The influence of multiple groups of biological ice nucleating particles on microphysical properties of mixed-phase clouds observed during MC3E

Abstract

Abstract. A new empirical parameterization (EP) for multiple groups of primary biological aerosol particles (PBAPs) is implemented in the aerosol–cloud model (AC) to investigate their roles as ice nucleating particles (INPs). The EP describes the heterogeneous ice nucleation by (1) fungal spores, (2) bacteria, (3) pollen, (4) detritus of plants, animals, and viruses, and (5) algae. Each group includes fragments from the originally emitted particles. A high-resolution simulation of a midlatitude mesoscale squall line by AC is validated against airborne and ground observations. Sensitivity tests are carried out by varying the initial vertical profiles of the loadings of individual PBAP groups. The resulting changes in warm and ice cloud microphysical parameters are investigated. The changes in warm microphysical parameters, including liquid water content and cloud droplet number concentration, are minimal (<10 %). Overall, PBAPs have little effect on the ice number concentration (<6 %) in the convective region. In the stratiform region, increasing the initial PBAP loadings by a factor of 1000 resulted in less than 40 % change in ice number concentrations. The total ice concentration is mostly controlled by various mechanisms of secondary ice production (SIP). However, when SIP is intentionally shut down in sensitivity tests, increasing the PBAP loading by a factor of 100 has an effect of less than 3 % on the ice phase. Further sensitivity tests revealed that PBAPs have little effect on surface precipitation and on the shortwave and longwave flux (<4 %) for a 100-fold perturbation in PBAPs.