The paper presents an overview of the main areas of research and some of the results of atmospheric aerosol research in the Middle Urals performed at the Institute of Industrial Ecology of the Ural Branch of the Russian Academy of Sciences and at the Ural Federal University for the period of 2004 to 2015. The results of measurements of atmospheric aerosol characteristics in the atmospheric column, in the lower atmosphere, in the city and at the background territory are presented. The paper discusses formulation of the problem for evaluating the spatial distribution of atmospheric contaminants on the basis of local measurements, as well as some results of verification of the method for solving this problem.