Articles | Volume 3, issue 1
https://doi.org/10.5194/ar-3-293-2025
https://doi.org/10.5194/ar-3-293-2025
Research article
 | 
03 Jun 2025
Research article |  | 03 Jun 2025

The applicability and challenges of black carbon sensors in monitoring networks

J. Tapio Elomaa, Krista Luoma, Sami D. Harni, Aki Virkkula, Hilkka Timonen, and Tuukka Petäjä

Related authors

Ventilation and low pollution enhancing new particle formation in Milan, Italy
Myriam Agrò, Manuel Bettineschi, Silvia Melina, Diego Aliaga, Andrea Bergomi, Beatrice Biffi, Alessandro Bigi, Giancarlo Ciarelli, Cristina Colombi, Paola Fermo, Ivan Grigioni, Veli-Matti Kerminen, Markku Kulmala, Janne Lampilahti, Angela Marinoni, Celestine Oliewo, Juha Sulo, Gianluigi Valli, Roberta Vecchi, Tuukka Petäjä, Katrianne Lehtipalo, and Federico Bianchi
EGUsphere, https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-2025-2387,https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-2025-2387, 2025
This preprint is open for discussion and under review for Atmospheric Chemistry and Physics (ACP).
Short summary
A process-evaluation of the impact of precipitation on aerosol particle number size distributions in three Earth System Models
Sara M. Blichner, Theodore Khadir, Sini Talvinen, Paulo Artaxo, Liine Heikkinen, Harri Kokkola, Radovan Krejci, Muhammed Irfan, Twan van Noije, Tuukka Petäjä, Christopher Pöhlker, Øyvind Seland, Carl Svenhag, Antti Vartiainen, and Ilona Riipinen
EGUsphere, https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-2025-2559,https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-2025-2559, 2025
This preprint is open for discussion and under review for Atmospheric Chemistry and Physics (ACP).
Short summary
Global fields of daily accumulation-mode particle number concentrations using in situ observations, reanalysis data and machine learning
Aino Ovaska, Elio Rauth, Daniel Holmberg, Paulo Artaxo, John Backman, Benjamin Bergmans, Don Collins, Marco Aurélio Franco, Shahzad Gani, Roy M. Harrison, Rakes K. Hooda, Tareq Hussein, Antti-Pekka Hyvärinen, Kerneels Jaars, Adam Kristensson, Markku Kulmala, Lauri Laakso, Ari Laaksonen, Nikolaos Mihalopoulos, Colin O'Dowd, Jakub Ondracek, Tuukka Petäjä, Kristina Plauškaitė, Mira Pöhlker, Ximeng Qi, Peter Tunved, Ville Vakkari, Alfred Wiedensohler, Kai Puolamäki, Tuomo Nieminen, Veli-Matti Kerminen, Victoria A. Sinclair, and Pauli Paasonen
Aerosol Research Discuss., https://doi.org/10.5194/ar-2025-18,https://doi.org/10.5194/ar-2025-18, 2025
Preprint under review for AR
Short summary
Brown carbon emissions from laboratory combustion of Eurasian arctic-boreal and South African savanna biomass
Arya Mukherjee, Anni Hartikainen, Markus Somero, Viljami Luostari, Mika Ihalainen, Christopher P. Rüger, Timo Kekäläinen, Ville H. Nissinen, Luis M. F. Barreira, Hanna Koponen, Tuukka Kokkola, Delun Li, Lejish Vettikkat, Pasi Yli-Pirilä, Muhammad Shahzaib, Meri M. Ruppel, Ville Vakkari, Kerneels Jaars, Stefan J. Siebert, Angela Buchholz, Kajar Köster, Pieter G. van Zyl, Hilkka Timonen, Niko Kinnunen, Janne Jänis, Annele Virtanen, Aki Virkkula, and Olli Sippula
EGUsphere, https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-2025-2759,https://doi.org/10.5194/egusphere-2025-2759, 2025
This preprint is open for discussion and under review for Atmospheric Chemistry and Physics (ACP).
Short summary
In-situ aerosol measurements at the Arctic Sammaltunturi measurement station during the Pallas Cloud Experiment 2022
John Backman, Krista Luoma, Henri Servomaa, Ville Vakkari, and David Brus
Earth Syst. Sci. Data Discuss., https://doi.org/10.5194/essd-2025-284,https://doi.org/10.5194/essd-2025-284, 2025
Preprint under review for ESSD
Short summary

