Occurrence of perfluorinated compounds in water, sediment and mussels from the Cantabrian Sea (North Spain)

Perfluorinated compounds (PFCs) have emerged as significant global environmental pollutants with persistent, bioaccumulative and toxic properties. The aim of this study was to determine the occurrence of PFCs in water (wastewater, submarine emissaries and port-waters), sediment and transplanted mussels in estuarine areas of high urban and industrial impact from Northern Spain. Five PFCs of industrial use were studied: perfluorooctanesulfonate, perfluorohexanesulfonate, perfluorobutanesulfonate, perfluorooctanoate acid and perfluorononanoate acid. After selective extraction, samples were analyzed by Ultra Performance Liquid Chromatography coupled to tandem mass spectrometry. ΣPFCs ranged from 0.06 to 10.9 ng/L in water, with higher levels in wastewater treatment plants effluents and port waters than in submarine emissaries. Little accumulation was observed in sediments and mussels with ΣPFCs ranging from 0.01-0.13 ng/g dw and 0.01-0.06 ng/g ww, respectively. Most ubiquitous compounds were PFOS and PFOA. Mass fluxes of PFCs to the Cantabrian Sea are estimated and the impact to the coastal ecosystem is discussed.     

Six new chrysophycean stomatocysts ornamented with reticulum from the Great Xing’an Mountains, China

Six new chrysophycean stomatocysts ornamented with reticulum were illustrated based on SEM observation. They were described following the guidelines of the International Statospore Working Group (ISWG). All samples were collected from the Great Xing’an Mountains, China. Their taxonomic characteristics and habitats were described to provide new information on the biodiversity of chrysophycean stomatocysts. As is common with many morphotypes, their biological affinities remain unknown.     

Tracing infiltration and recharge using stable isotope in Taihang Mt., North China

The groundwater in headwater region is an important recharge source for the adjacent mountain-front plain. In order to reveal the relationship among precipitation, soil water and groundwater, from June to September in 2004, stable isotopes (deuterium and oxygen-18) in precipitation and soil waters at the depths of 10, 20, 30, 50, 70, 90, and 110 cm were analyzed at two sites covered by black locust (Robinia Pseudoacia L.) (Site A) and grass predominated by Themeda triandra (T. japonica (Willd.) Tanaka) and Bothriochloa ischaemum (B. ischaemum (L.) Keng) (Site B) in an experimental catchment at Taihang Mt., North China, respectively. The δ¹⁸O of precipitation in daily rain events shows large variations (−13.3 to −4.3‰) with a mean of 8.1‰. The δ¹⁸O and δ D of soil waters along profiles in two sites suggest that the influence of canopy cover was just up to 10 cm in top soil water. The soil water moved over the zero flux plane at 70 cm in-depth is expected to escape the evaporative effect at the end of September in both sites. The results show that the stable isotope, instead of tritium as tradition, can be used to trace the soil water behaviors based on the movement of isotopic peak along the vertical profiles in this semi-arid and semi-humid mountainous region. The infiltration depths of soil water in Taihang Mt. are 12 and 10 mm/day from June to September in 2004 in Site A and Site B, respectively. Tracing by stable isotope, recharge fluxes of soil water to local groundwater are of 3.8 and 3.2 mm/day in Site A and Site B, respectively. The results provide desirable information for assessment of local groundwater resources. An erratum to this article can be found at     

临汾盆地晚冰期至中全新世黄土-古土壤序列的风化特征及指示的气候意义

了解中国北方晚冰期和全新世时期的气候环境变化及其驱动机制,有助于预测未来气候变化的可能情景。基于黄土高原东南缘临汾盆地的黄土-古土壤剖面,在3个AMS14C年代的支持下,通过粒度、磁化率、土壤有机碳以及地球化学元素等指标,重建了临汾盆地晚冰期至中全新世晚期的气候变化历史。结果表明：宋村沟剖面的黄土和古土壤分别处于初等和中等化学风化阶段,而不同地区风成堆积物的化学风化强度存在明显差异,主要受控于东亚夏季风的区域变化。多指标综合分析表明,晚冰期以来临汾盆地的气候演变经历了4个阶段：晚冰期东亚冬季风较强,气候干冷;早全新世东亚夏季风强化,气候向暖湿转变;早中全新世东亚夏季风达到峰值,为最暖湿的适宜期;中全新世晚期东亚夏季风减弱,气候再次转向干冷;临汾盆地的气候变化主要受控于北半球太阳辐射强度和冰量的变化。     

Oil pollution of the anabranches of the Ob river on the territory of Khanty-Mansi Autonomous Okrug–Yugra

