Analysis & Comparison of Carbon and Carbon Content in Wetlands

1. Analysis & Comparison of Carbon and Carbon Content in Wetlands Tamika Tannis, HS Student Miriam Jones, Graduate Student Sanpisa Sritrairat, Graduate Student Argie Miller, HS Teacher Dr. Dorothy Peteet, Scientist

2. ABSTRACT • Purpose: Scientists are interested in how much carbon wetlands can store to find a way to combat global warming and rising C02 levels, and also to know how much carbon would be released if wetlands were destroyed. • Analyzed the carbon storage ability of the Swanson Fen wetland in Alaska and marsh in Tivoli, New York. A Loss-On-Ignition (LOI) analysis was done to obtain the amount of organic matter in the core. Data used to calculate the total carbon and total organic matter of both cores.

3. CORE SITES Swanson Fen, AK Tivoli, NY

4. MATERIALS & METHODS • Cores sub sampled at intervals of 4 centimeters. • Quantify organic matter content with LOI analysis by burning dried samples at 375 degrees Celsius for one hour. • Percent of organic matter = ((mass of dried sediment – mass of burned sediment) / mass of dried sediment) * 100. • Percent of carbon for Tivoli core calculated with CHN analyzer. Percent carbon for Swanson Fen estimated to be half of organic matter. • Percents multiplied by bulk density to obtain content in g/cc. • For ratio of C-12 to C-13 analysis, samples were dried and ground into fine particles using mortar and pestle to be run through mass spectrometer machine. • Mass spectrometer measures how much C-12 and C-13 is in the sample and ratio is obtained.

5. CARBON CONTENT GRAPH Carbon Content (cg/cc)

6. TOTAL CARBON & ORGANIC MATTER COMPARISON cg/cc

7. DISCUSSION & CONCLUSIONS • Larger range of fluctuation in Swanson Fen’s carbon content may be because a fen is more sensitive to water fluctuation. More moisture usually results in higher carbon storage. • Swanson fluctuation corresponds to vegetation changes. Tivoli fluctuation corresponds to date of human impact and disturbances. • For last 700 years, Tivoli’s higher total carbon might be due to the Swanson’s lower nutrients, lower temperature, and shorter growing seasons, which may lead to lower productivity. However, these factors also lower decomposition rate in the fen, so the net carbon storage of the two cores are not much different. • Total carbon and total organic content for cores underestimate the actual values. Data for Tivoli is not representative of entire core. For Swanson core, carbon content was estimated to be half of organic matter, which is not always true. • Future Work: Carbon-13 analysis

8. ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS • NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies • Columbia University’s Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory • New York City Research Initiative • Miriam Jones & Sanpisa Sritrairat • Argie Miller • Dr. Dorothy Peteet