ATMS 458, Autumn 2010
Global Atmospheric Chemistry

Final Project
Students will write a paper and give a 12-minute presentation (10-minute talk, 2 minutes for questions) during the last week of class. A list of possible topics is included below, or students can pick a topic of his or her own choosing. The paper should be at least 5 pages long (but no more than 10 pages) using ~1.5 line spacing and include at least 10 references, as well as figures to illustrate your points. The paper is worth 15% of your total grade for the class.  The presentation is not part of your project grade, but will factor into your participation grade.  Participation points will be given both on your presentation effort and questions you ask during other students' presentations.  This is meant to give you practice at communicating your work, in a low pressure, supportive environment.  Papers (hardcopies only please) are due on Tuesday, December 7.

Examples of potential topics:
  • Air pollution in mega-cities
  • Air pollution and health
  • Intercontinental transport of pollutants
  • Geoengineeing
  • Biogenic emissions of VOCs
  • Secondary Organic Aerosol formation
  • Composition of polar stratospheric clouds
  • Biomass burning, and its effect on aerosols/ozone in tropical regions 
  • Halogen chemistry in the marine boundary layer
  • Ozone depletion events in the arctic boundary layer
  • Is the global oxidizing capacity of the atmosphere changing?
  • Satellite observations of tropospheric or stratospheric composition 
  • Lightning and the global NOx budget
  • Recent trends in CH4
  • Glacial-interglacial changes in CH4
  • Planetary photochemistry
  • Effects of aerosols on tropospheric ozone
  • Cloud chemistry
  • Formation of the stratospheric ozone layer in Earth's early atmosphere (~2 billion years ago)
  • Mesospheric clouds
  • Climate change - polar ozone depletion feedbacks
  • Volcanoes and atmospheric chemistry
  • The 2002 Antarctic ozone hole
  • Sources of lead
  • The effects of global warming on the recovery of the stratospheric ozone
  • Composition of polar stratospheric clouds
  • Biogenic emissions of VOCs: past and future
  • Sources and chemistry of DMS
  • New insights in heterogeneous and multiphase (cloud) chemistry

Presentation schedule (week of December 6):

Tuesday Dec. 7: Chelsea, Brian, Jim, Mariana, Archana

Wednesday Dec. 8: Jan Rey, Christian, Eleanor, Brendan

Friday Dec. 10: Kevin, Eric, Bejan, Crystal