Dual isotope evidence for sedimentary integration of plant wax biomarkers across an Andes-Amazon elevation transect

Author Posting. © The Author(s), 2018. This is the author's version of the work. It is posted here under a nonexclusive, irrevocable, paid-up, worldwide license granted to WHOI. It is made available for personal use, not for redistribution. The definitive version was published in Geochimica et Cosmochimica Acta 242 (2018): 64-81, doi:10.1016/j.gca.2018.09.007.Tropical montane regions tend to have high rates of precipitation, biological production, erosion, and sediment export, which together move material off the landscape and toward sedimentary deposits downstream. Plant wax biomarkers can be used to investigate sourcing of organic matter and are often used as proxies to reconstruct past climate and environment in sedimentary deposits. To understand how plant waxes are sourced within a wet, tropical montane catchment, we measure the stable C and H isotope composition (δ13C and δD) of n-alkanes and n-alkanoic acids in soils along an elevation transect and from sediments within the Madre de Dios River network along the eastern flank of the Peruvian Andes, draining an area of 75,400 km2 and 6 km of elevation. Soils yield systematic trends in plant wax δ13C (+1.75 and +1.31‰ km−1, for the C29n-alkanes and C30n-alkanoic acids respectively in the mineral horizon) and δD values (−10 and −12‰ km−1, respectively) across a 3.5 km elevation transect, which approximates trends previously reported from canopy leaves, though we find offsets between δ13C values in plants and soils. River suspended sediments generally follow soil isotopic gradients defined by catchment elevations (δ13C: +1.03 and +0.99‰ km−1 and δD: −10 to −7‰ km−1, for the C29n-alkanes and C30n-alkanoic acids respectively) in the wet season, with a lowering in the dry season that is less well-constrained. In a few river suspended sediments, petrogenic contributions and depth-sorting influence the n-alkane δ13C signal. Our dual isotope, dual compound class and seasonal sampling approach reveals no Andean-dominance in plant wax export, and instead that the sourcing of plant waxes in this very wet, forested catchment approximates that expected for spatial integration of the upstream catchment, thus with a lowland dominance on areal basis, guiding paleoenvironmental reconstructions in tropical montane regions. The dual isotope approach provides a cross-check on the altitudinal signals and can resolve ambiguity such as might be associated with vegetation change or aridity in paleoclimate records. Further, the altitude effect encoded within plant waxes presents a novel dual-isotope biomarker approach to paleoaltimetry.This material is based upon work supported by the US National Science Foundation under Grant No. EAR-1227192 to A.J.W and S.J.F for the river work

An examination and application of two geochemical proxies for environmental and climate reconstructions in northern South China Sea

Two biomarkers, n-alkanes and alkenones, have been studied for the distribution of their relative concentrations spatially and temporally in sediments in the Pearl River Estuary. 59 modern sediments have been collected across the Pearl River Estuary and offshore Hong Kong, covering a wide range of environmental and sedimentary conditions. The relative abundances between long-chain (C27 to C33) terrestrial-derived n-alkanes, and short-chain (C18 to C22) n-alkanes which are ascribed to marine algal and bacterial production, have been analyzed as “terrestrial-to-marine n-alkane ratios”. Results show that this ratio follows a general gradient of increasing towards uplands. More detailed interpretation has revealed that this ratio is highly dependent on the proximity of the sampling site to the supply of terrestrial matters, i.e., to river mouths and lands. This finding provides fundamentals on the development of terrestrial-to-marine n-alkane ratio as a potential new proxy for terrestrial sediment flux. The newly developed potential environmental and climate proxy, the relative abundances of n-alkane compounds, is applied on analysis of a sediment core drilled in coastal marine environment offshore Hong Kong, HKUV11, which can be dated back to c. 11,000 yr BP. Alkenone unsaturation ratios are also analyzed to reconstruct post-Younger Dryas change in sea surface temperature (SST). Records show a rapid warming of the ocean surface at the start of the Holocene epoch from c. 11,000 yr BP to c. 9000 yr BP, during when the SST researched its optimum, followed by a long period of more stabilized temperatures with the presence of some short-term cold events. The terrestrial-to-marine n-alkane ratio matches well not only with the alkenone SST data in this study, but also with the bulk organic carbon geochemical data and grain size analysis of HKUV11. This suggest that the n-alkane ratio is a reliable proxy for terrestrial sediment supply in this coastal and estuarine environment, as supported by both the field studies of its natural distribution across the environmental gradient, and the successful application on an actual sediment core. The Holocene climate variability of coastal south China recovered by the HKUV11 sediment record has been compared with δ18O records from a Dongge Cave stalagmite, a Greenland ice core and the Northern Hemisphere summer insolation variability. Results show that late-Glacial to Holocene climate in coastal South China generally agrees with the trend in the distal high-latitude North Atlantic, suggesting a strong external driving force of global climate change by the NH summer insolation variability. A detailed comparison between the HKUV11 SST record and Dongge Cave Asian monsoon record reveals that the temperature in coastal south China is sensitively correlated to the strength of Asian monsoon. These results have important implications to how monsoonal winds and temperature are coupled together, and can provide insights to how they may interact under future climate change in this densely-populated region.published_or_final_versionEarth SciencesMasterMaster of Philosoph

