Fred C. Davison Early Career Scholar Award

Amanda Frossard, assistant professor in the Department of Chemistry, has developed new techniques to study the ocean surface and marine aerosol production through a combination of field and laboratory studies. This work has implications for atmospheric chemistry, Earth systems, and climate. She has built an international reputation as an expert in ocean surfactants—chemicals that reduce surface tension—and their transfer to sea spray aerosol. Her group developed analytical methods for surfactant characterization in aerosol particles and seawater. Frossard designed and fabricated an aerosol optical trap instrument to study single-particle absorption of water, and she has undertaken six field studies for sample collection, including multiple research cruises. She received a five-year National Science Foundation CAREER grant award, reflecting that her work is reshaping long-held conventional views of the cycling of particulate organic matter in marine air.