Researchers at the University of California, Davis (UCD) will collaborate with other scientists in the Ocean-Atmosphere-Sea Ice-Snowpack (OASIS) 2009 field campaign at Barrow, AK. This project has three main objectives, centered around the photochemistry of snow: 1) Measure the amount of light absorption by soluble species in/on snow grains, including hydrogen peroxide (H2O2), nitrate, nitrite, and unknown (presumably organic) chromophores. 2) Measure the physical, chemical, and optical properties of the snow. 3) Integrate these results to characterize the contributions of organic chromophores to light absorption in snow, determine the physical and chemical factors affecting light fluxes and light absorption in snow, examine the effects of snow photochemistry on snow and boundary layer composition, and model the snow photochemistry. The UCD team will also coordinate the OASIS field campaign. This would be among the first studies of the contributions of organic species to the pool of chromophores in/on snow grains, and could lead to significant advances in our understanding of snow photochemistry and its impacts on atmospheric composition.
Broader impacts include: outreach via live web cams during the field campaign; coordination with U.S. and international TV stations to cover the Barrow field work; participation of undergraduate students; educational outreach to students at a rural high school near Davis; coordination of data archiving from the field campaign; and hosting OASIS 2009 sessions at conferences.
