Collaborative Research: Quantifying past water table depth and hydroclimate with dissolved noble gas isotopes in groundwater

合作研究：利用地下水中溶解的惰性气体同位素量化过去的地下水位深度和水文气候

• 批准号: 1702571
• 负责人: Martin Stute
• 金额: $ 8.51万
• 依托单位: Columbia University
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Standard Grant
• 财政年份: 2017
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2017-07-01 至 2022-06-30
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=1702571&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: Collaborative; Research; Quantifying; past; water

Water resources are a critical issue for agriculture in the arid parts of the US, and it is likely that water availability will be affected by future climate change, yet it remains difficult to predict the magnitude of future rainfall changes. The proposed research will develop a new and precise method for quantifying past changes in water table depth, using measurements of dissolved noble gas isotopes in ancient groundwater. This knowledge of past water table fluctuations will help illuminate the regional rainfall response to climate variations, and strengthen predictions by providing rigorous tests of rainfall models. The method is based on the demonstrated fact that heavy gases settle to the bottom of the stagnant column of air in the soil above the water table depth. The deeper the water table, the more extreme the enrichment of heavy isotopes, and these heavy isotopes become dissolved in the water thus preserving information about the water table depth in aquifers containing ancient groundwater. This groundwater is already routinely sampled to learn about past temperature from the abundance of the noble gases; the proposed research will add water table depth to the information that can be extracted from the samples.

水资源是美国干旱地区农业的一个关键问题，未来气候变化可能会影响可用水量，但预测未来降雨变化的幅度仍然很困难。拟议的研究将开发一种新的精确方法，通过测量古代地下水中溶解的惰性气体同位素来量化过去地下水位深度的变化。 对过去地下水位波动的了解将有助于阐明区域降雨对气候变化的响应，并通过对降雨模型进行严格的测试来加强预测。该方法基于已证实的事实，即重气体沉降到地下水位深度以上土壤中静止空气柱的底部。 地下水位越深，重同位素的富集度越高，这些重同位素溶解在水中，从而保留了含有古代地下水的含水层中地下水位深度的信息。 人们已经定期对地下水进行采样，以便从稀有气体的丰度中了解过去的温度。拟议的研究将把地下水位深度添加到可以从样本中提取的信息中。

项目成果

Widespread six degrees Celsius cooling on land during the Last Glacial Maximum

末次盛冰期陆地上普遍降温六摄氏度

• DOI: 10.1038/s41586-021-03467-6
• 发表时间: 2021
• 期刊: Nature
• 影响因子: 64.8
• 作者: Seltzer, Alan M.;Ng, Jessica;Aeschbach, Werner;Kipfer, Rolf;Kulongoski, Justin T.;Severinghaus, Jeffrey P.;Stute, Martin
• 通讯作者: Stute, Martin