Effects of acid mist on needles from mature Sitka spruce grafts. Part II. Influence of developmental stage, age and needle morphology on visible damage

Mature grafts of five Sitka spruce (Picea sitchensis (Bong.) Carr.) clones were exposed to simulated acid mist comprising an equimolar mixture of H(2)SO(4) and NH(4)NO(3) (1.6 and 0.01 mol m(-3)) at pH 2.5 and 5.0. Mist was applied to potted plants growing in open-top chambers on consecutive days, four times a week, at a precipitation equivalent of 1 mm per day. The total exposure to polluted mist was equivalent to three times that measured at an upland forest in SE Scotland. The aim of the experiment was to characterize the response of juvenile foliage produced by physiologically mature grafts (on seedling root stock) and compare it with the behaviour of juvenile foliage on seedlings. Development of visible foliar damage was followed through the growing season. Measurements of needle length, diameter, weight, surface area, surface was weight and wettability were made on current year needles to determine whether particular foliar characteristics increased susceptibility to injury. Significant amounts (> 10%) of visible needle damage was observed on only one of the five clones. Damage was most severe on the clone with the most horizontal branch and needle habit, but over the five clones there was no relationship between angle of branch display and damage. Likewise no combination of needle characteristics (length, width, area, amount of wax) was indicative of potential susceptibility. A comparison with previous acid misting experiments using seedlings suggests that juvenile foliage on physiologically mature trees is equally susceptible to visible injury as juvenile seedling foliage. Data of budburst differed among clones, and in this experiment exerted the over-riding influence on development of injury symptoms. Foliage exposed to a combination of strong acidity and high sulphate concentrations over the few weeks immediately following budburst suffered most visible injury. The absence of significant amounts of visible damage in UK forests probably reflects the general low susceptibility to visible injury of Sitka spruce exposed to acid mist.     

Diagnostic indicators of elevated nitrogen deposition

Tissue N content of mosses, which has been shown to be an indicator of enhanced N, was studied at a range of locations dominated either by wet or dry deposited and oxidised and reduced forms of N. Tissue N responded differently to wet and dry deposited N. For a 1 kg ha(-1) y(-1) increase in N deposition, tissue N increased by 0.01% at wet deposition sites but by 0.03% at sites dominated by dry deposited NH3. Tissue N at wet deposition sites responded more to concentrations of NO3- and NH4+ in precipitation (r(2) 0.63) than to total N deposition (r(2) 0.27), concentration explaining 66% of the variation in tissue N, wet deposition 33%. The study clearly concludes that tissue N concentration in mosses provides a good indication of N deposition at sites where deposition is dominated by NH3, and is also valuable in identifying vegetation exposed to large concentrations of NH4+ or NO3-, in wet deposition dominated areas, such as hilltops and wind exposed woodland edges.     

An investigation of aqueous activity coefficients at low concentrations

The activity of a chemical in solution determines its tendency to move into other media. At low concentrations (<0.01M) it is generally considered to be linearly related to concentration. A hypothetical model based on the structure of liquid water is discussed which could cause deviations from this linearity in the ppb region, a concentration much lower than that normally investigated thermodynamically, but one of great importance environmentally. Headspace experiments are reported with carbon tetrachloride and chloroform in water at concentrations down to ～10^?3 ppb but no such deviations were discerned.     

Erosion vs. recovery of coral reefs after 1998 El Niño: Chagos reefs, Indian Ocean

Three years after most corals died on the central Indian Ocean reefs of Chagos, erosion and recovery were studied to 30 m depth. Mortality was near-total to 15 m deep in northern atolls, and to > 35 m in central and southern atolls. Some reef surfaces have 'dropped' 1.5 m due to the loss of dense coral thickets. Coral bioerosion is substantial, reducing 3-D reef 'structure' and forming unconsolidated rubble. Juvenile corals are abundant, though mostly on eroding or unstable substrates, and are of less robust species. Reef fish abundance and diversity at 15 m depth remains high; species dependent on corals have diminished, while some herbivores and detritivores have increased. A new sea surface temperature (SST) data set shows that mean SST has risen 0.65 degree C since 1950. The critical SST causing the mortality in Chagos was 29.9 degrees C.     

