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Heterogeneous ice nucleation activity of bacteria: new laboratory experiments at simulated cloud conditions
1Institute for Meteorology and Climate Research (IMK-AAF), Forschungszentrum Karlsruhe, Karlsruhe, Germany
2Department of Agricultural Biotechnology, Agricultural University of Athens, Athen, Greece
3INRA, Unité de Pathologie Végétale UR407, Montfavet, France
4Institute for Physical Chemistry, University of Heidelberg, Heidelberg, Germany
Abstract. The ice nucleation activities of five different Pseudomonas syringae, Pseudomonas viridiflava and Erwinia herbicola bacterial species and of SnomaxTM were investigated in the temperature range between −5 and −15°C. Water suspensions of these bacteria were directly spray into the cloud chamber of the AIDA facility of Forschungszentrum Karlsruhe at a temperature of −5.7°. At this temperature, about 1% of the SnomaxTM cells induced freezing of the spray droplets before they evaporated in the cloud chamber. The other suspensions of living cells didn't induce any measurable ice concentration during spray formation at −5.7°. The remaining aerosol was exposed to typical cloud activation conditions in subsequent experiments with expansion cooling to about −11°C. During these experiments, the bacterial cells first acted as cloud condensation nuclei to form cloud droplets and then eventually acted as ice nuclei to freeze the droplets. The results indicate that the bacteria investigated in the present study are mainly ice active in the temperature range between −7 and −11°C with an INA fraction of the order of 10−4. The ice nucleation efficiency of SnomaxTM cells was much larger with an INA fraction of 0.2 at temperatures around −8°C.
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Citation: Möhler, O., Georgakopoulos, D. G., Morris, C. E., Benz, S., Ebert, V., Hunsmann, S., Saathoff, H., Schnaiter, M., and Wagner, R.: Heterogeneous ice nucleation activity of bacteria: new laboratory experiments at simulated cloud conditions, Biogeosciences Discuss., 5, 1445-1468, 2008. Bibtex EndNote Reference Manager
