TY - JOUR A1 - Ramachandran, Srikanthan A1 - Rupakheti, Maheswar A1 - Lawrence, Mark T1 - Black carbon dominates the aerosol absorption over the Indo-Gangetic Plain and the Himalayan foothills JF - Environment international : a journal of science, technology, health, monitoring and policy N2 - This study, based on new and high quality in situ observations, quantifies for the first time, the individual contributions of light-absorbing aerosols (black carbon (BC), brown carbon (BrC) and dust) to aerosol absorption over the Indo-Gangetic Plain (IGP) and the Himalayan foothill region, a relatively poorly studied region with several sensitive ecosystems of global importance, as well as highly vulnerable populations. The annual and seasonal average single scattering albedo (SSA) over Kathmandu is the lowest of all the locations. The SSA over Kathmandu is < 0.89 during all seasons, which confirms the dominance of light-absorbing carbonaceous aerosols from local and regional sources over Kathmandu. It is observed here that the SSA decreases with increasing elevation, confirming the dominance of light absorbing carbonaceous aerosols at higher elevations. In contrast, the SSA over the IGP does not exhibit a pronounced spatial variation. BC dominates (>= 75%) the aerosol absorption over the IGP and the Himalayan foothills throughout the year. Higher BC concentration at elevated locations in the Himalayas leads to lower SSA at elevated locations in the Himalayas. The contribution of dust to aerosol absorption is higher throughout the year over the IGP than over the Himalayan foothills. The aerosol absorption over South Asia is very high, exceeding available observations over East Asia, and also exceeds previous model estimates. This quantification will be valuable as observational constraints to help improve regional simulations of climate change, impacts on the glaciers and the hydrological cycle, and will help to direct the focus towards BC as the main contributor to aerosol-induced warming in the region. KW - atmospheric aerosols KW - characteristics KW - absorption KW - black carbon KW - brown KW - carbon KW - dust KW - Himalayas KW - IGP KW - South Asia Y1 - 2020 U6 - https://doi.org/10.1016/j.envint.2020.105814 SN - 0160-4120 SN - 1873-6750 VL - 142 PB - Elsevier CY - Oxford ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Naafs, B. David A. A1 - Hefter, Jens A1 - Acton, Gary A1 - Haug, Gerald H. A1 - Martinez-Garcia, Alfredo A1 - Pancost, Richard A1 - Stein, Rüdiger T1 - Strengthening of North American dust sources during the late Pliocene (2.7 Ma) JF - Earth & planetary science letters N2 - Here we present orbitally-resolved records of terrestrial higher plant leaf wax input to the North Atlantic over the last 3.5 Ma, based on the accumulation of long-chain n-alkanes and n-alkanl-1-ols at IODP Site U1313. These lipids are a major component of dust, even in remote ocean areas, and have a predominantly aeolian origin in distal marine sediments. Our results demonstrate that around 2.7 million years ago (Ma), coinciding with the intensification of the Northern Hemisphere glaciation (NHG), the aeolian input of terrestrial material to the North Atlantic increased drastically. Since then, during every glacial the aeolian input of higher plant material was up to 30 times higher than during interglacials. The close correspondence between aeolian input to the North Atlantic and other dust records indicates a globally uniform response of dust sources to Quaternary climate variability, although the amplitude of variation differs among areas. We argue that the increased aeolian input at Site U1313 during glacials is predominantly related to the episodic appearance of continental ice sheets in North America and the associated strengthening of glaciogenic dust sources. Evolutional spectral analyses of the n-alkane records were therefore used to determine the dominant astronomical forcing in North American ice sheet advances. These results demonstrate that during the early Pleistocene North American ice sheet dynamics responded predominantly to variations in obliquity (41 ka), which argues against previous suggestions of precession-related variations in Northern Hemisphere ice sheets during the early Pleistocene. KW - aeolian input KW - dust KW - terrestrial higher plant waxes KW - Milankovitch KW - North Atlantic KW - Quaternary Y1 - 2012 U6 - https://doi.org/10.1016/j.epsl.2011.11.026 SN - 0012-821X SN - 1385-013X VL - 317 SP - 8 EP - 19 PB - Elsevier CY - Amsterdam ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Hayes, Christopher T. A1 - Anderson, Robert F. A1 - Fleisher, Martin Q. A1 - Serno, Sascha A1 - Winckler, Gisela A1 - Gersonde, Rainer T1 - Quantifying lithogenic inputs to the North Pacific Ocean using the long-lived thorium isotopes JF - Earth & planetary science letters N2 - Dissolved Th-232 is added to the ocean though the partial dissolution of lithogenic materials such as aerosol dust in the same way as other lithogenically sourced and more biologically important trace metals such as Fe. Oceanic Th-230, on the other hand, is sourced primarily from the highly predictable decay of dissolved U-234. The rate at which dissolved Th-232 is released by mineral dissolution can be constrained by a Th removal rate derived from Th-230:U-234 disequilibria, assuming steady-state. Calculated fluxes of dissolved Th-232 can in turn be used to estimate fluxes of other lithogenically sourced dissolved metals as well as the original lithogenic supplies, such as aerosol dust deposition, given the concentration and fractional solubility of Th (or other metals) in the lithogenic material. This method is applied to 7 water column profiles from the Innovative North Pacific Experiment (INOPEX) cruise of 2009 and 2 sites from the subtropical North Pacific. The structure of shallow depth profiles suggests rapid scavenging at the surface and at least partial regeneration of dissolved Th-232 at 100-200 m depth. This rapid cycling could involve colloidal Th generated during mineral dissolution, which may not be subject to the same removal rates as the more truly dissolved Th-230. An additional deep source of Th-232 was revealed in deep waters, most likely dissolution of seafloor sediments, and offers a constraint on dissolved trace element supply due to boundary exchange. (C) 2013 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved. KW - dust KW - aerosols KW - thorium KW - boundary exchange KW - North Pacific Ocean KW - GEOTRACES compliant Y1 - 2013 U6 - https://doi.org/10.1016/j.epsl.2013.09.025 SN - 0012-821X SN - 1385-013X VL - 383 IS - 12 SP - 16 EP - 25 PB - Elsevier CY - Amsterdam ER -