When aerosol sulfate goes up, so does oxalate: implication for the formation mechanisms of oxalate

Oxalic acid is often the single most abundant water-soluble organic compound identified in ambient aerosols, but its precursors have not been identified, and its formation mechanism is not well understood. On the contrary, sulfate as a major aerosol component, its formation pathways have been established, and in-cloud processing is recognized as its major production pathway. Our measurements of aerosol sulfate and oxalate collected across a wide geographical span in the East Asia region, up to Beijing in the north and down to Hong Kong in the south, indicate that the two species are highly correlated among samples collected at the same location and among samples collected at different locations in the Pearl River Delta region. This good correlation is also found in measurements made elsewhere by other researchers. We argue that a common dominant formation pathway, likely in-cloud processing, explains the close tracking of the two chemically distinct species. This also highlights the potential importance of in-cloud processing as a pathway leading to formation of secondary organic aerosols.