 value, making S/N a suitable metric for determining TCO recovery.
GEOPHYSICAL RESEARCH LETTERS
(2023)
Article
Environmental Sciences
Catherine Wespes, Gaetane Ronsmans, Lieven Clarisse, Susan Solomon, Daniel Hurtmans, Cathy Clerbaux, Pierre-Francois Coheur
Summary: In this paper, the authors utilize a 10-year data record from the IASI-A/MetOp infrared sounder to investigate the relationship between temperature decrease and nitric acid (HNO3) loss in the Antarctic stratosphere. They verify the recurrence of specific regimes in the annual cycle of IASI HNO3 and identify the onset of strong HNO3 depletion in the Antarctic winter. The study highlights the capability of the IASI sounder to monitor the evolution of polar stratospheric HNO3.
ATMOSPHERIC CHEMISTRY AND PHYSICS
(2022)
Article
Environmental Sciences
Janis Pukite, Christian Borger, Steffen Doerner, Myojeong Gu, Thomas Wagner
Summary: Chlorine dioxide (OClO) in polar regions serves as an indicator of chlorine activation during polar winter and spring at twilight conditions. The slant column densities (SCDs) of OClO retrieved from satellite measurements show good correlation with meteorological conditions and are consistent with polar stratospheric cloud (PSC) observations. The study also reveals exceptionally high OClO levels during the northern hemispheric winter of 2019/20 and an extraordinary winter event in the Southern Hemisphere in 2019.
ATMOSPHERIC CHEMISTRY AND PHYSICS
(2022)
Article
Environmental Sciences
Florent Tence, Julien Jumelet, Marie Bouillon, David Cugnet, Slimane Bekki, Sarah Safieddine, Philippe Keckhut, Alain Sarkissian
Summary: The ground-based lidar data at the French Antarctic station Dumont d'Urville (DDU) during 2007-2020 reveals that PSCs in the polar stratosphere consist of over 30% supercooled ternary solutions, over 60% nitric acid trihydrate mixtures, and less than 10% water-ice dominated PSCs. Comparison with the Cloud-Aerosol Lidar with Orthogonal Polarization shows good agreement despite differences in water-ice PSC detection. The trend analysis suggests a significant decrease of 4.6 PSC days per decade at DDU, consistent with satellite temperature measurements in high latitudes.
ATMOSPHERIC CHEMISTRY AND PHYSICS
(2023)
Article
Meteorology & Atmospheric Sciences
Jens-Uwe Grooss, Rolf Mueller
Summary: In the Arctic winter/spring of 2019/2020, due to very stable polar vortex and exceptionally low stratospheric temperatures until early April, significant chemical ozone depletion occurred. Despite a decrease of more than 10% in chlorine and bromine compounds compared to peak values around 2000, unprecedented ozone depletion was caused by meteorological conditions in winter/spring 2019/2020.
JOURNAL OF GEOPHYSICAL RESEARCH-ATMOSPHERES
(2021)
Article
Environmental Sciences
Xiaoyu Jiao, Congcong He, Huan Yu, Jun He, Chengjun Wang
Summary: Photochemical reactions involving aqueous HNO3 and H2O2 in polar stratospheric clouds can lead to the production of halogen radicals, which may contribute to ozone depletion.
Article
Meteorology & Atmospheric Sciences
Jinlong Huang, Peter Hitchcock
Summary: Using ERA5 reanalysis data, this study identifies seven easily calculable indices of the strength of the Arctic stratospheric vortex and compares their effects on climatological statistics and meteorological properties of strong and weak vortex events. The study also evaluates different definitions of strong vortex events and presents dynamical benchmarks for assessing their representation in climate models. The results highlight the challenges in defining strong vortex events and emphasize the implications of different choices, providing valuable guidance for future studies.
JOURNAL OF GEOPHYSICAL RESEARCH-ATMOSPHERES
(2023)
Article
Environmental Sciences
Yan Xia, Yongyun Hu, Yi Huang, Jianchun Bian, Chuanfeng Zhao
Summary: Arctic ozone loss may lead to a decrease in surface UV radiation over the Siberian Arctic in spring, while an increase in high clouds allows more UV radiation to reach the surface. The masking effect of high clouds is found to be stronger than that of stratospheric ozone loss over the Siberian Arctic in spring.
ENVIRONMENTAL RESEARCH LETTERS
(2021)
Article
Geosciences, Multidisciplinary
Pengfei Yu, Sean M. Davis, Owen B. Toon, Robert W. Portmann, Charles G. Bardeen, John E. Barnes, Hagen Telg, Christopher Maloney, Karen H. Rosenlof
Summary: The Australian wildfires from 2019 to 2020 released approximately 0.9 Tg of smoke into the stratosphere, containing 2.5% black carbon. Model calculations suggest a 1 K warming in the stratosphere of the Southern Hemisphere midlatitudes for more than 6 months following the injection of black-carbon containing smoke. It is estimated that the smoke-induced chemical reaction led to a decrease in total column ozone in the mid-high southern latitudes.
GEOPHYSICAL RESEARCH LETTERS
(2021)
Article
Meteorology & Atmospheric Sciences
Deepashree Dutta, Steven C. Sherwood, Martin Jucker, Alex Sen Gupta, Katrin J. Meissner
Summary: Climate models underestimate Arctic warming in past warm climates like the early Cretaceous and Paleogene periods, indicating missing or poorly represented physical processes. Previous studies suggest that wintertime Arctic polar stratospheric clouds (PSCs) could promote Arctic amplification through additional greenhouse warming. This study explores PSC changes under high methane levels, preindustrial carbon dioxide, and polar-amplified surface warming, finding that PSCs could play an important role in Arctic warming in a warmer-than-present-day climate, but only if methane levels were higher than suggested by previous modeling studies for past warm climates.
JOURNAL OF CLIMATE
(2023)
Article
Geosciences, Multidisciplinary
Michael Steiner, Beiping Luo, Thomas Peter, Michael C. Pitts, Andrea Stenke
Summary: Polar stratospheric clouds play a crucial role in catalyzing ozone destruction and their accurate representation in chemistry-climate models is important. This study evaluated the simulation of PSCs in the Antarctic winters using the CCM SOCOLv3.1 and compared the results with measurements from the CALIPSO satellite.
GEOSCIENTIFIC MODEL DEVELOPMENT
(2021)
Article
Environmental Sciences
Matthias Tesche, Peggy Achtert, Michael C. Pitts
Summary: This study evaluated the impact of tropospheric cloudiness on ground-based lidar observations of polar stratospheric clouds (PSCs) using data from the CALIPSO satellite. The findings suggest that the location of ground-based measurements and related tropospheric cloudiness can have a significant influence on derived PSC statistics, which are often inconsistent with polewide results from CALIOP observations.
ATMOSPHERIC CHEMISTRY AND PHYSICS
(2021)
Article
Meteorology & Atmospheric Sciences
Yuli Zhang, Zhaonan Cai, Yi Liu
Summary: The Arctic stratospheric polar vortex was exceptionally strong, cold, and persistent in the winter and spring of 2019-2020. The less active upward propagation of planetary waves affected this strong polar vortex, leading to the most serious Arctic ozone depletion observed since 2004.
ATMOSPHERIC AND OCEANIC SCIENCE LETTERS
(2021)