Stem growth reduction in mature Sitka spruce trees exposed to acid mist

An eighteen-year-old clone of Sitka spruce (Picea sitchensis (Bong.) Carr) growing in the field was used to evaluate the whole tree response of 'mature' Sitka spruce to acid mist treatment. The mist, an equimolar mixture of H(2)SO(4) and NH(4)NO(3) at pH 2.5 with or without particles (soda glass ballotini < 20 microm diameter), was applied twice weekly (equivalent to 4 mm precipitation week(-1)) throughout the growing season, May-November 1990-1992. The annual dose of S, N, H applied as mist (at 51, 48 and 3.3 kg ha(-1), respectively) was 2.5 times that measured in the Scottish uplands. Throughout the experiment there was no evidence of visible injury symptoms, yet there was a highly significant reduction (p < 0.02) in the stem-area increment relative to the stem area at the start, measured using vernier dendrometer bands. There was no significant difference between the (acid mist + particle) and the acid mist only treatments. The mean relative stem-area increment over two complete growing seasons (1991-1992) was 65% for control trees, but only 53% for acid-misted trees.     

Early effects of atmospheric ammonia deposition on Calluna vulgaris (L.) hull growing on an ombrotrophic peat bog

This paper reports data from a field study investigating the impacts of elevated ammonia (NH₃) deposition on Calluna vulgaris growing on an ombrotrophic peat bog in S.E. Scotland. Shoot extension, foliar N concentrations, chlorophyll concentration and chlorophyll fluorescence were measured during the second growing season of exposure to a gradient of ammonia concentrations. Results indicate that NH₃ increases growth between 150–200 kg N ha^?1y^?1 cumulative deposition. Foliar N content increased significantly in response to NH₃ cumulative deposition up to 400 kg N ha^?1 y^?1 whereas chlorophyll a content significantly decreased. Measurements of Fv/Fm suggest that although NH₃ exposure altered the growth and reduced chlorophyll a, the efficiency of photosystem II was insensitive to NH₃–N deposition at this stage.     

A flexible spatio-temporal model for air pollution with spatial and spatio-temporal covariates

The development of models that provide accurate spatio-temporal predictions of ambient air pollution at small spatial scales is of great importance for the assessment of potential health effects of air pollution. Here we present a spatio-temporal framework that predicts ambient air pollution by combining data from several different monitoring networks and deterministic air pollution model(s) with geographic information system covariates. The model presented in this paper has been implemented in an R package, SpatioTemporal, available on CRAN. The model is used by the EPA funded Multi-Ethnic Study of Atherosclerosis and Air Pollution (MESA Air) to produce estimates of ambient air pollution; MESA Air uses the estimates to investigate the relationship between chronic exposure to air pollution and cardiovascular disease. In this paper we use the model to predict long-term average concentrations of \(\text {NO}_{x}\) in the Los Angeles area during a 10 year period. Predictions are based on measurements from the EPA Air Quality System, MESA Air specific monitoring, and output from a source dispersion model for traffic related air pollution (Caline3QHCR). Accuracy in predicting long-term average concentrations is evaluated using an elaborate cross-validation setup that accounts for a sparse spatio-temporal sampling pattern in the data, and adjusts for temporal effects. The predictive ability of the model is good with cross-validated \(R^2\) of approximately \(0.7\) at subject sites. Replacing four geographic covariate indicators of traffic density with the Caline3QHCR dispersion model output resulted in very similar prediction accuracy from a more parsimonious and more interpretable model. Adding traffic-related geographic covariates to the model that included Caline3QHCR did not further improve the prediction accuracy.     

油浸变压器排油注氮装置在500kV变电站的设计与应用

在分析500kV变电站主变压器消防系统的现状,比较3类消防系统优缺点的基础上,详细论述了主变排油注氮装置的结构组成、工作原理、参数计算、控制系统设计以及需要注意的事项等,为下一步排油注氮装置的推广应用打下基础.