Investigation of the correlation between odd oxygen and secondary organic aerosol in Mexico City and Houston

On several days in Mexico City, the [OOA]/[Ox] ratio decreased by a factor of ~2 between 08:00 and 13:00 local time. This decrease is only partially attributable to evaporation of the least oxidized and most volatile components of OOA; differences in the diurnal emission trends and timescales for photochemical processing of SOA precursors compared to ozone precursors also likely contribute to the observed decrease. The extent of OOA oxidation increased with photochemical aging.

Calculations of the ratio of the SOA formation rate to the Ox production rate using ambient VOC measurements and traditional laboratory SOA yields are lower than the observed [OOA]/[Ox] ratios by factors of 5 to 15, consistent with several other models' underestimates of SOA. Calculations of this ratio using emission factors for organic compounds from gasoline and diesel exhaust do not reproduce the observed ratio. Although not succesful in reproducing the atmospheric observations presented, modeling P(SOA)/P(Ox) can serve as a useful test of photochemical models using improved formulation mechanisms for SOA.