Physical Sciences and Mathematics Commons^™

Dependence Of Ice-Core Relative Trace-Element Concentration On Acidification, Bess G. Koffman, Michael J. Handley, Erich C. Osterberg, Mark L. Wells, Karl J. Kreutz

Dartmouth Scholarship

To assess the role of methodological differences on measured trace-element concentrations in ice cores, we developed an experiment to test the effects of acidification strength and time on dust dissolution using snow samples collected in West Antarctica and Alaska. We leached Antarctic samples for 3 months at room temperature using nitric acid at concentrations of 0.1, 1.0 and 10.0% (v/v). At selected intervals (20 min, 24 hours, 5 days, 14 days, 28 days, 56 days, 91 days) we analyzed 23 trace elements using inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry. Concentrations of lithogenic elements scaled with acid strength and increased by 100–1380% …