Masanori Saito
It is estimated that between 1,000 million-5,000 million tons of dust enter the atmosphere annually from the ground, sometimes traveling long distances to affect other regions’ soil, water, climate, and human and ecosystem health. This, however, is a very rough estimate, and not much is known about its behavior aloft, especially how it interacts with light -- a relationship that proves critical for everything from human health to global transportation.
With the assistance of $1,080,636 in National Science Foundation (NSF) grant funding, Masanori Saito, an assistant professor in the Department of Atmospheric Science at the University of Wyoming, has formed a multistate collaboration to bridge gaps in understanding of the phenomenon.
Through this joint project with a total budget of $5.2 million, researchers and students at partner institutions in Nevada, Oklahoma and Wyoming will not only study how mineral dust aerosols interact with light; they also will consider how that knowledge can be applied to real-world problems.
“What this project adds is a focus on how the specific mineral composition and shape of each dust type changes the way it interacts with sunlight and laser light -- information that’s critical for characterizing dust from satellites, forecasting dust storms and understanding its role in heating or cooling the planet,” Saito says. “The research is a bridge between basic science of dust and real-world applications for health alerts, climate prediction and infrastructure protection.”
The grant provides four years of funding for dozens of student research positions, both graduate and undergraduate, as well as two postdoctoral scholars, travel and research expenses. In addition to sharing their findings with researchers and industry professionals across a range of disciplines impacted by atmospheric dust, the project will contribute significantly to workforce and professional development for the students involved.
The team based at UW will capitalize on strengths in theoretical light-scattering simulations and particle morphology modeling of dust particles. This work will feed into the collaboration across states, drawing on the specific strengths of each partner in the project. The other participating institutions in the project are the Desert Research Institute and Truckee Meadows Community College, both in Nevada, the University of Oklahoma and Central Wyoming College.
“We, as a team, are especially excited about combining one-of-a-kind dust samples with state-of-the-art laboratory experiments and sophisticated computer modeling, something that hasn’t been done at this scale before,” Saito says.
Because dust itself is so widespread and its impact so vast, the knowledge gained from the grant project likewise stands to impact a wide range of sectors, including through a better understanding of global and local climate systems; improvements in telecommunications technologies; an increase in aviation safety; upgrades to national defense systems; and critical insights into respiratory and pulmonary disease and mortality.
Read more about the grant here: www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=2521434&HistoricalAwards=false.
