Atmos. Chem. Phys., 20, 8227–8250, 2020 https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-20-8227-2020 © Author(s) 2020. This work is distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License. Polar semivolatile organic compounds in biomass-burning emissions and their chemical transformations during aging in an oxidation flow reactor Deep Sengupta, Vera Samburova, Chiranjivi Bhattarai, Adam C. Watts, Hans Moosmüller, and Andrey Y. Khlystov Desert Research Institute, 2215 Raggio Parkway, Reno, NV 89512, USA Correspondence: Vera Samburova (
[email protected]) Received: 20 December 2019 – Discussion started: 23 January 2020 Revised: 7 May 2020 – Accepted: 18 May 2020 – Published: 16 July 2020 Abstract. Semivolatile organic compounds (SVOCs) emit- 350 g mol−1 decreased after OFR aging, while abundances ted from open biomass burning (BB) can contribute to chem- of low-MW compounds (e.g., hexanoic acid) increased. This ical and physical properties of atmospheric aerosols and indicated a significant extent of fragmentation reactions in also may cause adverse health effects. The polar fraction of the OFR. Methoxyphenols decreased after OFR aging, while SVOCs is a prominent part of BB organic aerosols, and thus a significant increase (3.7 to 8.6 times) in the abundance of it is important to characterize the chemical composition and dicarboxylic acids emission factors (EFs), especially maleic reactivity of this fraction. In this study, globally and region- acid (10 to 60 times), was observed. EFs for fresh and ratios ally important representative fuels (Alaskan peat, Moscow from fresh-to-aged BB samples reported in this study can be peat, Pskov peat, eucalyptus, Malaysian peat, and Malaysian used to perform source apportionment and predict processes agricultural peat) were burned under controlled conditions occurring during atmospheric transport.