Journal ArticleDOI
Impact of the North African drought and El Niño on mineral dust in the Barbados trade winds
Joseph M. Prospero,Ruby T. Nees +1 more
Reads0
Chats0
TLDR
This article showed that spring-summer dust concentrations at Barbados (13° 10′N, 50°30′ W) are correlated to rainfall deficits in the sub-Sahara.Abstract:
A large area of North Africa has been affected by a drought which began in the late 1960s and which has resulted in widespread crop failures, starvation and death. At the same time, there has been a great increase in the concentration of mineral aerosol in the trade winds over the western North Atlantic Ocean and the Caribbean, especially in the early 1970s and again in the early 1980s, when the drought was most severe. Concentrations in 1983 and 1984 were unprecedented and exceeded pre-drought means by a factor of four. Here we show that spring–summer dust concentrations at Barbados (13° 10′N, 50°30′ W) are correlated to rainfall deficits in the sub-Sahara. Winter dust concentrations, which are normally at a seasonal low, also increased during the drought; concentrations in 1982–1983 were ten times greater than predrought values, and appeared to be related to large-scale circulation changes associated with El Ni˜o rather than to the drought itself.read more
Citations
More filters
Journal ArticleDOI
Climate change 2001: the scientific basis
John Theodore Houghton,Y. Ding,David John Griggs,M. Noguer,P. J. van der Linden,X. Dai,K. Maskell,C. A. Johnson +7 more
TL;DR: In this article, the authors present an overview of the climate system and its dynamics, including observed climate variability and change, the carbon cycle, atmospheric chemistry and greenhouse gases, and their direct and indirect effects.
Journal ArticleDOI
Environmental characterization of global sources of atmospheric soil dust identified with the nimbus 7 total ozone mapping spectrometer (toms) absorbing aerosol product
TL;DR: In this article, the authors used the Total Ozone Mapping Spectrometer (TOMS) sensor on the Nimbus 7 satellite to map the global distribution of major atmospheric dust sources with the goal of identifying common environmental characteristics.
Journal ArticleDOI
Global Iron Connections Between Desert Dust, Ocean Biogeochemistry, and Climate
Tim Jickells,Zhisheng An,Katrine Krogh Andersen,Alex R. Baker,Gilles Bergametti,Nick Brooks,Junji Cao,Philip W. Boyd,Robert A. Duce,Keith A. Hunter,Hodaka Kawahata,Nilgun Kubilay,Julie LaRoche,Peter S. Liss,Natalie M. Mahowald,Joseph M. Prospero,Andy Ridgwell,Ina Tegen,Rodrigo Torres +18 more
TL;DR: The iron cycle, in which iron-containing soil dust is transported from land through the atmosphere to the oceans, affecting ocean biogeochemistry and hence having feedback effects on climate and dust production, is reviewed.
Journal ArticleDOI
A satellite view of aerosols in the climate system
TL;DR: Increases in aerosol concentration and changes in their composition, driven by industrialization and an expanding population, may adversely affect the Earth's climate and water supply.
Journal ArticleDOI
Operational remote sensing of tropospheric aerosol over land from EOS moderate resolution imaging spectroradiometer
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors used the EOS moderate resolution imaging spectroradiometer (MODIS) using dark land targets to estimate the optical thickness and columnar mass concentration of the accumulation mode.
References
More filters
Journal ArticleDOI
The Large-Scale Movement of Saharan Air Outbreaks over the Northern Equatorial Atlantic
TL;DR: In this article, the authors show that dust-laden heated air emerges from West Africa as a series of large-scale anticyclonic eddies which move westward over the tropical Atlantic above the trade-wind moist layer, principally in the layer between 5000 and 15,000 ft (600-800 mb).
Journal ArticleDOI
Vertical and areal distribution of Saharan dust over the western equatorial north Atlantic Ocean
TL;DR: Aerosol measurements were made as a part of the Barbados Oceanographic and Meteorological Experiment (Bomex) during May, June, and July 1969 as discussed by the authors during which the average concentration of mineral aerosol within the Saharan air layer was 61 μg m−3; in contrast to the low-level air was 22 μgm−3.
Journal ArticleDOI
Transport of mineral aerosol from Asia Over the North Pacific Ocean
TL;DR: The SEAREX Asian Dust Network in the North Pacific has been used to collect data from seven stations between January 1981 and March 1982 as discussed by the authors, with the greatest concentrations occurring in the mid-latitudes.
Journal ArticleDOI
Atmospheric transport of soil dust from Africa to South America
TL;DR: The results from an aerosol sampling station at Cayenne, French Guiana, which indicate that large quantities of soil dust are being carried out of North Africa and across the Atlantic during the winter months as well but at this time of year the transport is primarily to South America.
Journal ArticleDOI
Saharan aerosols over the tropical North Atlantic — Mineralogy
TL;DR: For example, during three major Saharan dust outbreaks as they passed across the tropical North Atlantic Ocean during the summer of 1974, the dominant mineral group was mica-illite; the mean concentration at each station ranged from 54% at Sal Island to 64% at Barbados and Miami, Florida as mentioned in this paper.