Mean residence times in steady-flow and some non-flow systems

Nature ◽  
1978 ◽  
Vol 274 (5674) ◽  
pp. 879-880 ◽  
Author(s):  
B. A. BUFFHAM
Nature ◽  
1977 ◽  
Vol 270 (5632) ◽  
pp. 47-48 ◽  
Author(s):  
L. G. GIBILARO

1983 ◽  
Vol 38 (2) ◽  
pp. 313-319 ◽  
Author(s):  
R.C. Awasthi ◽  
K. Vasudeva

2001 ◽  
Vol 81 (3) ◽  
pp. 299-307 ◽  
Author(s):  
M C Wang ◽  
S H Chang

Humic substances are well known for their long-term persistence in soil environments. The relationship between the mean residence times (MRT) and characteristics of humic substances extracted from a soil with highorganic matter (OM) content in Taiwan was investigated. The MRTs of the soil organic matter (SOM) and its humic substances extracted from the soil samples taken from three depths (0–20, 40–60, and 70–150 cm) of a soil profile were determined by 14C-dating procedures. Moreover, the humic substances were subjected to elemental analysis and investigation by electron spin resonance (ESR), Fourier transform infrared (FTIR), and solid-state 13C nuclear magnetic resonance (13C NMR) spectroscopies. The ranges of the MRT of fulvic acids (FA) (MW < 1000), FA (MW > 1000), humic acid (HA) (MW > 1000), and humins (MW > 1000) were 143 ± 110 to 1740 ± 60, 213 ± 120 to 1690 ± 200, 253 ± 60 to 2200 ± 40, and 293 ± 40 to 2173 ± 70 yr, respectively. The higher standard deviations of the means of determined MRTs of FA (MW < 1000) and FAs (MW > 1000) may be due to their lability. Further, the MRTs of the FAs (MW < 1000), FAs (MW > 1000), HAs (MW > 1000), and humins (MW > 1000) increased with increasing soil profile depth, indicating the slow biological and chemical degradations of humic substances in the deeper layers. The elemental composition and spectroscopic properties of FTIR, 13C NMR, and ESR of humic substances did not change significantly with their MRTs. The MRTs in the range observed in this study were apparently long enough to render humic substances a high degree of chemical stability. Key words: Humic substances, mean residence times, ESR, FTIR, 13C NMR, humin


2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Grant Ferguson ◽  
Mark Cuthbert ◽  
Kevin Befus ◽  
Tom Gleeson ◽  
Chandler Noyes ◽  
...  

&lt;p&gt;Groundwater age and mean residence times have been invoked as measures of groundwater sustainability, with the idea that old or &quot;fossil&quot; groundwater is non-renewable. This idea appears to come from the link between groundwater age and background recharge rates, which are also of questionable use in assessing the sustainability of groundwater withdrawals. The use of groundwater age to assess renewability is further complicated by its relationship with flow system geometry. Young groundwaters near recharge areas are not inherently more renewable than older groundwaters down gradient. Similarly, there is no reason to preferentially use groundwater from smaller aquifers, which will have smaller mean residence times than larger aquifers for the same recharge rate. In some cases, groundwater ages may provide some information where groundwater recharge rates were much higher in the past and systems are no longer being recharged. However, there are few examples where the relationship between depletion and changes in recharge over long time periods has been rigorously explored. Groundwater age measurements can provide insights into the functioning of groundwater flow systems and calibration targets for numerical models and we advocate for their continued use, but they are not a metric of sustainable development. Simple metrics to assess groundwater sustainability remain elusive and a more holistic approach is warranted to maintain water levels and environmental flows.&lt;/p&gt;


2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Rose Abramoff ◽  
Bertrand Guenet ◽  
Haicheng Zhang ◽  
Katerina Georgiou ◽  
Xiaofeng Xu ◽  
...  

&lt;p&gt;Soil carbon (C) models are used to predict C sequestration responses to climate and land use change. Yet, the soil models embedded in Earth system models typically do not represent processes that reflect our current understanding of soil C cycling, such as microbial decomposition, mineral association, and aggregation. Rather, they rely on conceptual pools with turnover times that are fit to bulk C stocks and/or fluxes. As measurements of soil fractions become increasingly available, it is necessary for soil C models to represent these measurable quantities so that model processes can be evaluated more accurately. Here we present Version 2 (V2) of the Millennial model, a soil model developed in 2018 to simulate C pools that can be measured by extraction or fractionation, including particulate organic C, mineral-associated organic C, aggregate C, microbial biomass, and dissolved organic C. Model processes have been updated to reflect the current understanding of mineral-association, temperature sensitivity and reaction kinetics, and different model structures were tested within an open-source framework. We evaluated the ability of Millennial V2 to simulate total soil organic C (SOC), as well as the mineral-associated and particulate fractions, using three independent data sets of soil fractionation measurements spanning a range of climate and geochemistry in Australia (N=495), Europe (N=176), and across the globe (N=716). Considering RMSE and AIC as indices of model performance, site-level evaluations show that Millennial V2 predicts soil organic carbon content better than the widely-used Century model, despite an increase in process complexity and number of parameters. Millennial V2 also reproduces between-site variation in SOC across gradients of climate, plant productivity, and soil type. By including the additional constraints of measured soil fractions, we can predict site-level mean residence times similar to a global distribution of mean residence times measured using SOC/respiration rate under an assumption of steady state. The Millennial V2 model updates the conceptual Century model pools and processes and represents our current understanding of the roles that microbial activity, mineral association and aggregation play in soil C sequestration.&lt;/p&gt;


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