This article has been reviewed according to Science X's editorial process and policies. Editors have highlighted the following attributes while ensuring the content's credibility: Salt and sugar from the sea can rise as far as the free troposphere, thereby influencing both cloud formation and the Arctic climate. This is the finding of balloon measurements carried out by a team of researchers on Spitsbergen in autumn 2021 and spring 2022.
With the Arctic becoming increasingly ice-free, more and more of these cloud-forming ingredients from seawater could enter the atmosphere and affect the radiation budget. The new findings therefore contribute to a better understanding of the complex interactions that lead to above-average warming in the Arctic, the researchers write in the journal Atmospheric Chemistry and Physics. The study, led by the Leibniz Institute for Tropospheric Research (TROPOS), also involved researchers from the University of Cologne, the Alfred Wegener Institute, Helmholtz Center for Polar and Marine Research (AWI), the Max Planck Institute for Marine Microbiology, the University of Oldenburg and the University of Bremen.
It forms part of the German Research Foundation's (DFG) Transregios 172 program, which has been investigating climate change in the Arctic since 2016 under the leadership of Leipzig University. The central Arctic is an ocean covered in sea ice in winter that features ever-increasing areas of open water in summer. Consequently, sea spray aerosol (SSA) particles play a key role in the climate, as they are a major source of cloud formation in this region.
As global warming intensifies and sea ice retreats, the importance of these particles from the sea will increase even further. These particles are released from seawater into the air above by breaking waves and bursting air bubbles. Under certain meteorological conditions, they can rise further into the atmosphere.
They consist of inorganic sea salt ions such as sodium and chloride, together with organic material originating from the surface film and the underlying seawater. The organic material also includes marine carbohydrates. Most of these sugar-like compounds are complex, highly branched polysaccharides that are produced and released by algae and bacteria.
In 2025, a TROPOS study using laboratory and field data provided evidence that the ice-nucleating activity of sea spray particles is significantly influenced by the polysaccharides they contain. Model simulations showed that the ice-nucleating activity of marine polysaccharides is particularly significant in the temperature range from –20°C to –15°C in remote ocean regions where the contribution of terrestrial ice-nucleating particles is minimal or absent altogether. Ice-nucleating aerosol particles promote ice formation in clouds and thus influence their radiative properties and precipitation formation.
Extract — continue reading at the source.
