Oxidation of low-molecular-weight organic compounds in cloud droplets: development of the Jülich Aqueous-phase Mechanism of Organic Chemistry (JAMOC) in CAABA/MECCA (version 4.5.0)

Abstract

The Jülich Aqueous-phase Mechanism of Organic Chemistry (JAMOC) is developed and implemented in the Module Efficiently Calculating the Chemistry of the Atmosphere (MECCA; version 4.5.0). JAMOC is an explicit in-cloud oxidation scheme for oxygenated volatile organic compounds (OVOCs), suitable for global model applications. It is based on a subset of the comprehensive Cloud Explicit Physico-chemical Scheme (CLEPS; version 1.0). The phase transfer of species containing up to 10 carbon atoms is included, and a selection of species containing up to 4 carbon atoms reacts in the aqueous phase. In addition, the following main advances are implemented: (1) simulating hydration and dehydration explicitly; (2) taking oligomerisation of formaldehyde, glyoxal, and methylglyoxal into account; (3) adding further photolysis reactions; and (4) considering gas-phase oxidation of new outgassed species. The implementation of JAMOC in MECCA makes a detailed in-cloud OVOC oxidation model readily available for box as well as for regional and global simulations that are affordable with modern supercomputing facilities. The new mechanism is tested inside the box model Chemistry As A Boxmodel Application (CAABA), yielding reduced gas-phase concentrations of most oxidants and OVOCs except for the nitrogen oxides.