What are aerosols and why do they matter?
Sorooshian: Aerosols are particles in the air. They include dust, sea spray from waves, and exhaust particles from our cars. They are natural and manmade, and can range from about one nanometer in diameter (10-9 meters) to several micrometers. They are really small, but the effect they have on things like climate, health (including the respiratory system), and visibility in the atmosphere is huge and totally disproportionate to their size. Particles in the atmosphere scatter and absorb light, and that degrades visibility. Aerosols also are important in terms of renewable energy because by directly interacting with light and also influencing cloud formation, they can reduce the amount of energy we can get through solar power. Q: What about climate? Sorooshian: Because aerosols scatter light, the light that would have come down to warm us is instead reflected up, so they play a role in cooling the Earth. Another thing, which is of great interest to me, involves clouds. The clouds you see
