What can we learn from aerosol measurements at baseline stations?

In this paper the results of existing baseline aerosol monitoring programs are reviewed. For this purpose, aerosol data from five baseline stations in both hemispheres are analysed. Their information content is compared to that which can be derived when utilizing experiences of recent field experiments and the present state of aerosol sciences in general. Recommendations for extensions and reductions of baseline aerosol measurements are given.     

Alkyl nitrates and bifunctional nitrates of atmospheric interest: Henry's law constants and their temperature dependencies

Henry's law coefficients of 15 alkyl nitrates, keto-, hydroxy-, and dinitrates of atmospheric interest have been measured, mostly over the temperature range 1–25°C. The compounds are stable in aqueous solution. Where literature data were available, Henry's law coefficients are in very good agreement. It is concluded that dissolution in cloud and rain water is not an important loss process for alkyl mononitrates in the atmosphere. The residence times of the more soluble bifunctional organic nitrates, however, are significantly affected or even controlled by washout and rainout. Gas chromatographic analysis of bifunctional nitrates in preconcentrated atmospheric samples may be adversely affected by the adsorptive properties of these compounds.     

Controls on carbonate platform architecture and reef recovery across the Palaeozoic to Mesozoic transition: A high-resolution analysis of the Great Bank of Guizhou

Carbonate platforms spanning intervals of global change provide an opportunity to identify causal links between the evolution of marine environment and depositional architecture. This study investigates the controls on platform geometry across the Palaeozoic to Mesozoic transition and yields new stratigraphic and palaeoenvironmental constraints on the Great Bank of Guizhou, a latest Permian to earliest Late Triassic isolated carbonate platform in the Nanpanjiang Basin of south China. Reconstruction of platform architecture was achieved by integrating field mapping, petrography, biostratigraphy, satellite imagery analysis and δ¹³C chemostratigraphy. In contrast to previous interpretations, this study indicates that: (i) the Great Bank of Guizhou transitioned during Early Triassic time from a low-relief bank to a platform with high relief above the basin floor (up to 600 m) and steep slope angles (preserved up to 50°); and (ii) the oldest-known platform-margin reef of the Mesozoic Era grew along steep, prograding clinoforms in an outer-margin to lower-slope environment. Increasing platform relief during Early Triassic time was caused by limited sediment delivery to the basin margin and a high rate of accommodation creation driven by Indosinian convergence. The steep upper Olenekian (upper Lower Triassic) slope is dominated by well-cemented grainstone, suggesting that high carbonate saturation states led to syndepositional or rapid post-depositional sediment stabilization. Latest Spathian reef initiation coincided with global cooling following Early Triassic global warmth. The first Triassic framework-building metazoans on the Great Bank of Guizhou were small calcareous sponges restricted to deeper water settings, but early Mesozoic reef builders were volumetrically dominated by Tubiphytes, a fossil genus of uncertain taxonomic affinity. In aggregate, the stratigraphic architecture of the Great Bank of Guizhou records sedimentary response to long-term environmental and biological recovery from the end-Permian mass extinction, highlighting the close connections among marine chemistry, marine ecosystems and carbonate depositional systems.     

One‐dimensional transitional behaviour in saltation

One‐dimensional simulations of the unsteady saltation process show that the transport rate's response depends on the amplitude and frequency of the wind fluctuations. At frequencies higher than f ≈ 0·5 Hz the transport rate was found not to respond to the wind changes. The initial overshoot reported by previous investigators was found not to appear for simulation heights smaller than 50 to 60 cm. This is due to the fast propagation of the grains' influence upward in the flow and the immediate deceleration of the wind. Confirmation of these findings comes from reports of experiments conducted in wind tunnels of different sizes. Further test calculations show that the discretization time step size Δt has an influence on the model's temporal behaviour. The reason for this is the better coupling of the wind–sand system when a smaller Δt is used. The implications of bed area choice on the statistical accuracy of predicted transport rate is also demonstrated. In the one‐dimensional case the grain cloud's total forward momentum equals transport rate, which is independent of model geometry. Copyright © 2000 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Patterns in the linkage of water quantity and quality during low‐flows

