Radiative feedbacks of dust-in-snow over East Asia in CAM4-BAM Xiaoning Xie 1 , Xiaodong Liu 1,2 , Huizheng Che 3 , Xiaoxun Xie 1 , Xinzhou Li 1 , Zhengguo Shi 1 , Hongli Wang 4 , Tianliang Zhao 5 , and Yangang Liu 6 1 SKLLQG, Institute of Earth Environment, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Xi’an 710061, China 2 University of Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100049, China 3 Key Laboratory for Atmospheric Chemistry, Institute of Atmospheric Composition, Chinese Academy of Meteorological Sciences, CMA, Beijing 100081, China 4 Shaanxi Radio and TV University, Xi’an 710119, China 5 Key Laboratory for Aerosol-Cloud-Precipitation of China Meteorological Administration, Nanjing University of Science Information &Technology, Nanjing 210044, China 6 Environmental and Climate Sciences Department, Brookhaven National Laboratory, Upton, NY 11973-5000, USA Correspondence to: Xiaoning Xie (xnxie@ieecas.cn) Abstract. Dust-in-snow on the Tibetan Plateau (TP) could reduce the visible snow albedo by changing surface optical proper- ties and remove the snow cover by increasing snowmelt, which leads to a significant positive radiative forcing and remarkedly alters the regional energy balance and the East Asian climate system. This study extends our previous investigation in dust- radiation interactions to investigate the dust-in-snow radiative forcing (SRF) and its feedbacks on the regional climate and the dust cycle over East Asia by use of the Community Atmosphere Model version 4 with a Bulk Aerosol Model parameterization 5 of the dust size distribution (CAM4-BAM). Our results show that SRF increases the East Asian dust emissions significantly, by 13.7% in the spring, in contrast to −7.6% of decreased dust emissions by the dust direct radiative forcing (DRF). SRF also remarkedly enhances the whole dust cycle, including dust transports, dry and wet depositions over East Asia. The simulated results show that the combined effect of DRF and SRF increases the dust emissions by 5.1%, and enhances the overall dust cycle over this region. Further analysis reveals that these results are mainly due to the regional climatic feedbacks induced by 10 SRF over East Asia. By reducing the snow albedo over the TP, the dust-in-snow mainly warms the TP to enhance its thermal effects by increasing the surface sensible and latent heat flux, and then increases the aridity and westerly winds over Northwest China, in turn enhances the East Asian dust cycle. Additionally, the dust-in-snow also accelerates snow melting, reduces the snow cover, and then expands the East Asian dust source region area, which results in increasing the regional dust emissions. Hence, a significant feature of SRF on the TP can create a positive feedback loop to enhance the dust cycle over East Asia. 15 1 Atmos. Chem. Phys. Discuss., https://doi.org/10.5194/acp-2018-350 Manuscript under review for journal Atmos. Chem. Phys. Discussion started: 7 May 2018 c  Author(s) 2018. CC BY 4.0 License.