Atmosphere 2015, 6, 164-182; doi:10.3390/atmos6020164 atmosphere ISSN 2073-4433 www.mdpi.com/journal/atmosphere Article PM2.5 Chemical Compositions and Aerosol Optical Properties in Beijing during the Late Fall Huanbo Wang 1, Xinghua Li 2, Guangming Shi 1, Junji Cao 3, Chengcai Li 4, Fumo Yang 1,*, Yongliang Ma 5 and Kebin He 5 1 Key Laboratory of Reservoir Aquatic Environment of CAS, Chongqing Institute of Green and Intelligent Technology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Chongqing 400714, China; E-Mails: hbwang@cigit.ac.cn (H.W.); shigm@cigit.ac.cn (G.S.) 2 School of Chemistry and Environment, Beihang University, Beijing 100191, China; E-Mail: lixinghua@buaa.edu.cn 3 Key Lab of Aerosol Chemistry & Physics, Institute of Earth Environment, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Xi’an 710075, China; E-Mail: cao@loess.llqg.ac.cn 4 School of Physics, Peking University, Beijing 100871, China; E-Mail: ccli@pku.edu.cn 5 State Environmental Protection Key Laboratory of Sources and Control of Air Pollution Complex, School of Environment, Tsinghua University, Beijing 100084, China; E-Mails: liang@tsinghua.edu.cn (Y.M.); hekb@tsinghua.edu.cn (K.H.) * Author to whom correspondence should be addressed; E-Mail: fmyang@cigit.ac.cn; Tel.: +86-23-6593-5921. Academic Editors: Ru-Jin Huang and Robert W. Talbot Received: 21 November 2014 / Accepted: 7 January 2015 / Published: 26 January 2015 Abstract: Daily PM2.5 mass concentrations and chemical compositions together with the aerosol optical properties were measured from 8–28 November 2011 in Beijing. PM2.5 mass concentration varied from 15.6–237.5 μg·m−3 and showed a mean value of 111.2 ± 73.4 μg·m−3. Organic matter, NH4NO3 and (NH4)2SO4 were the major constituents of PM2.5, accounting for 39.4%, 15.4%,...