In atmospheric and environmental sciences, optical spectrometers are used for the measurements of greenhouse gas mole fractions and the isotopic composition of water vapor or greenhouse gases. The large sample cell volumes (tens of milliliters to several liters) in commercially available spectrometers constrain the usefulness of such instruments for applications that are limited in sample…

In this paper, we report the vertical profiles of CO₂ and CH₄ measured with a cavity ring-down spectrometer (CRDS) on a research aircraft from near-ground level to 8 km above mean sea level. The airborne platform employed in this paper is an Alpha Jet aircraft operated from NASA's Ames Research Center. Flights were undertaken to Railroad Valley, NV, USA, to…

Hillslopes are the dominant landscape components where incoming precipitation is transferred to become groundwater, streamflow or atmospheric water vapor. However, directly observing flux partitioning in the soil is almost impossible. Hydrological hills-lope models are therefore being used to investigate the involved processes. Here we report on a modeling experiment using the Catchment…

Precise methods for the detection of geologically stored CO₂ within and above soil surfaces are an important component of the development of carbon capture and storage (CCS) under terrestrial environments. Although CO₂ leaks are not expected in well-chosen and operated storage sites, monitoring is required by legislation and any leakage needs to be quantified…

A Particle-into-Liquid Sampler – Total Organic Carbon and fraction collector sys-tem was flown aboard a Twin Otter aircraft sampling prescribed burning emis-sions in South Carolina in November 2011 to obtain smoke marker measure-ments. The fraction collector provided 2min time-integrated off-line samples for car-bohydrate (i.e., smoke markers levoglucosan, mannosan, galactosan) analysis by…

Water is the key resource limiting world agricultural production. Although an impressive number of research reports have been published on plant drought tolerance enhancement via genetic modifications during the last few years, progress has been slower than expected. We suggest a feasible alternative strategy by application of rhizospheric bacteria coevolved with plant roots in harsh…

Silage is an important dietary water source that influences the oxygen and hydrogen isotopic composition of domestic herbivores and their products. Silage sampled fresh from the silo had¹⁸O- and ²H-depleted tissue water when compared with fresh pasture grass sampled around midday during the silage-making seasons. During exposure in the feed bunk, silage water…

Degradation of plant material by animals is an important transformation pathway in the nitrogen (N) cycle. During the involved processes, volatile reduced alkaline nitro-gen compounds, mainly ammonia (NH₃) and aliphatic amines such as trimethylamine (TMA), are formed. Today, animal husbandry is estimated to constitute a main source of aliphatic amines into the atmosphere with TMA…

Hydrological and geochemical processes controlling the pore water chemistry in a permafrost wetland, with loam overlain by sphagnum peat, were investigated. The vertical distributions of dissolved Cl, and of pore water δ¹⁸O, appeared unrelated to ion freeze-out and isotope ice-water fractionation processes, respectively, dismissing solute freeze-out as a main control on the water…

Hydrogeochemistry of 32 hot springs in the western Sichuan Province after the Wenchuan  8.0 earthquake was investigated by analyzing the concentrations of cation and anion and the isotopic compositions of hydrogen and oxygen. The water samples of the hot springs were collected four times from June 2008 to April 2010. Hydrogeochemical data indicated the water samples can be…

The East Scotia Ridge is an active back-arc spreading centre located to the west of the South Sandwich island arc in the Southern Ocean. Initial exploration of the ridge by deep-tow surveys provided the first evidence for hydrothermal activity in a back-arc setting outside of the western Pacific, and we returned in 2010 with a remotely operated vehicle to precisely locate and sample…

Suitable predictors of degradability are sought to support the identification of biochars with large potential to increase C sequestration in soils. We determined the biodegradation of 9 chars from hydrothermal carbonization and pyrolysis in two agricultural soils. The 200- and 115-day degradation correlated strongly with the O:C- and slightly with the H:C-atomic ratio of 9 and 14 biochars…

A dedicated system for airborne ship emission measurements of SO₂, NO_x and particles has been developed and used from several small aircraft. The system has been adapted for fast response measurements at 1 Hz, and the use of several of the instruments is unique. The uncertainty of the given data is about 20% for SO₂ and 24% for NO_x …

There is a pressing need to verify air pollutant and greenhouse gas emissions from anthropogenic fossil energy sources to enforce current and future regulations. We demonstrate the feasibility of using simultaneous remote sensing observations of column abundances of CO₂, CO, and NO₂ to inform and verify emission inventories. We report, to our knowledge, the first ever…

A reliable and precise in situ CO₂ and CO analysis system has been developed and deployed at eight sites in the NOAA Earth System Research Laboratory's (ESRL) Global Greenhouse Gas Reference Network. The network uses very tall (> 300 m) television and radio transmitter towers that provide a convenient platform for mid-boundary-layer trace-gas sampling. Each analyzer has…

High-precision analysis of the ¹⁷O / ¹⁶O isotope ratio in water and water vapor is of interest in hydrological, paleoclimate, and atmospheric science applications. Of specific interest is the parameter ¹⁷O excess (Δ¹⁷O), a measure of the deviation from a‾linear relationship between ¹⁷O / ¹⁶O and…

RATIONALE

Traditionally, stable isotope analysis of plant and soil water has been a technically challenging, labour-intensive and time-consuming process. Here we describe a rapid single-step technique which combines Microwave Extraction with Isotope Ratio Infrared Spectroscopy (ME-IRIS).

METHODS

Plant, soil and insect water is extracted into a dry air stream by…

Dissolved oxygen (DO) is commonly recognized as an important factor influencing nitrous oxide (N₂O) production by ammonia-oxidizing bacteria (AOB). However, it has been difficult to separate the true effect of DO from that of nitrite, as DO variation often affects nitrite accumulation. The effect of DO on N₂O production by an enriched nitrifying sludge, consisting of…