Plant waxes (n-alkanes and n-alkanoic acids) isotopes, abundances, and stocks in six litter-to-soil profiles under tropical forests from Andes to Amazon

The waxy coating that protects the leaves and other soft tissues of plants includes n-alkane and n-alkanoic acid compounds that are commonly used as biomarkers to reconstruct past environment. Plant waxes have geological relevance given their persistence in soils and paleosols, as well as in lake and marine sediments, yet diagenesis may alter their molecular and isotopic signatures from synthesis to deposition. This study seeks to understand the fate of plant wax biomarkers in soils after leaf-fall as characterized by a series of tropical soil profiles. We investigate the changes in abundance, molecular distributions, and hydrogen (δD) and carbon isotopic compositions (δ13C) of plant waxes (n-alkanes and n-alkanoic acids) in six litter-to-soil profiles along a 2740 m elevation transect from the eastern flank of the Andes mountains down to the lowland Amazon floodplain in Peru. From litter to soil, we find acid/alkane ratios increase, while absolute abundances decrease. In contrast, within each soil, acid/alkane ratios are roughly constant and we find an equivalent exponential decline in concentration in both compound classes with depth; with molecular distributions indicating some new production. We observe a 4 - 6‰ 13C-enrichment from litter to deeper soils for both C29 n-alkanes and C30 n-alkanoic acids; of which the Suess effect accounts for ≤ 2‰. We infer that microbial degradation and production (or 'turnover') processes influence the δ13C of plant waxes that survive in soils; in contrast, no systematic change in δD values is observed. The plant wax signal in soils includes averaging of inputs and diagenetic effects, so this signature is particularly relevant for the interpretation of plant waxes archives in paleosols and the plant waxes eroded from soils and exported to downstream sedimentary archives. We show that soils represent the major stock of plant wax under living ecosystems, suggesting that soils may be a quantitatively-important source of plant waxes available for fluvial erosion, with implications for studies of carbon cycling and paleoenvironmental reconstructions from downstream geological archives

Rediscovery of Quercus aliena Blume (Fagaceae) in Taiwan

The first collection of Quercus aliena Blume var. acutiserrata Maxim. Ex Wenz. In Taiwan was made by Y. Shimada in 1924 from Hongmao. Since then, no other specimen had ever been collected. Recently, this species was rediscovered from Fengshan (3 km south of Hongmao) in Hsinchu County. On closer studies it was found to be the typical variety of Q. aliena Blume rather than the name recognized by Shimada. The population of Q. aliena is quite small at that limited location, and is vulnerable to human impacts. Therefore, it is necessary to take steps to conserve the habitat as soon as possible. The taxonomic treatment, morphological descriptions, photographs and notes of the species are given here. A key to distinguish it from the other three closely related Taiwanese species is also provided