An analysis is made of the oil pollution of the Ob river waters using a long-term (1993–2013) hydrochemical monitoring of oil fields in Khanty-Mansi Autonomous Okrug. Contents of oil hydrocarbons (OHC) were determined in 4277 samples from the main Ob channel, and in 7076 samples from its anabranches by using infrared spectrometry. An increase in MAC (0.05 mg/dm³) was observed in 28% of the samples from the main channel, and in 32% from the anabranches. The total percentage of samples with an extremely high (> 50 MAC) and high (30–50 MAC) pollution level made up 0.3% of the samples for the anabranches, and 0.1% for the main channel. Maximum pollution was revealed in the eastern part of Okrug, from its eastern boundary to the mouth of the Trom’egan river which is associated with a considerable number of accidents on the pipelines within the Nizhnevartovskii district. The upper and lower quantiles in the most polluted anabranches, Pasl and Bagras, are 0.03–01.7 and 0.032–0.16 mg/dm³, respectively, whereas in the main Ob channel they vary from 0.022 to 0.065 mg/dm³ (0.4–1.2 MAC). The methods of geoinformatics and mathematical statistics were used to assess a dependence of OHC on the number of pollution sources (well clusters, and the area of oil spills) in zones at different distances from the river channels. By calculating the Spearman correlation coefficients, it was shown that OHC contents are dependent mainly on the number of wells, and on the area of oil spills located at less than 2 km from the channels.     

Influence of internal decadal variability on the summer rainfall in Eastern China as simulated by CCSM4

The combined impact of the Pacific Decadal Oscillation(PDO) and Atlantic Multidecadal Oscillation(AMO) on the summer rainfall in eastern China was investigated using CCSM4. The strongest signals occur with the combination of a positive PDO and a negative AMO(+PDO- AMO), as well as a negative PDO and a positive AMO(-PDO + AMO). For the +PDO- AMO set, significant positive rainfall anomalies occur over the lower reaches of the Yangtze River valley(YR),when the East Asian summer monsoon becomes weaker, while the East Asian westerly jet stream becomes stronger, and ascending motion over the YR becomes enhanced due to the jet-related secondary circulation. Contrary anomalies occur over East Asia for the-PDO + AMO set. The influence of these two combinations of PDO and AMO on the summer rainfall in eastern China can also be observed in the two interdecadal rainfall changes in eastern China in the late 1970 s and late 1990 s.     

Neoproterozoic Volhynia-Brest magmatic province in the western East European craton: Within-plate magmatism in an ancient suture zone

The reasons for the isotopic and geochemical heterogeneity of magmatism of the Neoproterozoic large Volhynia-Brest igneous province (VBP) are considered. The province was formed at 550 Ma in response to the break up of the Rodinia supercontinent and extends along the western margin of the East European craton, being discordant to the Paleoproterozoic mobile zone that separates Sarmatia and Fennoscandia and the Mesoproterozoic Volhynia-Orsha aulacogen. The basalts of VBP show prominent spatiotemporal geochemical zoning. Based on petrographic, mineralogical, geochemical, and isotopic data, the following types of basalts can be distinguished: olivine-normative subalkaline basalts consisting of low-Ti (sLT, < 1.10–2.0 wt % TiO₂; ε_Nd(550) from ?6.6 to ?2.7) and medium-Ti (sMT, 2.0–3.0 wt % TiO₂, occasionally up to 3.6 wt % TiO₂; ε_Nd(550) from ?3.55 to + 0.6) varieties; normal quartz-normative basalts (tholeiites) including low-Ti (tLT, < 1.75–2.0 wt % TiO₂) and medium-to-high-Ti (tHT1, 2.0–3.6 wt % TiO₂, ε_Nd(550) from ?1.3 to + 1.0) varieties. The hypabyssal bodies are made up of subalkaline low-Ti olivine dolerites (LT, 1.2–1.5 wt % TiO₂; ε_Nd(550) = ?5.8) and subalkaline high-Ti olivine gabbrodolerites (HT2, 3.0–4.5 wt % TiO₂; ε_Nd(550) = ?2.5). Felsic rocks of VBP are classed as volcanic rocks of normal (andesidacites, dacites, and rhyodacites) and subalkaline (trachyrhyodacites) series with TiO₂ 0.72–0.77 wt% and ε_Nd(550) of ?12. The central part of VBP is underlain by a Paleoproterozoic domain formed by continent-arc accretion and contains widespread sills of HT2 dolerites and lavas of LT basalts; the northern part of the province is underlain by the juvenile Paleoproterozoic crust dominated by MT and HT1 basalts. MT and LT basalts underwent significant AFC-style upper crustal contamination. During their long residence in the upper crustal magmatic chambers, the basaltic melts fractionated and caused notable heating of the wall rocks and, correspondingly, nonmodal melting of the upper crustal protolith containing high-Rb phase (biotite), thus producing the most felsic rocks of the province. The basalts of VBP were derived from geochemically different sources: probably, the lithosphere and a deep-seated plume (PREMA type). The HT2 dolerites were generated mainly from a lithospheric source: by 3–4% melting of the geochemically enriched garnet lherzolite mantle. LT dolerites were obtained by partial melting of the modally metasomatized mantle containing volatile-bearing phases. The concepts of VBP formation were summarized in the model of three-stage plume-lithosphere interaction.     