This study investigates 72 catchments across the federal state of Baden‐Wuerttemberg, Germany, for changes in water quality during low‐flow events. Data from the state's water quality monitoring network provided seven water quality parameters (water temperature, electrical conductivity, concentrations of chloride, sodium, sulfate, nitrate, and phosphate), which were statistically related to streamflow variability. Water temperature changes during low‐flow showed seasonal dependence. Nitrate concentrations revealed high spatial heterogeneity with about one third of the stations showing decreasing values during low discharge. For most other parameters, concentrations increased during low‐flow. Despite consistent trend directions, the magnitudes of changes with streamflow differed markedly across the state. Both multiple linear regression and a multiple analysis of variances were applied to explain these differences with the help of catchment characteristics. Results indicated that for sulfate and conductivity, geology of the catchments was the most important control, whereas for chloride, sodium, and nitrate, sewage treatment plants had the largest influence. For phosphate, no clear control could be identified. Independent from the applied method, land use was a less important control on river water quality during low‐flow than geology or inflow from sewage treatment plants. These results show that the effects of diffuse and point sources, as well as those of natural and anthropogenic sources differ for different water quality parameters. Overall, a high diversity of potential water quality deterioration signals needs to be considered when the ecological status of rivers is to be protected during low‐flow events.     

Suitability of North American Regional Reanalysis (NARR) output for hydrologic modelling and analysis in mountainous terrain

Meteorological observations at high elevations in mountainous regions are often lacking. One opportunity to fill this data gap is through the use of downscaled output from weather reanalysis models. In this study, we tested the accuracy of downscaled output from the North American Regional Reanalysis (NARR) against high‐elevation surface observations at four ridgetop locations in the southern Coast Mountains of British Columbia, Canada. NARR model output was downscaled to the surface observation locations through three‐dimensional interpolation for air temperature, vapour pressure and wind speed and two‐dimensional interpolation for radiation variables. Accuracy was tested at both the 3‐hourly and daily time scales. Air temperature displayed a high level of agreement, especially at the daily scale, with root mean square error (RMSE) values ranging from 0.98 to 1.21 °C across all sites. Vapour pressure downscaling accuracy was also quite high (RMSE of 0.06 to 0.11 hPa) but displayed some site specific bias. Although NARR overestimated wind speed, there were moderate to strong linear relations (r² from 0.38 to 0.84 for daily means), suggesting that the NARR output could be used as an index and bias‐corrected. NARR output reproduced the seasonal cycle for incoming short‐wave radiation, with Nash–Sutcliffe model efficiencies ranging from 0.78 to 0.87, but accuracy suffered on days with cloud cover, resulting in a positive bias and RMSE ranged from 42 to 46 Wm^{? 2}. Although fewer data were available, incoming long‐wave radiation from NARR had an RMSE of 19 Wm^{? 2} and outperformed common methods for estimating incoming long‐wave radiation. NARR air temperature showed potential to assist in hydrologic analysis and modelling during an atmospheric river storm event, which are characterized by warm and wet air masses with atypical vertical temperature gradients. The incorporation of a synthetic NARR air temperature station to better represent the higher freezing levels resulted in increased predicted peak flows, which better match the observed run‐off during the event. Copyright © 2016 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Fluid elemental and stable isotope composition of the Nibelungen hydrothermal field (8°18′S,Mid-Atlantic Ridge): Constraints on fluid–rock interaction in heterogeneous lithosphere

Depending on the geological setting, the interaction of submarine hydrothermal fluids with the host rock leads to distinct energy and mass transfers between the lithosphere and the hydrosphere. The Nibelungen hydrothermal field is located at 8°18′S, about 9 km off-axis of the Mid-Atlantic Ridge (MAR). At 3000 m water depth, 372 °C hot, acidic fluids emanate directly from the bottom, without visible sulfide chimney formation. Hydrothermal fluids obtained in 2009 are characterized by low H₂S concentrations (1.1 mM), a depletion of B (192 μM) relative to seawater, lower Si (13.7 mM) and Li (391 μM) concentrations relative to basaltic-hosted hydrothermal systems and a large positive Eu anomaly, and display a distinct stable isotope signature of hydrogen (?²H_H2O = 7.6–8.7‰) and of oxygen (?¹⁸O_H2O = 2.2–2.4‰).The heavy hydrogen isotopic signature of the Nibelungen fluids is a specific feature of ultramafic-hosted hydrothermal systems and is mainly controlled by the formation of OH-bearing alteration minerals like serpentine, brucite, and tremolite during pervasive serpentinization. New isotopic data obtained for the ultramafic-hosted Logatchev I field at 14°45′N, MAR (?²H_H2O = 3.8–4.2‰) display a similar trend, being clearly distinguished from other, mafic-hosted hydrothermal systems at the MAR.The fluid geochemistry at Nibelungen kept stable since the first sampling campaign in 2006 and is evident for a hybrid alteration of mafic and ultramafic rocks in the subseafloor. Whereas the ultramafic-fingerprint parameters Si, Li, B, Eu anomaly and ?²H_H2O distinguish the Nibelungen field from other hydrothermal systems venting in basaltic settings at similar physico-chemical conditions and are related to the interaction with mantle rocks, the relatively high concentrations of trace alkali elements, Pb, and Tl can only be attributed to the alteration of melt-derived gabbroic rocks. The elemental and isotopic composition of the fluid suggest a multi-step alteration sequence: (1) low- to medium-temperature alteration of gabbroic rocks, (2) pervasive serpentinization at moderate to high temperatures, and (3) limited high-temperature interaction with basaltic rocks during final ascent of the fluid. The integrated water/rock ratio for the Nibelungen hydrothermal system is about 0.5.The fluid compositional fingerprint at Nibelungen is similar to the ultramafic-hosted Logatchev I fluids with respect to key parameters. Some compositional differences can be ascribed to different alteration temperatures and other fluid pathways involving a variety of source rocks, higher water/rock ratios, and sulfide precipitation in the sub-seafloor at Logatchev I.     

