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Zender, C.S., R.L. Miller, and I. Tegen, 2004: Quantifying mineral dust mass budgets: Terminology, constraints, and current estimates. Eos Trans. Amer. Geophys. Union, 85, no. 48, 509, 512.
Mineral dust aerosol is created by wind erosion of soil particles. In addition to its direct radiative effect, dust aerosol mediates ocean carbon uptake and the chemical cycles of other aerosols like sulfates. Dust observations during the past decade span measurements of local concentration and deposition to global satellite retrievals of aerosol optical thickness.
One goal of this article is to draw awareness to the wide range of model estimates of dust emission and atmospheric loading. Comparison is made difficult by the different assumptions made by modelers. For example, some models include dust sources created by human disturbance of the soil (by agriculture or overgrazing, for example), while others include only natural sources.
The second goal of this article is to propose a terminology distinguishing different anthropogenic contributions to the dust cycle that is useful for both scientists and policy makers. Distinguishing dust that results from anthropogenic land use change (and is potentially remediable) from dust arising from anthropogenic climate change has important consequences for environmental planning. Though dust from all sources combines in the real atmosphere, making provenance difficult to discriminate in observations, it can be distinguished in models. This proposed taxonomy attempts to provide a basis for comparison between models.
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