The chemical composition of atmospheric aerosol is complex and poorly understood. Aqueous reactions of aldehydes with amines or ammonium salts have been implicated in atmospheric brown carbon formation processes. Photochemical reactions of these brown carbon compounds play a large part in particle aging. A variety of techniques, including NMR spectroscopy and ESI-MS, are used to identify the reaction products of small, water soluble carbonyls (e.g. glyoxal, methylglyoxal, and glycolaldehyde) with ammonium sulfate. We present structural and mass comparisons between products formed from the bulk reactions of these aldehydes with ammonium sulfate before and after photochemical aging. The results of these studies will allow us to better understand the aqueous chemistry of atmospheric aerosol droplets.

Photochemistry of atmospheric carbonyl reaction products

255th National Meeting (2018)

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