Influence of atmospheric relative humidity on ultraviolet flux and aerosol direct radiative forcing: Observation and simulation

The atmospheric aerosols can absorb moisture from the environment due to their hydrophilicity and thus affect atmospheric radiation fluxes. In this article, the ultraviolet radiation and relative humidity (RH) data from ground observations and a radiative transfer model were used to examine the influence of RH on ultraviolet radiation flux and aerosol direct radiative forcing under the clear-sky conditions. The results show that RH has a significant influence on ultraviolet radiation because of aerosol hygroscopicity. The relationship between attenuation rate and RH can be fitted logarithmically and all of the R-2 of the 4 sets of samples are high, i.e. 0.87, 0.96, 0.9, and 0.9, respectively. When the RH is 60%, 70%, 80% and 90%, the mean aerosol direct radiative forcing in ultraviolet is -4.22W m(-2), -4.5W m(-2), -4.82W m(-2) and -5.4W m(-2), respectively. For the selected polluted air samples the growth factor for computing aerosol direct radiative forcing in the ultraviolet for the RH of 80% varies from 1.19 to 1.53, with an average of 1.31.