A view on recent ice-nucleating particle intercomparison studies: why the uncertainty of the activation temperature matters

Schrod, Jann; Bingemer, Heinz G.

doi:https://doi.org/10.5194/amt-18-2591-2025

Articles | Volume 18, issue 12

https://doi.org/10.5194/amt-18-2591-2025

© Author(s) 2025. This work is distributed under
the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.

https://doi.org/10.5194/amt-18-2591-2025

© Author(s) 2025. This work is distributed under
the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.

Articles | Volume 18, issue 12

Research article

|

18 Jun 2025

Research article |

| 18 Jun 2025

A view on recent ice-nucleating particle intercomparison studies: why the uncertainty of the activation temperature matters

Jann Schrod and Heinz G. Bingemer

Supplement

https://doi.org/10.5194/amt-18-2591-2025-supplement

Data sets

Data for the figures of the manuscript: A view on recent ice-nucleating particle intercomparison studies: Why the uncertainty of the activation conditions matters Jann Schrod https://doi.org/10.25716/gude.1j28-hp2d

Short summary

Ice-nucleating particle (INP) observations often differ by 1 order of magnitude, when multiple instruments measure in parallel. As INP measurements are sensitive to the activation conditions, inaccuracies in the temperature measurement may induce significant deviations in the INP concentration. It was found that typical temperature uncertainties reported in intercomparison studies may explain divergences of a factor of 2 (± 0.5 °C) or 5 to 10 (± 1 °C) between two INP counters with opposite bias.