Analysis of the Winter AOD Trends over Iran from 2000 to 2020 and Associated Meteorological Effects

High aerosol levels pose severe air pollution and climate change challenges in Iran. Although regional aerosol optical depth (AOD) trends have been analyzed during the dusty season over Iran, the specific factors that are driving the spatio-temporal variations in winter AOD and the influence of meteorological dynamics on winter AOD trends remain unclear. This study analyzes the long-term AOD trends over Iran in winter during the period 2000–2020 using the updated Modern-Era Retrospective Analysis for Research and Applications version 2 (MERRA-2) and the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) datasets. Our results showed that the winter AOD exhibited a significant upward trend during the period 2000–2010 followed by a significant decrease during the period 2010–2018. We found that the winter AOD trends are important over this arid region due to multiple meteorological mechanisms which also affect the following spring/summer dusty period. Ground-based observations from Aerosol Robotic Network data (AERONET) in the Middle East region display trends comparable to those of both MERRA-2 and MODIS and indicated that aeolian dust and the meteorological dynamics associated with it play a central role in winter AOD changes. Furthermore, this study indicated that a significant downward trend in winter sea level pressure (SLP) during the early period (2000–2010) induced hot and dry winds which originated in the desert regions in Iraq and Arabia and blew toward Iran, reducing relative humidity (RH) and raising the temperature and thus promoting soil drying and dust AOD accumulation. In contrast, a significant increase in winter SLP during the late period (2010–2018) induced cold and wet winds from northwestern regions which increased RH and lowered the temperature, thus reducing dust AOD. This suggests that the changes in AOD over Iran are highly influenced by seasonal meteorological variabilities. These results also highlight the importance of examining wintertime climatic variations and their effects on the dust aerosol changes over the Middle East.