Atmospheric Chemistry and Climate Change - Susan Solomon Group
Within the Solomon group at MIT, we focus on interactions between chemistry and climate, at both poles of the Earth as well as the tropics.
A selection of current projects includes:
- Probing heterogeneous and gas-phase chemistry of wildfire smoke.
- Evaluating and understanding the healing of the Antarctic ozone hole as well as other regions.
- Quantifying emissions of chlorofluorocarbons, hydrochlorofluorocarbons and hydrofluorocarbons, including those from refrigeration, air conditioning, and insulation foam, as well as from chemical feedstocks and by-products.
- Ocean-atmosphere interactions.
Image: Jake Belcher
- Influences of volcanoes on the chemistry, climate, and radiative properties of the Earth’s atmosphere.
Featured Publications and News
Graduate Student Jian Guan and colleagues find ozone depletion began...
Image: Jose-Luis Olivares, MIT
MIT News - Jennifer Chu (LINK)
June 29, 2026
Using modern tools, they also determined that carbon tetrachloride, used as a dry-cleaning and degreasing agent as early as the 1930s, was at the root of early ozone loss.