How Well Does Chlorophyll Explain the Seasonal Variation in Phytoplankton Activity?

The seasonal variation in phytoplankton activity is determined by analysing 1385 primary production (PP) profiles, chlorophyll a (Chl) concentration profiles and phytoplankton carbon biomass concentrations (C) from the period 1998–2012. The data was collected at six different stations in the Baltic Sea transition zone (BSTZ) which is a location with strong seasonal production patterns with light as the key parameter controlling this productivity. We show that the use of Chl as a proxy for phytoplankton activity strongly overestimates the contribution from the spring production to annual pelagic carbon flow. Spring (February and March) Chl comprised 16–30% of the total annual Chl produced, whereas spring C was much lower (8–23%) compared to the annual C. Spring PP accounted for 10–18% of the total annual PP, while the July–August production contributed 26–33%, i.e. within the time frame when zooplankton biomass and grazing pressure are highest. That is, Chl failed in this study to reflect the importance of the high summer PP. A better proxy for biomass may be C, which correlated well with the seasonal pattern of PP (Pearson correlation, p < 0.05). Thus, this study suggests to account for the strong seasonal pattern in C/Chl ratios when considering carbon flow in coastal systems. Seasonal data for PP were fitted to a simple sinusoidal wave model describing the seasonal distribution of PP in the BSTZ and were proposed to present a better parameterizaton of PP in shallow stratified temperate regions than more commonly applied proxies.     

Assessment of RegCM4 simulated inter-annual variability and daily-scale statistics of temperature and precipitation over Mexico

The skill of a regional climate model (RegCM4) in capturing the mean patterns, interannual variability and extreme statistics of daily-scale temperature and precipitation events over Mexico is assessed through a comparison of observations and a 27-year long simulation driven by reanalyses of observations covering the Central America CORDEX domain. The analysis also includes the simulation of tropical cyclones. It is found that RegCM4 reproduces adequately the mean spatial patterns of seasonal precipitation and temperature, along with the associated interannual variability characteristics. The main model bias is an overestimation of precipitation in mountainous regions. The 5 and 95 percentiles of daily temperature, as well as the maximum dry spell length are realistically simulated. The simulated distribution of precipitation events as well as the 95 percentile of precipitation shows a wet bias in topographically complex regions. Based on a simple detection method, the model produces realistic tropical cyclone distributions even at its relatively coarse resolution (dx = 50 km), although the number of cyclone days is underestimated over the Pacific and somewhat overestimated over the Atlantic and Caribbean basins. Overall, it is assessed that the performance of RegCM4 over Mexico is of sufficient quality to study not only mean precipitation and temperature patterns, but also higher order climate statistics.     

Changes in Habitat Availability for Multiple Life Stages of Diamondback Terrapins (<Emphasis Type="Italic">Malaclemys terrapin</Emphasis>) in Chesapeake Bay in Response to Sea Level Rise

Global sea level rise (SLR) will significantly alter coastal landscapes through inundation and erosion of low-lying areas. Animals that display area fidelity and rely on fringing coastal habitats during multiple life stages, such as diamondback terrapins (Malaclemys terrapin Schoepff 1793), are likely to be particularly vulnerable to SLR-induced changes. We used a combination of empirical nest survey data and results from a regional SLR model to explore the long-term availability of known nesting locations and the modeled availability of fringing coastal habitats under multiple SLR scenarios for diamondback terrapin in the MD portion of Chesapeake Bay and the MD coastal bays. All SLR scenarios projected the rapid inundation of historically used nesting locations of diamondback terrapins with 25%–55% loss within the next 10 years and over 80% loss by the end of the century. Model trajectories of habitat losses or gains depended on habitat type and location. A key foraging habitat, brackish marsh, was projected to decline 6%–94%, with projections varying spatially and among scenarios. Despite predicted losses of extant beach habitats, future gains in beach habitat due to erosion and overwash were projected to reach 40%–600%. These results demonstrate the potential vulnerability of diamondback terrapins to SLR in Chesapeake Bay and underscore the possibility of compounding negative effects of SLR on animals whose habitat requirements differ among life stages. More broadly, this study highlights the vulnerability of species dependent on fringing coastal habitats and emphasizes the need for a long-term perspective for coastal development in the face of SLR.