A.1. MAIN BLOCK WP1 – RESEARCH PERFORMANCE.
The outcomes of the MAIN BLOCK are to: 1) purchase a research level state-of-the art airborne filter system (HERA) and 2) develop a totally new device (hereafter referred to as DRINCRO) for quantifying the concentration of ice nucleating particles in the atmosphere. Through the guidance and collaboration with UiO and TROPOS, INCAS will gain the skills to characterize the HERA filter system as well as design, develop, test and calibrate the new DRINCRO instrument for ice nucleation research. The activities within the MAIN BLOCK will provide INCAS with the required skills to become a leading research provider in the field of aerosol-cloud interactions.
WP 1 is broken down into six tasks. The first involves the purchase, characterization and installation of the HERA filter-based aerosol sampler. This task will be led by the TROPOS team, who are the primary developers of the HERA sampler and therefore, experts on its characterization and operation.
During task 2, the INP counter, DRINCRO, will be developed in coordination with the UiO team, whose team members are responsible for the initial design of DRINCZ (David et al, 2019) and involved in its subsequent improvements (e.g., Miller et al, 2021) as well as developing a similar system at UiO. The development of DRINCRO will also rely on input from the TROPOS team who have developed several similar INP counters (e.g., Chen et al, 2018) Thus, INCAS will learn how to quantify the ambient INP concentrations from leaders in the ice nucleation community. DRINCRO will then be characterized by conducting temperature calibrations and running standard wt% suspensions of well-known ice nucleating materials like NX-Illite and Lignin.
Task 3 involves the coordination and operation of a test campaign. During this task, TROPOS and UiO will work with INCAS to ensure that the test campaign and associated research flights are conducted in an appropriate manner so that HERA and DRINCRO are correctly characterized. Task 4 will train INCAS on the best approaches to conduct research flights in order to obtain the required data to eventually improve the representation of aerosol-cloud processes in ESMs. This will be guided in large part by the experience that UiO has in the development of aerosol and cloud parametrizations for use in regional and climate models. The planning activities in Task 4 will be implemented in Task 5 when the research flights are carried out by INCAS in Bucharest, Romania and Andenes, Norway. These two locations have been selected in order to obtain data from a myriad of aerosol and cloud conditions as well as having collocated remote sensing observations. The research campaigns will also be conducted during the planned summer schools in order to provide future aerosol and cloud researchers the opportunity to be involved in a state-of-the-art research campaign. Lastly, during Task 6, INCAS scientists will be trained in the complex analysis of the HoloScene and INP data by UiO. This will culminate in comprehensive data sets for use in better understanding aerosol-cloud interactions and their implementation in ESMs. The data and the key results will be disseminated to the research community through peer-reviewed publications and presentations at major conferences (see WP 2). Furthermore, the data sets in Task 6 will be distributed to the summer school attendees for further analysis and associated learning activities as described in WP 2.
A.2. TWIN BLOCK WP 2 – VISIBILITY.
This WP is designed to boost the visibility of INCAS in the European scientific arena. The main objective will be tackled by presenting and publishing the scientific data obtained by the project team (from DRINCRO, scientific data achieved in flight campaigns, achievements so far, etc.). These events (participation in conferences, summer schools, etc.) will not only help INCAS to be more visible but will also strengthen its position within these European research teams and institutions. Events with IAGOS12 will be designed on topics related to air quality research as the aircrafts at INCAS will be equipped with several instruments and collect other scientific data than associated with this project. As previously mentioned, INCAS is a member of the ACTRIS-RO13 consortium, the Romanian component of ACTRIS-RI14. It is worth adding that Romania will be a founding member15 of the future ACTRIS-ERIC that will be implemented early next year once the European Commission Decision is issued and published in the Official Journal. This is excellent ground for quick dissemination across the scientific community. Furthermore, based on the existing collaboration with NASA, the added capability of collecting aerosols for offline analysis (via HERA) will extend the types of validation campaigns that INCAS can participate in. In particular, it is foreseen that after BRACE-MY, INCAS will be able to provide validation services for aerosol chemical composition retrievals developed for NASA satellites.
An important element in increasing the visibility of INCAS is exposing and involving its staff in activities (both in this project and other projects) that are critical in the international science community. In this respect, the INCAS team will draft research papers / presentations that will be presented to AGU16 and EGU17, in cooperation with researchers from UiO, TROPOS and ASP (involving other researchers, if needed). Presentations will be based on achievements within BRACE-MY and other research activities performed by INCAS staff. Summer schools are key elements for both education and dissemination activities. There will be two summer school organized during BRACE-MY with one occurring in Romania and one in Norway, which will involve lecturers from INCAS, UiO, TROPOS and ASP. Students and young researchers from Romania (e.g. master and PhD students from INCAS, the faculty of Physics at the University of Bucharest and other technical universities in Romania) and other European universities will be invited to participate.
