Atmosphere may cleanse itself better than previously thought
A group of researchers at Purdue University and the University of California, San Diego found that the atmosphere can be more effective to cleanse itself of smog and other damaging hydrocarbons once thought. Scientists, including Joseph S. Francisco, discovered that certain naturally occurring chemicals in the atmosphere react with sunlight more effectively than was previously thought to substances that produce smog from the air spot.Components. While many of these chemicals has long been known to behave in this way - the production of natural air filter called OH radicals - the chemicals the team studied, was observed in the first generation of air purification OH lengths of low wave ultraviolet. This comment was removed by science primarily because photochemistry at
these wavelengths is difficult to study.the atmosphere may produce up to 20 percent more OH radicals from these chemicals than previously thought, said Francisco, who is a professor of earth and atmospheric sciences and chemistry at Purdue University School of . We now have a better understanding of atmospheric processes that could give our weary lungs more room to breathe pollution.
edition of the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. Appears in the print edition May 24 (vol. 102, No. 21). Air pollution is both chemicals called hydrocarbons, which are produced during combustion of organic materials such as wood or fossil fuels.
away. This is the third possibility is that the question here, how the decomposition of these hydrocarbons arechemically, said Francisco. The atmosphere is based on a reactive group of chemicals called OH radicals that attach themselves to hydrocarbons and rip to pieces inert.
pollutants that create smog. But these models do not always function well, Francisco said, in part because OH radicals are in some ways an unknown quantity. One of the biggest problems in our area is the amount of OH radicals the atmosphere holds, he said.
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