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A comprehensive global modeling assessment of nitrate heterogeneous formation on desert dust Sousse Villa, Ruben Jorba Casellas, Oriol Gonçalves Ageitos, María Bowdalo, Dene Guevara Vilardell, Marc Pérez García-Pando, Carlos Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya. Doctorat en Enginyeria Ambiental Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya. Departament d'Enginyeria de Projectes i de la Construcció Barcelona Supercomputing Center Àrees temàtiques de la UPC::Enginyeria civil::Geologia::Mineralogia Àrees temàtiques de la UPC::Desenvolupament humà i sostenible::Degradació ambiental::Canvi climàtic Desert dust Nitrate Aerosols Multiscale Online Nonhydrostatic AtmospheRe CHemistry (MONARCH) Desert dust undergoes complex heterogeneous chemical reactions during atmospheric transport, forming nitrate coatings that influence hygroscopicity, gas partitioning, optical properties, and aerosol radiative forcing. Contemporary atmospheric chemistry models show significant disparities in aerosol nitrogen species due to varying parameterizations and inaccuracies in representing heterogeneous chemistry and dust alkalinity. This study investigates key processes in nitrate formation in the presence of dust and evaluates their representation in models. We incorporate varying levels of dust heterogeneous chemistry complexity into the Multiscale Online Nonhydrostatic AtmospheRe CHemistry (MONARCH) model, assessing sensitivity to critical processes. Our analyses address the condensation pathways of gas species onto dust (irreversible and reversible); the influence of nitrate representation on species burdens, lifetimes, and size distribution; and the role of alkalinity. Using annual global simulations, we compare particulate and gas species surface concentrations to observations and evaluate global budgets and spatial distributions. Findings show significant outcome dependence on methodology, particularly on reversible vs. irreversible gas condensation on dust, with wide ranges for particulate nitrate burdens (0.66 to 1.93 Tg) and correlations with observations (0.66 to 0.91). In contrast, particulate ammonium burdens show lower variability (0.19 to 0.31 Tg). Incorporating dust (together with sea-salt) alkalinity improves consistency with observations, with reversible condensation along with alkalinity representation yielding the best agreement, while showing consistent gas and particle partitioning. In contrast, irreversible uptake reactions overestimate coarse particulate nitrate formation. Our findings offer guidelines for integrating nitrate heterogeneous formation on dust in models, paving the road for improved estimates of aerosol radiative effects. This research was supported by the European Research Council (FRAGMENT, grant no. 773051), the AXA Research Fund (AXA Chair on Sand and Dust Storms at the Barcelona Supercomputing Center), and grant no. PID2022-140365OB-I00 funded by MCIN/AEI /10.13039/501100011033 and by ERDF/EU. Rubén Soussé Villa was funded by the predoctoral program AGAUR-FI ajuts (grant no. 2023 FI-1 01106) Joan Oró, which is backed by the Secretariat of Universities and Research of the Department of Research and Universities of the Generalitat of Catalonia, as well as the European Social Plus Fund. Peer Reviewed Postprint (published version) 2025-05-07 Article Sousse, R. [et al.]. A comprehensive global modeling assessment of nitrate heterogeneous formation on desert dust. "Atmospheric chemistry and physics", 7 Maig 2025, vol. 25, núm. 9, p. 4719-4753. 1680-7324 https://hdl.handle.net/2117/429641 10.5194/acp-25-4719-2025 eng https://acp.copernicus.org/articles/25/4719/2025/ info:eu-repo/grantAgreement/EC/H2020/773051/EU/FRontiers in dust minerAloGical coMposition and its Effects upoN climaTe/FRAGMENT info:eu-repo/grantAgreement/AEI/Plan Estatal de Investigación Científica y Técnica y de Innovación 2021-2023/PID2022-140365OB-I00/ES/LA INFLUENCIA OCULTA DEL POLVO DESERTICO GRUESO Y SUPER GRUESO EN PROCESOS RELEVANTES DEL SISTEMA TIERRA/ http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ Open Access Attribution 4.0 International 35 p. application/pdf European Geosciences Union (EGU)