Enhanced Quantification and Source Apportionment Capabilities of a New Higher-Resolution Aerosol Chemical Speciation Monitor for Long-Term Measurements of Non-Refractory Aerosol

Long-term measurements of the composition and mass concentration of particulate matter (PM) are essential for source apportionment, epidemiological studies, and air quality trends. Over the past ten years, the Aerosol Chemical Speciation Monitor (ACSM) has been widely used for long-term, in situ, high time resolution measurements. However, to date there are limited measurements with these instruments in Africa and South/Southeast Asia. The measurements that have been made in these regions suggest the presence of varied and complex sources. Current ACSMs have unit mass resolution (UMR), which impacts detection limits and separation and identification of ions, limiting source apportionment. Here, we present a new instrument, the Time-of-Flight ACSM with eXtended resolution (TOF-ACSM-X) with updated analysis software (Tofware) to allow for high-resolution peak fitting. The TOF-ACSM-X has a mass resolution of ~2000 m/Δm, which is approximately an order of magnitude higher than the other versions of the ACSM. This enhanced resolution improves ammonium detection limits by approximately 2-orders of magnitude, from ~0.200 μg m^-3 to ~0.008 μg m^-3 (TOF-ACSM versus TOF-ACSM-X, respectively), for 15-minute integration times. Intercomparisons of the TOF-ACSM-X with other measurements show improved performance in source apportionment and elemental analysis.