A key component in generating more (high quality) projects is finding appropriate partners that could generate a critical mass for a consortium. (Mini) brokerage events (match-making events) will be organized by INCAS in order to: a) refine the research topics within Horizon Europe (HE) where INCAS could participate as a partner or coordinator, and b) identify potential organizations that could partner with INCAS to submit project proposals in response to HE or other calls (for project proposals or for tenders). Through these proposed activities, UiO, TROPOS and ASP will participate and assess various opportunities for future collaborations and involvement in upcoming proposal calls. At INCAS, young scientist employment is critical for each and every department.
The recruitment pool is composed of master and PhD students and postdocs from the University of Bucharest (Faculty of Physics) and other universities in Romania. They are trained through course work at their university and by being involved in various activities at INCAS. Therefore, the scientific topics that will be presented at the planned summer schools will be related to the research activities described in WP 1 (MAIN BLOCK- research performance) combined with other scientific subjects related to cloud microphysics. Additionally, Master and PhD students will be mentored and involved in research activities at the environmental department of INCAS (at their level of competence) in order to complete their thesis work.
Within this task, the team will meet and define the future activities and scientific collaborations required for INCAS to become a key member of the European cloud and aerosol microphysics research community. WP3 – INTEGRATION. Designed to increase the international visibility of INCAS within the scientific community, public at large and to better integrate the institute in the European research area, WP3 will facilitate co-organisation of scientific workshops with ACTRIS and EUFAR, of project definition sessions and organized (Mini) Brokerage Events. Since visibility is built step by step by “being present and visible” at international events, several scientific workshops with the EU’s biggest atmospheric (ACTRIS) and airborne research (EUFAR) communities, are planned. By addressing cloud remote sensing and in situ common topics, regular common INCAS – ACTRIS events will be organized. Contributing to EUFAR regular webinars & online expert group meetings on airborne measurements, INCAS will increase its visibility and strengthen its position in the ESFRI community. In this way, INCAS’ position within the two European research infrastructures will be stronger and more visible. In task 3.1. the joint workshops will be organized in such a manner to allow presentations of BRACE-MY achievements, plans for the future and assess the way to integrate them within the scientific activities performed by the two communities. The (Mini) Brokerage (acronym BE, meaning match-making sessions) events will be organized with the aim to increase the number of collaborations with various organizations across Europe acting in environmental research.
A.3. ADMIN BLOCK
The management block is a key part of the process in increasing INCAS’s capabilities to perform and exploit high quality research in partnership with national and international organisations. It is worth mentioning that most of INCAS’s activities are within TRL 4-7, but INCAS is capable of conducting innovation related activities (TRL 8-9). This means that INCAS needs to professionalize their IPR related activities. In this respect, the IP departments at UiO and ASP will transfer knowledge to the IP department of INCAS. Several training sessions will be organized (either online or in person) with participation of staff from UiO and ASP. Thereby, setting the grounds for IPR protection & management (e.g., DRINCRO could be a study case) training activities. Within “IPR exploitation”-type activities, techniques to write research publications are foreseen.
It is obvious that scientific information is the main component of a scientific paper but this information should be put in the appropriate framework in order to be publishable (in prestigious journals). Unfortunately, the majority of Romanian scientists are not yet knowledgeable enough to submit papers to these high impact journals even if they frequently conduct high-quality research. As presented in Figure 6 even though INCAS’ income from R&D or R&D related projects is increasing every year, the number of publications and citations are well below that of its partners in this consortium. Therefore, INCAS research-staff urgently need to be trained in the publication of research articles.
Therefore, the main topics that will be addressed within these trainings are: 1. Analysis of “white spots” in the scientific area concerned; 2. Data format / data processing and visualization; 3. Article formatting according to Journal requirements; 4. Future directions in the concerned research area; The successful implementation of BRACE-MY is ensured by activities in WP 7-management, while WP 6 – dissemination ensures that the project achievements are extensively spread through online interaction with the general public via the project webpage and social media accounts.
WP 6 will be the main instrument to communicate the project outcomes and results to specialists in the field and the general public. This will be done mainly via e-means, for example through the project webpage, social-media accounts, e-newsletters, webinars and live broadcast of summer schools and scientific events (in full compliance of GDPR principles).
WP 7 monitors and assesses the activities carried out in all of the other WPs to ensure that the outcomes and results are delivered according to the work plan. Furthermore, the project will be presented to an independent group of experts that will act as External Advisory Board (formed by DLR, ETH and EUFAR cloud physics experts) in order to ensure that BRACE-MY follows the initially agreed upon directions. The group will receive all deliverables, planning for the next period, and plan on how to achieve the main outcomes. They will provide (scientific) feedback and guidance to the project team.