The balance between heterogeneous and homogeneous nucleation of ice clouds using CAM5/CARMA

We present a modification to the Community Aerosol and Radiation model for Atmospheres (CARMA) sectional ice microphysical model where we have added interactive nucleation of sulfates and heterogeneous nucleation onto dust in order to create a more comprehensive representation of ice nucleation within the CARMA sectional ice model. The Yu et al. (2019, ) convective wet removal fix has also been added in order to correctly transport aerosol within the Community Atmosphere Model version 5 (CAM5) and the 3-mode Modal Aerosols Model (MAM3).

In CARMA, the balance of homogeneous and heterogeneous nucleation is controlled by the presence of temperatures below 240 K, supersaturation, and the availability of heterogeneous nuclei. Due to a paucity of dust at altitudes above about 7 km, where temperatures over most of the Earth fall below 240 K, cirrus clouds above 7 km nucleate primarily via homogeneous nucleation on aqueous sulfate aerosols in our simulations.