Possible transcontinental dust transport from North Africa and the Middle East to East Asia

Tanaka, Taichu Y.; Kurosaki, Yasunori; Chiba, Momoko; Matsumura, Takatsugu; Nagai, Tomohiro; Yamazaki, Akihiro; Uchiyama, Akihiro; Tsunematsu, Nobumitsu; Kai, Kenji

doi:10.1016/j.atmosenv.2005.03.034

Cited by 76 publications

(37 citation statements)

References 30 publications

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“…Asian dust may reach North America and Europe via the Pacific [43]. Saharan dust could be carried thousands of kilometers to the Mediterranean [44], Europe [45,46], the Middle East [9,47], the Americas [48], and even the Arctic [49]. The above trajectories can be seen during specific times of the year, with the intensity varying annually [50].…”

Section: Geographical Distribution Of Studies Addressing Health Effecmentioning

confidence: 99%

A Systematic Review of Global Desert Dust and Associated Human Health Effects

et al. 2016

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Dust storms and sandy dust events originating in arid and semi-arid areas can transport particulate material, pollutants, and potential transport long distances from their sources. Exposure to desert dust particles is generally acknowledged to endanger human health. However, most studies have examined anthropogenic particulate sources, with few studies considering contributions from natural desert dust. A systematic literature review was undertaken using the ISI Web of Knowledge and PubMed databases with the objective of identifying all studies presenting results on the potential health impact from desert dust particles across the world. This review reveals an imbalance between the areas most exposed to dust and the areas most studied in terms of health effects. Among the human health effects of dust storms are mortality and morbidity, arising from respiratory system, circulatory system, and other diseases. We summarize the quantitative results of current scientific health research and possible pathological mechanisms, and describe some of the many challenges related to understanding health effects from exposures to desert dust particles. Overall, for respiratory and circulatory mortality, both positive and negative associations have been reported for PM 10 of desert dust, but only a positive relationship was reported between PM 2.5-10 and mortality, and a positive relationship was also reported between PM 2.5 and human mortality. Future pathological studies should continue to focus on those mechanisms causing the most harmful effect of desert dust on respiratory and cardiovascular diseases. More attention should also be paid to the association between desert dust and the morbidity of other diseases, such as those affecting the reproductive system and nervous system.

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Section: Geographical Distribution Of Studies Addressing Health Effecmentioning

confidence: 99%

A Systematic Review of Global Desert Dust and Associated Human Health Effects

et al. 2016

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“…Within a week time, lidar stations in Japan measured dust at altitudes between 2 and 6 km, without having major dust outbreaks in the Taklamakan and Gobi deserts. Model simulations indicated that the dust was transported to Japan via north of the Tien Shan mountains (Tanaka et al, 2005). For that case, Tanaka et al (2005) estimated 50 % of the dust particles arriving in Japan came from the Sahara, 30 % from the Middle East, and only 10 % from China.…”

Section: Dust Layer Heightmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Even bacteria, fungi, and viruses can be transported by dust over long distances (Griffin, 2007;Hara and Zhang, 2012;Yamaguchi et al, 2015;Park et al, 2016). Dust is also transported across the highly polluted Central Asia (Balance and Pant, 2003) further eastwards (Tanaka et al, 2005;Mikami et al, 2006) and on its way it is subject to stronger anthropogenic influence compared to the westward transport of Saharan dust (Bi et al, 2016).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Long-term profiling of mineral dust and pollution aerosol with multiwavelength polarization Raman lidar at the Central Asian site of Dushanbe, Tajikistan: case studies

et al. 2017

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Abstract. For the first time, continuous vertically resolved aerosol measurements were performed by lidar in Tajikistan, Central Asia. Observations with the multiwavelength polarization Raman lidar Polly XT were conducted during CADEX (Central Asian Dust EXperiment) in Dushanbe, Tajikistan, from March 2015 to August 2016. Co-located with the lidar, a sun photometer was also operated. The goal of CADEX is to provide an unprecedented data set on vertically resolved aerosol optical properties in Central Asia, an area highly affected by climate change but largely missing vertically resolved aerosol measurements. During the 18-month measurement campaign, mineral dust was detected frequently from ground to the cirrus level height. In this study, an overview of the measurement period is given and four typical but different example measurement cases are discussed in detail. Three of them are dust cases and one is a contrasting pollution aerosol case. Vertical profiles of the measured optical properties and the calculated dust and non-dust mass concentrations are presented. Dust source regions were identified by means of backward trajectory analyses. A lofted layer of Middle Eastern dust with an aerosol optical thickness (AOT) of 0.4 and an extinction-related Ångström exponent of 0.41 was measured. In comparison, two near-ground dust cases have Central Asian sources. One is an extreme dust event with an AOT of 1.5 and Ångström exponent of 0.12 and the other one is a most extreme dust event with an AOT of above 4 (measured by sun photometer) and an Ångström exponent of −0.08. The observed lidar ratios (and particle linear depolarization ratios) in the presented dust cases range from 40.3 to 46.9 sr (and 0.18-0.29) at 355 nm and from 35.7 to 42.9 sr (0.31-0.35) at 532 nm wavelength. The particle linear depolarization ratios indicate almost unpolluted dust in the case of a lofted dust layer and pure dust in the near-ground dust cases. The lidar ratio values are lower than typical lidar ratio values for Saharan dust (50-60 sr) and comparable to Middle Eastern or west-Asian dust lidar ratios (35-45 sr). In contrast, the presented case of pollution aerosol of local origin has an Ångström exponent of 2.07 and a lidar ratio (particle linear depolarization ratio) of 55.8 sr (0.03) at 355 nm and 32.8 sr (0.08) at 532 nm wavelength.

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“…The Sahara is the largest source of mineral aerosols in the world, with a contribution of almost 40 % compared to the overall emissions from natural sources (Ramanathan et al, 2001;Tanaka et al, 2005). The mineral dust aerosols emitted from the Sahara can be transported over long distances in the atmosphere and can be detected in locations as far as the Americas (Prospero et al, 1981;Swap et al, 1992;Formenti et al, 2001;Kaufman et al, 2005;Ansmann et al, 2009;Ben-Ami et al, 2010), the Mediterranean region (Bergametti et al, 1989;Moulin, 1997;Ansmann et al, 2003), and Asia (Ganor and Mamane, 1982;Israelevich et al, 2003;Ganor et al, 2010).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%