This new study led by Yuan Wang and published in the latest edition of the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS) presents a global multiscale perspective of the climatic effects of pollution outflows from Asia.

Satellite-based estimates of the aerosol indirect effect (AIE) are consistently smaller than the estimates from global aerosol models, and, partly as a result of these differences, the assessment of this climate forcing includes large uncertainties. Satellite estimates typically use the present-day (PD) relationship between observed cloud drop number concentrations (Nc) and aerosol optical depths (AODs) to determine the preindustrial (PI) values of Nc.