Chemical Records in Snowpits from High Altitude Glaciers in the Tibetan Plateau and Its Surroundings

• Published in: PloS one 2016-05, Vol.11 (5), p.e0155232-e0155232
• Main Authors: Zhang, Yulan, Kang, Shichang, Zhang, Qianggong, Gao, Tanguang, Guo, Junming, Grigholm, Bjorn, Huang, Jie, Sillanpää, Mika, Li, Xiaofei, Du, Wentao, Li, Yang, Ge, Xinlei
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Air mass trajectories; Air mass transport; Air masses; Altitude; Analysis; Anthropogenic factors; Arid regions; Arid zones; Atmospheric models; Biology and Life Sciences; Chemical pollution; Climate change; Cold; Constituents; Dust - analysis; Dust deposition; Earth; Earth science; Earth Sciences; Ecology and Environmental Sciences; Engineering research; Environmental aspects; Environmental changes; Environmental conditions; Environmental Monitoring; Environmental science; Geography; Glacier variations; Glaciers; Green chemistry; High altitude; High-altitude environments; Human influences; Ice Cover - chemistry; Ions - analysis; Laboratories; Mass transport; Microparticles; Monsoons; Oxygen Isotopes - analysis; Particulate Matter - analysis; Physical Sciences; Pollution sources; Principal Component Analysis; Principal components analysis; Research and Analysis Methods; Seasonal variations; Seasons; Semiarid zones; Snow; Snow - chemistry; Spatial Analysis; Spatial distribution; Tibet; Trajectory analysis; Wind
• ISSN: 1932-6203; 1932-6203
• DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0155232

Glaciochemistry can provide important information about climatic change and environmental conditions, as well as for testing regional and global atmospheric trace transport models. In this study, δ18O and selected chemical constituents records in snowpits collected from eight glaciers in the Tibetan Plateau and adjacent areas have been investigated. Drawing on the integrated data, our study summarized the seasonal and spatial characteristics of snow chemistry, and their potential sources. Distinct seasonal patterns of δ18O values in snowpits indicated more negative in the south TP controlled by Indian monsoon, and less negative in the north TP and Tien Shan. Overall increasing concentrations of microparticles and crustal ions from south to north indicated a strength of dust deposition on glaciers from semi-arid and arid regions. Principal component analysis and air mass trajectories suggested that chemical constituents were mainly attributable to crustal sources as demonstrated by the high concentrations of ions occurring during the non-monsoon seasons. Nevertheless, other sources, such as anthropogenic pollution, played an important role on chemical variations of glaciers near the human activity centers. This study concluded that air mass transport from different sources played important roles on the spatial distributions and seasonality of glaciochemistry.