Oxidant and Particle Photochemical Processes above a South-East Asian tropical rain forest (OP3-Danum-08) is a 3-year Consortium Grant of the Natural Environment Research Council (NERC), beginning 1 October 2007.

The OP3-Danum-08 consortium consists of 23 PIs and co-PIs from eight UK institutions (seven Universities and one NERC laboratory), plus partners from the Malaysian Meteorological Department, Universiti Malaysia Sabah, Yayasan Sabah and USA. The project will utillize the NERC Facility for Airborne Atmospheric Measurements reaserch aircraft ( FAAM) and a Global Atmosheric Watch station , with 100m research tower, in an undisturbed rainforest in Sabah Malaysia.

The objectives of the OP3-Danum-08 project are (i) to understand how emissions of reactive trace gases from a tropical rain forest mediate the production and processing of oxidants and particles in the troposphere, and (ii) to better understand the impact of these processes on local, regional and global scale atmospheric composition, chemistry and climate.

The field campaign phase of the project consists of 2 separate ground-based measurement periods at the Danum Valley Research centre (7th April - 4th May 2008 and 21st June - 27th July 2008). The second of these campaigns will involve concurrent observations above the ground based site aboard the FAAM BAe 146 aircraft, a collaboration between the Met Office(TM) and the Natural Environment Research Council (NERC). There was also a ground based measurement period from 10th May - 12th June based at the Sabahmas Estate oil plantation, which was part of the APPRAISE funded ACES project. Data from all 4 parts of the project can be found in the OP3 archive.

The OP3 project is led by Professor Nick Hewitt (University of Lancaster)