A single particle analytical technique, called low-Z electron probe X-ray microanalysis (low-Z EPMA) was applied to characterize atmospheric particles collected in Busan, Korea, over a daytime period in Dec. 2001. The ability to quantitatively analyze the low-Z elements, such as C, N, and 0, in microscopic volume enables the low-Z EPMA to specify the chemical composition of individual atmospheric particle. Various types of atmospheric particles such as organics, carbon-rich, aluminosilicates, silicon oxide, calcium carbonate, iron oxide, sodium chloride, sodium nitrate, ammonium sulfate, and titanium oxide were identified. In the sample collected in Busan, sodium nitrate particles produced as a result of the reaction between sea salt and nitrogen oxides in the atmosphere were most abundantly encountered both in the coarse and fine fractions. On the contrary, original sea salt particles were rarely observed. The fact that most of the carbonaceous particles were distributed in the fine fraction implies that their origin is anthropogenic.