Atmospherically Relevant Chemistry and Aerosol box model – ARCA box (version 1.2)

Abstract

We introduce the Atmospherically Relevant Chemistry and Aerosol box model ARCA box (v.1.2.2). It is a zero-dimensional process model with a focus on atmospheric chemistry and submicron aerosol processes, including cluster formation. A novel feature in the model is its comprehensive graphical user interface, allowing for detailed configuration and documentation of the simulation settings, flexible model input, and output visualization. Additionally, the graphical interface contains tools for module customization and input data acquisition. These properties – customizability, ease of implementation and repeatability – make ARCA an invaluable tool for any atmospheric scientist who needs a view on the complex atmospheric aerosol processes. ARCA is based on previous models (MALTE-BOX, ADiC and ADCHEM), but the code has been fully rewritten and reviewed. The gas-phase chemistry module incorporates the Master Chemical Mechanism (MCMv3.3.1) and Peroxy Radical Autoxidation Mechanism (PRAM) but can use any compatible chemistry scheme. ARCA's aerosol module couples the ACDC (Atmospheric Cluster Dynamics Code) in its particle formation module, and the discrete particle size representation includes the fully stationary and fixed-grid moving average methods. ARCA calculates the gas-particle partitioning of low-volatility organic vapours for any number of compounds included in the chemistry, as well as the Brownian coagulation of the particles. The model has parametrizations for vapour and particle wall losses but accepts user-supplied time- and size-resolved input. ARCA is written in Fortran and Python (user interface and supplementary tools), can be installed on any of the three major operating systems and is licensed under GPLv3.