<br/>Urban grime, a complex film formed by the deposition of organic and inorganic pollutants, can be an important medium for heterogeneous chemistry in cities. Experimental evidence from ambient grime sampling and laboratory-made proxies have uncovered a wide range of chemical compositions, relevant reactions, and thus highly varied potential consequences for urban air quality. Explicitly modeling this chemistry is challenging, given the multiphase nature of grime. We present progress on a novel modeling framework based on cellular automata that can simulate the deposition and partitioning of gases and aerosols onto surfaces and their subsequent chemical reactions for common grime constituents. We use this model to identify the ambient conditions under which urban grime can act as a NOx sink or source. While our grime automata model is 2-dimensional (representing chemistry on smooth surfaces), our approach is generalizable to 3-dimensions for ambient aerosol chemistry simulation.

Simulating urban grime with cellular automata

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