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Measuring Carbon-based Contaminant Mineralization Using Combined CO2 Flux and Radiocarbon Analyses
Published on: October 21, 2016
Ice core records of atmospheric N2O covering the last 106,000 years
Todd Sowers1, Richard B Alley, Jennifer Jubenville
1Department of Geosciences and the EMS Environment Institute, Pennsylvania State University, UniversityPark, PA 16802, USA. sowers@geosc.psu.edu
Abstract:
Paleoatmospheric records of trace-gas concentrations recovered from ice cores provide important sources of information on many biogeochemical cycles involving carbon, nitrogen, and oxygen. Here, we present a 106,000-year record of atmospheric nitrous oxide (N2O) along with corresponding isotopic records spanning the last 30,000 years, which together suggest minimal changes in the ratio of marine to terrestrial N2O production. During the last glacial termination, both marine and oceanic N2O emissions increased by 40 +/- 8%. We speculate that our records do not support those hypotheses that invoke enhanced export production to explain low carbon dioxide values during glacial periods.
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