the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.
the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.
| 02 Mar 2026
Global Ocean Data Set of Marine Aerosol Properties
Abstract. NOAA's Pacific Marine Environmental Laboratory (PMEL) has made measurements of aerosol chemical, microphysical, optical, and cloud nucleating properties onboard research cruises since 1991. The twenty-five cruises have covered all of the world’s oceans – the Pacific, Atlantic, Indian, Arctic, and Southern. The result is the most comprehensive, publicly available database to date of aerosol properties in the marine atmosphere. The database also contains gas phase species (O3, SO2, Radon, and dimethylsulfide (DMS), seawater species (DMS, NH4+, NO3-, and chlorophyll-a), and meteorological parameters. Details of the cruises (locations, dates, and objectives), parameters measured, instrumentation used, and data availability are provided here. Also included are PMEL’s high-level major findings and past usage of the data by others. The goal of this paper is to promote broader awareness of the database to the atmospheric aerosol in situ measurement, satellite, and modelling communities. Data are publicly available at NOAA’s National Centers for Environmental Information (NCEI) data archive (https://www.ncei.noaa.gov/). Links to the Digital Object Identifiers (DOIs) for each cruise are provided herein.
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Status: final response (author comments only)
- RC1: 'Comment on essd-2025-573', Anonymous Referee #1, 31 Mar 2026
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RC2: 'Comment on essd-2025-573', Anonymous Referee #2, 15 Apr 2026
Quinn et al. present a comprehensive, publicly available dataset of marine aerosol properties collected from a series of research cruises conducted in the period 1991 to 2020 across all major ocean basins. The goal of the authors is to make the dataset more widely available to the research community and, given the richness of the dataset, this is certainly a worthy contribution to the literature. The summary of how the data have been used is a nice addition and the details of how the data can be accessed are sufficient. Given this, I suggest publication based on minor revisions.
Overarching minor comments
While the introduction does a good job in motivating the publication of this dataset in its entirety from a science perspective, I think that some further discussion of the need for this dataset and its publication now could be considered by the authors. As written, the introduction implies a lack of comprehensive in situ data (which is certainly the case), but this implication could be strengthened to state the value of this dataset over existing datasets (e.g., consistency, global coverage, etc.) and how this will likely help model or satellite validation amongst other things. In the same vein, the authors could also consider framing the dataset amongst current scientific priorities (e.g., linking ocean biology to climate, uncertainties in aerosol radiative forcing, etc.).
While the methods section provides substantial details on aerosol sampling, contamination control, humidity conditioning, etc., I do miss a little more engineering detail. If I want to replicate the design of the aerosol sampling mast, for example (and I may well want to do this to provide continuity with these measurements), I would like to either see exact inlet geometry details or a very clear link to where they can be found.
While Figure 1 effectively demonstrates the global coverage of the dataset, in my view, the inclusion of individual cruise labels and a detailed legend makes the figure visually cluttered without adding interpretable information. As such, I would be inclined to simplify the figure (for example, by grouping cruises or removing individual labels to improve clarity).
Figure 2 provides photographs of the sampling setup as a means of providing context. However, it provides limited insight into the sampling design or flow configuration (see my second comment above). I would much prefer to see a schematic illustrating the inlet geometry, airflow paths, and key components (e.g., RH conditioning, subsampling lines), since this would be much more informative for readers seeking to understand or replicate the system.
Specific comments
Line 14 - I would probably rephrase to "The result is the most comprehensive publicly available database of marine aerosol properties to date."
Line 15 - Should be "gas-phase"
Line 187 - should read 2002 I think
Throughout - be consistent with how charges are written (e.g. SO4=, SO4, SO42-)
Citation: https://doi.org/10.5194/essd-2025-573-RC2
Data sets
Global Ocean Data Set of Marine Aerosol Properties Patricia K. Quinn, Timothy S. Bates, Derek J. Coffman, James E. Johnson, Lucia M. Upchurch, and Hanna Best https://www.ncei.noaa.gov
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- 1
Review of Global Ocean Data Set of Marine Aerosol Properties
This paper brings together atmospheric and oceanic measurements from 25 cruises, since 1991. Together, this is a very impressive set of data, and it will be very helpful to the broader community, especially for modeling.
General Comments:
One general suggestion would be to add more references to the Introduction. While many of the statements are known, it would still be helpful to have additional citations. This would also strengthen the background information. For example, sources could be added for the aerosol produced from wave breaking.
This may be beyond the scope of this paper, but because there is a section on past data usage, there could be a couple sentences about future data usage as well. This could include the outlook for these measurements and how they could be used in models, etc.
Specific Comments:
In Figure 1, the legend seems unnecessary, since each cruise is labeled in the map as well.
For Table 1, could the names be included in the table, instead of included as footnotes? It seems like each cruise has a footnote, so that could just be an additional column, or written under the acronym.
Page 3, Line 75: I would add a sentence here similar to “Each cruise is presented briefly in the following paragraphs.” And then make “The Pacific Stratus…” the start of a new paragraph.
Figure 2 is interesting to see but may not be that useful. For example, panel c is not very clear and just looks like a lot of tubing. It is not clear what the tubing is connected to. Depending on the goal of this figure, it might be better to show a schematic instead. If it is not published elsewhere, it would also be helpful to have a general schematic of the inlet in this paper. It is relatively unique to the PMEL sampling platform and thus would be good to include, even in a supplement.
Page 13, Line 321: Because it is stated that the limits varied based on the cruises, it would be helpful to have a range instead of one specific number. No number is listed for the relative wind direction, even though there are values listed for the other two limits.
Table 2: Similar comment as for Table 1 – could the names of the instruments be included in the table instead of as a long list in the footnotes?
Table 3: It would be easier to read if there was a separate column for particle size ranges. The substrate types could be added as well. Also, some of the rows have the instrument listed (i.e., IC) while others do not (i.e., the last row, which has AMS measurements). It might be helpful to have sub-headers, such as “Inorganic ions”, “OC and EC”, “Aerosol Mass”, etc. since each of those encompass multiple rows. If it is not too variable, it might also be good to add the time resolution for some of these so that it is easy information to access.
Page 24, Line 588: Can you list the trace elements measured with XRF? Some are listed in the following dust discussion, but there are likely more.
Table 4: Can the particle size be a separate column?
Table 5: Similar suggestion as Table 3 – subheaders or another column would be helpful for the parameters, since they are repeated. Also, DMS is the only species measured in both the atmosphere and the seawater, so this could be two different tables.
Page 37, Line 922: The phrasing of point #8 is a little odd. Is the “not” supposed to be there?
Page 38, Line 927: In point #8, it is written as “non-sea salt sulfate” and in point #9, it is written as nss SO4=. These should be consistent.