Natural and anthropogenic aerosols within the Asian continent have been studied over recent decades and continue to be an important topic due to their spatial and temporal variabilities.The compositions of these aerosols are influenced by their modes of generation (anthropogenic vs.natural) and can be either episodic (e.g.mineral dust and biomass) or continuous (e.g.industrial or urban).Hence, their physical and chemical properties are often difficult to measure directly and thus needs to be inferred by using some techniques/methods.In the Logan et al.(2010) study, we used spectral curvature (i.e.slope of Angstr(o)m Exponent (AE or)) to help classify Asian dust events based solely on their physical properties.From our current study (Logan et al.2011), we will present some preliminary results using a modified aerosol classification scheme which combines the spectral variation technique with one based upon the absorption AE (AAE) and absorption spectral curvature (abs) of Asian aerosols.The purpose of this new classification scheme is to reduce ambiguities in aerosol composition as abs is strongly correlated with aerosol type.We will use the absorption spectral curvature (i.e.slope of AAE) to (a) illustrate the scattering and absorbing nature of aerosols and (b) report the rate at which aerosol composition varies.