Quantitative comparison of measured and simulated O4 absorptions for one day with extremely low aerosol load over the tropical Atlantic

Abstract

In this study, we compare measured and simulated O4 absorptions for conditions of extremely low aerosol optical depth (between 0.034 to 0.056 at 360 nm) on one day during a ship cruise in the tropical Atlantic. For such conditions, the uncertainties related to imperfect knowledge of aerosol properties do not significantly affect the comparison results. We find that the simulations underestimate the measurements by 15% to 20 %. Even for simulations without any aerosols, the measured O4 absorptions are still systematically higher than the simulation results. The observed discrepancies cannot be explained by uncertainties of the measurements and simulations and thus indicate a fundamental inconsistency between simulations and measurements.