Sea spray facilitates the movement of matter and energy between the ocean and the atmosphere. While many of its contributions to heat and momentum transfer are relatively well understood, the contribution to chemical exchange, particularly gas exchange, remains less well known. This study provides an estimation of sea-spray gas-exchange potential for five gases (helium, neon, argon, oxygen and nitrogen) using a chemically modified microphysical model, the Andreas Gas Exchange Spray model. This model uses the physical evolution of the sea-spray droplet and gas-exchange equilibria to estimate the potential exchange of gases attributable to spray droplets. We find that sea spray does not contribute appreciably to gas exchange of helium and neon. However, for argon, oxygen and nitrogen, at high wind speeds (above 18 m s^–1), sea-spray-droplet-facilitated exchange could contribute substantially to gas flux and is on the same order of magnitude as the empirically constrained direct exchange across the interface. Sea spray, as a potential pathway for atmosphere–ocean gas exchange, may improve gas-exchange predictions in the high-wind scenarios that are particularly important in the Southern Ocean polar region.

海浪促进了物质和能量在海洋和大气之间的运动。虽然它对热量和动量传递的许多贡献相对较好，但对化学交换，特别是气体交换的贡献仍然鲜为人知。本研究使用化学改性的微物理模型 Andreas 气体交换喷雾模型估计了五种气体（氦气、氖气、氩气、氧气和氮气）的海喷雾气体交换潜力。该模型使用海喷雾液滴的物理演化和气体交换平衡来估计可归因于喷雾液滴的潜在气体交换。我们发现海浪对氦和氖的气体交换没有明显的贡献。然而，对于氩气、氧气和氮气，在高风速（高于 18 m s ^–1），海喷雾液滴促进交换可以显着促进气体通量，并且与跨界面的经验约束直接交换处于同一数量级。海浪作为大气-海洋气体交换的潜在途径，可以改善在南大洋极地地区特别重要的强风情景下的气体交换预测。