Bridging the Carbon Cycle at Nano- and Mountain-Scales

September 20, 2021
A photo of mountains and a valley in the Northern Sierra Nevadas, California. Photo by Wayne Hsieh.
Photo of mountains in the Middle Fork Feather River watershed, where samples were collected, by Wayne Hsieh.

To understand the carbon cycle at the scale of mountains, SWAC researchers looked at nano scale interactions between minerals and organic carbon. Conventional wisdom says that erosion rates have a large impact on soil carbon chemistry, but a collaboration between geochemists and soil scientists has led to interesting discoveries: a new study found that the chemistry was consistent, regardless of the erosion rate in these mountainous regions. “We are learning a lot of new things by bridging the two scales,” says Prof. Kyungsoo Yoo

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