Sea fog is frequently occurred throughout the Arctic melt season. To study the interactions between sea fog process and aerosol chemistry, high time-resolved in-situ measurement of water-soluble ions of atmospheric aerosol particles were conducted over the Arctic Ocean ice floe regions from August 1^st to 12^th, 2017, when the frequent observations of sea fog had been carried out. Na⁺, Cl^-, Mg²⁺, methanesulfonic acid (MSA^-), sea salt sulfate (ss-SO₄²) and non-sea salt sulfate (nss-SO₄^2-) exhibited significant differences between sea fog and non-sea fog processes. Average mass concentrations of sea salt ions like Na⁺, Mg²⁺, Cl^- and ss-SO₄^2- during the sea fog processes were obviously lower than that in the non-sea fog period; while nss-SO₄^2- display opposite. Detailed sea fog processes studies exhibited that mass concentrations of sea salts ions increased obviously before the occurrence of sea fog, while decreased significantly with the formation of sea fog; nss-SO₄^2- showed none decreasing but maintained at a higher concentration during the sea fog processes. These results suggest that sea salt aerosol particles are more likely to serve as fog condensation nuclei and can be cleared away by sea-fog effectively than nss-SO₄^2- particles. MSA, only which combined with sea salt particles are likely nucleated and removed by the sea fog.

Sea fog, aerosol, Arctic Ocean, sea salt aerosol, Non-sea salt sulfate (nss-SO42-)