Unveiling a large fraction of hidden organosulfates in ambient organic aerosol

Jialiang Ma (), Natalie Reininger, Cunliang Zhao, Damian Döbler, Julian Rüdiger, Yanting Qiu, Florian Ungeheuer, Mario Simon, Luca D’Angelo, Anna Breuninger, Julia David, Yanxin Bai, Yushan Li, Ying Xue, Lili Li, Yuchen Wang, Stefanie Hildmann, Thorsten Hoffmann, Bangjun Liu, Hongya Niu, Zhijun Wu and Alexander L. Vogel ()
Additional contact information
Jialiang Ma: Goethe University Frankfurt
Natalie Reininger: Goethe University Frankfurt
Cunliang Zhao: Hebei University of Engineering
Damian Döbler: German Environment Agency
Julian Rüdiger: German Environment Agency
Yanting Qiu: Peking University
Florian Ungeheuer: Goethe University Frankfurt
Mario Simon: Goethe University Frankfurt
Luca D’Angelo: Goethe University Frankfurt
Anna Breuninger: Goethe University Frankfurt
Julia David: Goethe University Frankfurt
Yanxin Bai: Hunan University
Yushan Li: Hunan University
Ying Xue: Hunan University
Lili Li: Hunan University
Yuchen Wang: Hunan University
Stefanie Hildmann: Johannes Gutenberg-University
Thorsten Hoffmann: Johannes Gutenberg-University
Bangjun Liu: Hebei University of Engineering
Hongya Niu: Hebei University of Engineering
Zhijun Wu: Peking University
Alexander L. Vogel: Goethe University Frankfurt

Nature Communications, 2025, vol. 16, issue 1, 1-11

Abstract: Abstract Organosulfates are key compounds driving the anthropogenic enhancement of ambient organic aerosol, however, total organosulfate quantification remains elusive due to their molecular diversity and the scarcity of authentic standards. Here, we present a solid-phase extraction method that isolates organosulfates from ambient aerosol samples and enables their identification and quantification using mass spectrometry and a charged aerosol detector, respectively. We investigate ambient aerosol samples from urban China and rural Germany and quantify ~130 and ~65 chromatographically resolved organosulfates, respectively, contributing less than ~2% to the total organic matter. We find a significantly larger organosulfate fraction appearing as a broad peak in the chromatograms from the charged aerosol detector. Confirming its origin from chromatographically non-resolved organosulfates, an all-ion fragmentation experiment reveals specific sulfate-related ions. Integrating this peak, we find the contribution of organosulfates to organic aerosol is 12-17% and ~21% in samples from urban China and rural Germany, respectively. These findings emphasise the potential of sulfur emission reduction for mitigating both sulfate-related and organic aerosol pollution.

Date: 2025
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-025-59420-y Abstract (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:nat:natcom:v:16:y:2025:i:1:d:10.1038_s41467-025-59420-y

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
https://www.nature.com/ncomms/

DOI: 10.1038/s41467-025-59420-y

Access Statistics for this article

Nature Communications is currently edited by Nathalie Le Bot, Enda Bergin and Fiona Gillespie

More articles in Nature Communications from Nature
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Sonal Shukla () and Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing ().