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Science 27 February 2004:
Vol. 303. no. 5662, pp. 1309 - 1311
DOI: 10.1126/science.1094411
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Perspectives

ATMOSPHERIC SCIENCE:
The Complex Interaction of Aerosols and Clouds

Hans-F. Graf

Interactions between aerosols--airborne liquid or solid particles--and clouds are believed to be one of the strongest influences on climate. In his Perspective, Graf discusses results in two papers in this issue that bear on our understanding of aerosol-cloud interactions. Koren et al. describe how boundary layer clouds are suppressed by smoke aerosols in Amazonia. And Andreae et al. report on their research into "smoking clouds" in Amazonia that appear to emit their own trails of smoke. A better grasp of how aerosols interact with clouds should provide much-improved models of climate and weather.

The author is in the Department of Geography, Centre for Atmospheric Science, University of Cambridge, Cambridge CB2 3EN, UK, and at the Max-Planck-Institute for Meteorology, Hamburg, Germany. E-mail: hfg21{at}cam.ac.uk

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THIS ARTICLE HAS BEEN CITED BY OTHER ARTICLES:
Atmospheric aerosols versus greenhouse gases in the twenty-first century.
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Evidence for the Predominance of Mid-Tropospheric Aerosols as Subtropical Anvil Cloud Nuclei.
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