Sea-Breeze Front Effects on Boundary-layer Aerosols at a Tropical Coastal Station

Abstract

The effects of sea breeze on optical depth, size distribution, and columnar loading of aerosols at the tropical coastal station of Trivandrum are studied. It has been observed that sea-breeze front activity results in a significant and short-lived enhancement in aerosol optical depth and columnar loading in contrast to the effects seen on normal sea-breeze days. Examination of the changes in columnar aerosol size distribution associated with sea-breeze activity revealed an enhancement of small-particle (size less than 0.28 µ m) concentration. The aerosol size distributions deduced from optical depth measurements generally show a pronounced bimodal structure associated with the frontal activity.