Preprints
There are 4713 Preprints listed.
Plastics aplenty in paddy lands: incidence of microplastics in two rice cultivars of Kerala, India, and its impact on primary producers found in paddy fields
Published: 2023-11-14
Subjects: Environmental Microbiology and Microbial Ecology Life Sciences, Environmental Sciences, Terrestrial and Aquatic Ecology, Toxicology
Microplastics (MP) have received worldwide attention in recent years because of its prevalence in key ecosystems, including agroecosystems. Occurrence of MP in native paddy fields, which are critical to world’s food security, is not reported till date. This study reports the abundance of MP in two different rice cultivars, one of which is the ‘Pokkali’ crop that is Geographical Indication tagged [...]
Helium, carbon and nitrogen isotope evidence for slab influence on volcanic gas emissions at Rabaul caldera, Papua New Guinea
Published: 2023-11-14
Subjects: Earth Sciences, Physical Sciences and Mathematics, Volcanology
The chemical and isotopic composition of the gases emitted by subduction zone volcanoes can provide insights into the origin of magmatic volatiles. In volcanic arcs, magmatic volatiles and therefore emitted gases can be supplied from the mantle, the subducting slab, or the rocks of the arc crust. Determining the relative contributions of these distinct sources is important for understanding the [...]
Leveraging Past Information and Machine Learning to Accelerate Land Disturbance Monitoring
Published: 2023-11-14
Subjects: Engineering
Near real time (NRT) monitoring of land disturbances holds great importance for delivering emergency aids, mitigating negative social and ecological impacts, and distributing resources for disaster recovery. Many past NRT techniques were built upon examining the overall change magnitude of a spectral anomaly with a pre-defined threshold, namely the unsupervised approach. However, their lack of [...]
Looking upstream: analyzing the protection of the drainage area of Amazon rivers
Published: 2023-11-13
Subjects: Earth Sciences, Environmental Indicators and Impact Assessment, Environmental Sciences, Hydrology, Sustainability, Water Resource Management
In the Amazon, aquatic ecosystems provide essential ecosystem services, including transportation, food, and livelihoods for millions of species. Land use changes and management impact these ecosystem services, and these impacts are not limited to the specific areas where they occur but propagate downstream along the drainage network. However, assessment of the accumulated human footprint upstream [...]
Probabilistic assimilation of optical satellite data with physiologically based growth functions improves crop trait time series reconstruction
Published: 2023-11-13
Subjects: Agriculture
A sound understanding of plant growth is critical to maintaining future crop productivity under ongoing climate change. Remotely sensed time series of crop functional traits from optical satellite imagery are an invaluable tool for deriving appropriate management practices that facilitate risk mitigation and increase the resilience of agroecosystems. However, the availability of imagery is [...]
Changing Landscapes in a Changing Climate: An Opportunity for Invasive Plants to Create a New Proxy for Recent Landslide Events
Published: 2023-11-11
Subjects: Education
The objective of this short communication is to review the impact resulting from climate change modifications in the landscape on the growth of invasive plant species within the Western Ghats region, with a specific emphasis on the state of Kerala in India. The study highlights the correlation between intense precipitation events and the frequency of landslides, which in turn facilitates ideal [...]
Bad science and good intentions prevent effective climate action
Published: 2023-11-10
Subjects: Oceanography and Atmospheric Sciences and Meteorology, Physical Sciences and Mathematics
Although the 2015 Paris Agreement climate targets seem certain to be missed, only a few experts are questioning the adequacy of the current approach to limiting climate change and suggesting that additional approaches are needed to avoid unacceptable catastrophes. This article posits that selective science communication and unrealistically optimistic assumptions are obscuring the reality that [...]
In-situ quantification of carbonate species concentrations, pH and pCO2 in calcite fluid inclusions using confocal Raman spectroscopy
Published: 2023-11-10
Subjects: Physical Sciences and Mathematics
Carbonate minerals are globally distributed on the modern and ancient Earth and are abundant in terrestrial and marine depositional environments. Fluid inclusions hosted by calcite retain primary signatures of the source fluid geochemistry at the time of mineral formation (i.e., pCO2) and can be used to reconstruct paleoenvironments. Confocal laser Raman spectroscopy provides a quick, [...]
How agriculture, droughts and diseases shaped the island environments of Remote Oceania over the last Millennium
Published: 2023-11-10
Subjects: Paleontology, Sedimentology
Over the past millennium, the Pacific Islands have experienced significant transformations, caused by different waves of human settlement and climatic variability. However, the paucity of archeological records coupled with the complex climatic setting of the tropical Pacific hinders our understanding of past environmental and societal changes. In this study, we employ a multi-proxy approach on [...]
Defining Plastic Pollution Hotspots
Published: 2023-11-10
Subjects: Environmental Sciences, Environmental Studies, Fresh Water Studies, Hydrology
Plastic pollution in the natural environment poses a growing threat to ecosystems and human health, prompting urgent needs for monitoring, prevention and clean-up measures, and new policies. To effectively prioritize resource allocation and mitigation strategies, it is key to identify and define plastic hotspots. UNEP’s draft global agreement on plastic pollution mandates prioritizing hotspots, [...]
Wetter climate favouring early Lapita horticulture in Remote Oceania
Published: 2023-11-10
Subjects: Paleontology, Sedimentology
The islands of Remote Oceania were among the last places on Earth colonised by humans. Lapita seafarers carrying with them an extensive root-tuber-tree crop complex and domestic animals, rapidly transformed nearly all of these previously unoccupied islands. However, the timing of initial Lapita settlements and the early introduction of horticulture remain a matter of debate as significant changes [...]
A late response of the sea-ice cover to Neoglacial cooling in the western Barents Sea
Published: 2023-11-09
Subjects: Physical Sciences and Mathematics
In high northern latitudes, the Middle to Late Holocene was a time of orbitally-induced atmospheric cooling. This led to increased sea-ice production in the Arctic Ocean and its export southward, a decrease in sea surface temperatures (SST), and glacier advances at least since 5-4 ka BP. However, the response of the ocean-climate system to decreasing insolation was not uniform. Our research shows [...]
Quantifying mantle mixing through configurational Entropy
Published: 2023-11-09
Subjects: Geophysics and Seismology, Other Earth Sciences
Geodynamic models of mantle convection provide a powerful tool to obtain insights into the structure and composition of the Earth’s mantle that resulted from a long history of differentiating and mixing. Comparing such models with geophysical and geochemical observations is challenging as these datasets often sample entirely different temporal and spatial scales. Here, we explore the use of [...]
ACCE DTP EDI Report 2023
Published: 2023-11-09
Subjects: Earth Sciences, Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Education, Environmental Sciences, Higher Education
Underrepresentation of minoritised and historically disadvantaged groups is prevalent in PhD recruitment, particularly in environmental sciences. The environmental science focussed ‘Adapting to the Challenges of a Changing Environment’ Doctoral Training Partnership (ACCE DTP) was awarded funding from the Natural Environment Research Council for an EDI-centred project. This project aimed to [...]
Pre- and Post-Last Glacial Maximum Groundwater Recharge in a Glaciated Region
Published: 2023-11-08
Subjects: Physical Sciences and Mathematics
Continental glaciations during the Pleistocene Epoch created complex systems of aquifers and aquitards across many northern regions of the Earth. Past measurements of δD and δ18O measurements show that tills have retained subglacial meltwater but the behaviour of intertill and buried valley aquifers in these regions is less clear. Here, we characterize groundwater ages in these aquifers in [...]