Related subject area

Aerosol Measurements & Instrumentation (AMI)
Impact of sampling frequency on low-cost PM sensor performance including short-term temporal events in high PM environments
Gulshan Kumar, Prasannaa Kumar D., Saran Raj, Jay Dhariwal, and Seshan Srirangarajan
Aerosol Research, 3, 429–439, https://doi.org/10.5194/ar-3-429-2025,https://doi.org/10.5194/ar-3-429-2025, 2025
Short summary
Development and characterization of an aircraft inlet system for broader quantitative particle sampling at higher altitudes: aerodynamic lenses, beam and vaporizer diagnostics, and pressure-controlled inlets
Dongwook Kim, Pedro Campuzano-Jost, Hongyu Guo, Douglas A. Day, Da Yang, Suresh Dhaniyala, Leah Williams, Philip Croteau, John Jayne, Douglas Worsnop, Rainer Volkamer, and Jose L. Jimenez
Aerosol Research, 3, 371–404, https://doi.org/10.5194/ar-3-371-2025,https://doi.org/10.5194/ar-3-371-2025, 2025
Short summary
Field-deployable cantilever-enhanced photoacoustic instrument for aerosol light absorption measurement at three wavelengths
Juho Karhu, Tommi Mikkonen, Joel Kuula, Aki Virkkula, Erkki Ikonen, Markku Vainio, Hilkka Timonen, and Tuomas Hieta
Aerosol Research, 3, 113–124, https://doi.org/10.5194/ar-3-113-2025,https://doi.org/10.5194/ar-3-113-2025, 2025
Short summary
The Centrifugal Differential Mobility Analyser – concept and initial validation of a new device for measuring 2D property distributions
Torben N. Rüther, David B. Rasche, and Hans-Joachim Schmid
Aerosol Research, 3, 65–79, https://doi.org/10.5194/ar-3-65-2025,https://doi.org/10.5194/ar-3-65-2025, 2025
Short summary
Performance evaluation of four cascade impactors for airborne ultrafine-particle (UFP) collection: the influence of particle type, concentration, mass, and chemical nature
Elisabeth Eckenberger, Andreas Mittereder, Nadine Gawlitta, Jürgen Schnelle-Kreis, Martin Sklorz, Dieter Brüggemann, Ralf Zimmermann, and Anke C. Nölscher
Aerosol Research, 3, 45–64, https://doi.org/10.5194/ar-3-45-2025,https://doi.org/10.5194/ar-3-45-2025, 2025
Short summary

Cited articles

Alas, H. D. C., Weinhold, K., Costabile, F., Di Ianni, A., Müller, T., Pfeifer, S., Di Liberto, L., Turner, J. R., and Wiedensohler, A.: Methodology for high-quality mobile measurement with focus on black carbon and particle mass concentrations, Atmos. Meas. Tech., 12, 4697–4712, https://doi.org/10.5194/amt-12-4697-2019, 2019. 
Alas, H. D. C., Müller, T., Weinhold, K., Pfeifer, S., Glojek, K., Gregorič, A., Močnik, G., Drinovec, L., Costabile, F., Ristorini, M., and Wiedensohler, A.: Performance of microaethalometers: Real-world field intercomparisons from multiple mobile measurement campaigns in different atmospheric environments, Aerosol Air Qual. Res., 20, 2640–2653, https://doi.org/10.4209/aaqr.2020.03.0113, 2020. 
Arnott, W. P., Hamasha, K., Moosmüller, H., Sheridan, P. J., and Ogren, J. A.: Towards Aerosol Light-Absorption Measurements with a 7-Wavelength Aethalometer: Evaluation with a Photoacoustic Instrument and 3-Wavelength Nephelometer, Aerosol Sci. Technol., 39, 17–29, https://doi.org/10.1080/027868290901972, 2005. 
Backman, J., Rizzo, L. V., Hakala, J., Nieminen, T., Manninen, H. E., Morais, F., Aalto, P. P., Siivola, E., Carbone, S., Hillamo, R., Artaxo, P., Virkkula, A., Petäjä, T., and Kulmala, M.: On the diurnal cycle of urban aerosols, black carbon and the occurrence of new particle formation events in springtime São Paulo, Brazil, Atmos. Chem. Phys., 12, 11733–11751, https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-12-11733-2012, 2012. 
Backman, J., Schmeisser, L., Virkkula, A., Ogren, J. A., Asmi, E., Starkweather, S., Sharma, S., Eleftheriadis, K., Uttal, T., Jefferson, A., Bergin, M., Makshtas, A., Tunved, P., and Fiebig, M.: On Aethalometer measurement uncertainties and an instrument correction factor for the Arctic, Atmos. Meas. Tech., 10, 5039–5062, https://doi.org/10.5194/amt-10-5039-2017, 2017. 
Download
Short summary
Black carbon (BC) is a pollutant from combustion that affects the climate and is harmful to health. We tested four different small BC sensors with a reference in Helsinki. The sensors compared well with the reference. As a sensor network they were able to capture differences in BC. Changes in temperature (T) and relative humidity (RH) caused error in the measurements. To reduce the effects of T and RH on BC sensors, more robust boxes should be developed, or corrections should be applied.
Share
Altmetrics
Final-revised paper
Preprint