Study finds correlation between rainfall in India and aerosol levels over W. Asia Monsoon rains over India could increase if desertification leads to more dust from West Asia and North Africa swirling into the air, suggests a research report being published in Nature Geoscience. There has been growing interest in examining how fine particles in the atmosphere, known as aerosols, affect the climate. However, much of this research has looked at particles generated by human activity, especially the role of soot. Aerosol role But natural aerosols, such as sea-salt and dust, are far more abundant than human-produced ones, remarked V. Vinoj, who is currently with IIT Bhubaneswar. The research appearing online in Nature Geoscience was carried out by him with Philip J. Rasch's group at the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory in the U.S. Analysing observational data, Dr. Vinoj and his colleagues found that monsoon rainfall during June, July and August over central I