Towards a representation of fungal spores in IFS-COMPO

Fungal spores have been recognized as a significant source of particulate matter as PM₁₀. They also represent a public health and air quality topic, as high concentrations of fungal spores can cause respiratory issues. Within the Copernicus Atmosphere Monitoring Service (CAMS), ECMWF operates the Integrated Forecasting System with atmospheric composition extension (IFS-COMPO) to provide global forecasts and reanalyses of aerosols and trace gases. In the context of the Horizon Europe CAMAERA (CAMS Aerosol Advancement) project, a first attempt has been made to include a simple representation of fungal spores in IFS-COMPO. Several emission schemes from the literature have been tested, using a variety of meteorological and land use variables as precursors. Evaluation is carried out against: 1) a growing database of fungal spores related observations composed of surface concentration of polyols (arabitol and mannitol) over Europe, which are a good proxy for fungal spores, fungal spores counts over the U.S. from the American Academy of Allergy, Asthma and Immunology (AAAI) and fungal spores DNA abundance as collected worldwide by the Global Spore Sampling Project (GSSP); and 2)  against PM₁₀ observations worldwide. In this contribution, we compare the skill of different fungal spores emission schemes and discuss the opportunity of adding fungal spores to the portfolio of CAMS products.