Sources,seasonal variability,and trajectories of atmospheric aerosols over central Siberian forest ecosystems

The possibility to obtain reliable data on the chemical and physical characteristics of aerosols and the regularities in the processes of their formation and transportation under the background natural-climatic conditions is a necessary requirement for verification of existing climate models [1, 2].     

Partitioning Stakeholders for the Economic Valuation of Ecosystem Services: Examples of a Mangrove System

Although the importance of ecosystem services provided by natural forests, especially mangroves, is well known, the destruction of these environments is still ubiquitous and therefore protection measures are urgently needed. The present study compares the current approach of economic valuation of ecosystem services to a proposed one, using a study case of a mangrove system as an example. We suggest that a cost-benefit analysis for economically valuing environmental services should be performed with three additional modifications consisting of (i) a categorization of local stakeholders as demanders of particular ecosystem services, (ii) acknowledgement of the government as one of these demander groups, and (iii) the inclusion of opportunity costs in the valuation. The application of this approach to the mangrove area in the east portion of Great Abaco Island, the Bahamas, reveals that not only the ecosystem services received differ between demander groups, but the monetary benefits and costs are also specific to each of these groups. We show that the economic valuation of the ecosystem should be differentiated for each category, instead of being calculated as a net ‘societal value’ as it is currently. Applying this categorization of demanders enables a better understanding of the cost and benefit structure of the protection of a natural area. The present paper aims to facilitate discussions regarding benefit and cost sharing related to the protection of natural areas.     

Ra-partitioning between phlogopite and silicate melt and 226Ra/Ba–230Th/Ba isochrons

In this study we experimentally determine phlogopite/melt partition coefficients of Ra and other trace elements in a lamproitic system. This work was achieved using an analytical technique (LA-ICP-MS) with low detection limits (~ 0.01 fg) permitting the measurement of the very low Ra concentrations feasible in experiments (~ 1 ppb). D_Ra^{phlogopite/melt} was determined to 2.28 ± 0.44 and 2.84 ± 0.47 in two experiments, the ratio D_Ra/D_Ba is around 1.6. The compatibility of Ra in phlogopite results from an ionic radius being close to the apex of the lattice strain parabola for earth alkalis in the large XII-coordinated interlayer site of phlogopite. A re-evaluation of D_Ra and D_Ra/D_Ba for magmatic minerals containing appreciable Ra, yields D_Ra^mineral/melt ranging from ~ 2.6 for phlogopite down to 2–3 ? 10^? 5 for pyroxenes, and D_Ra/D_Ba^mineral/melt from ~ 4 for leucite to 2 ? 10^? 2 for orthopyroxene. The influence of melt composition on D_Ra/D_Ba is less than 10%. All investigated minerals have different D_Ra/D_Ba, strongly fractionating Ra from Ba. Thus, for magmatic systems, (²²⁶Ra)/Ba in the various minerals is not constant, these minerals do not form a straight line in the (²²⁶Ra)/Ba–(²³⁰Th)/Ba system at the time of crystallization and thus, there is no (²²⁶Ra)/Ba–(²³⁰Th)/Ba isochron at t₀. ²²⁶Ra–²³⁰Th–Ba mineral dating is thus applicable only to model ages calculated from mineral–glass pairs with known D_Ra.