Feasibility of coupling a thermal/optical carbon analyzer to a quadrupole mass spectrometer for enhanced PM2.5 speciation

A thermal/optical carbon analyzer (TOA), normally used for quantification of organic carbon (OC) and elemental carbon (EC) in PM_2.5 (fine particulate matter) speciation networks, was adapted to direct thermally evolved gases to an electron impact quadrupole mass spectrometer (QMS), creating a TOA-QMS. This approach produces spectra similar to those obtained by the Aerodyne aerosol mass spectrometer (AMS), but the ratios of the mass to charge (m/z) signals differ and must be remeasured using laboratory-generated standards. Linear relationships are found between TOA-QMS signals and ammonium (NH₄⁺), nitrate (NO₃^?), and sulfate (SO₄^2-) standards. For ambient samples, however, positive deviations are found for SO₄^2-, compensated by negative deviations for NO₃^?, at higher concentrations. This indicates the utility of mixed-compound standards for calibration or separate calibration curves for low and high ion concentrations. The sum of the QMS signals across all m/z after removal of the NH₄⁺, NO₃^?, and SO₄^2- signals was highly correlated with the carbon content of oxalic acid (C?H?O?) standards. For ambient samples, the OC derived from the TOA-QMS method was the same as the OC derived from the standard IMPROVE_A TOA method. This method has the potential to reduce complexity and costs for speciation networks, especially for highly polluted urban areas such as those in Asia and Africa.

Implications: Ammonium, nitrate, and sulfate can be quantified by the same thermal evolution analysis applied to organic and elemental carbon. This holds the potential to replace multiple parallel filter samples and separate laboratory analyses with a single filter and a single analysis to account for a large portion of the PM_2.5 mass concentration.     

Pond bank access as an approach for managing toxic cyanobacteria in beef cattle pasture drinking water ponds

Forty-one livestock drinking water ponds in Alabama beef cattle pastures during were surveyed during the late summer to generally understand water quality patterns in these important water resources. Since livestock drinking water ponds are prone to excess nutrients that typically lead to eutrophication, which can promote blooms of toxigenic phytoplankton such as cyanobacteria, we also assessed the threat of exposure to the hepatotoxin, microcystin. Eighty percent of the ponds studied contained measurable microcystin, while three of these ponds had concentrations above human drinking water thresholds set by the US Environmental Protection Agency (i.e., 0.3 μg/L). Water quality patterns in the livestock drinking water ponds contrasted sharply with patterns typically observed for temperate freshwater lakes and reservoirs. Namely, we found several non-linear relationships between phytoplankton abundance (measured as chlorophyll) and nutrients or total suspended solids. Livestock had direct access to all the study ponds. Consequently, the proportion of inorganic suspended solids (e.g., sediment) increased with higher concentrations of total suspended solids, which underlies these patterns. Unimodal relationships were also observed between microcystin and phytoplankton abundance or nutrients. Euglenoids were abundant in the four ponds with chlorophyll concentrations >?250 μg/L (and dominated three of these ponds), which could explain why ponds with high chlorophyll concentrations would have low microcystin concentrations. Based on observations made during sampling events and available water quality data, livestock-mediated bioturbation is causing elevated total suspended solids that lead to reduced phytoplankton abundance and microcystin despite high concentrations of nutrients, such as phosphorus and nitrogen. Thus, livestock could be used to manage algal blooms, including toxic secondary metabolites, in their drinking water ponds by allowing them to walk in the ponds to increase turbidity.     

Identifying key areas of ecosystem services potential to improve ecological management in Chongqing City,southwest China

Because natural ecosystems and ecosystem services (ES) are both critical to the well-being of humankind, it is important to understand their relationships and congruence for conservation planning. Spatial conservation planning is required to set focused preservation priorities and to assess future ecological implications. This study uses the combined measures of ES models and ES potential to estimate and analyze all four groups of ecosystem services to generate opportunities to maximize ecosystem services. Subsequently, we identify the key areas of conservation priorities as future forestation and conservation hotspot zones to improve the ecological management in Chongqing City, located in the upper reaches of the Three Gorges Reservoir Area, China. Results show that ecosystem services potential is extremely obvious. Compared to ecosystem services from 2000, we determined that soil conservation could be increased by 59.11%, carbon sequestration by 129.51%, water flow regulation by 83.42%, and water purification by 84.42%. According to our prioritization results, approximately 48% of area converted to forests exhibited high improvements in all ecosystem services (categorized as hotspot-1, hotspot-2, and hotspot-3). The hotspots identified in this study can be used as an excellent surrogate for evaluation ecological engineering benefits and can be effectively applied in improving ecological management planning.     

Soil surface Hg emission flux in coalfield in Wuda,Inner Mongolia,China

Hg emission flux from various land covers, such as forests, wetlands, and urban areas, have been investigated. China has the largest area of coalfield in the world, but data of Hg flux of coalfields, especially, those with coal fires, are seriously limited. In this study, Hg fluxes of a coalfield were measured using the dynamic flux chamber (DFC) method, coupled with a Lumex multifunctional Hg analyzer RA-915+ (Lumex Ltd., Russia). The results show that the Hg flux in Wuda coalfield ranged from 4 to 318 ng m^?2 h^?1, and the average value for different areas varied, e.g., coal-fire area 99 and 177 ng m^?2 h^?1; no coal-fire area 19 and 32 ng m^?2 h^?1; and backfilling area 53 ng m^?2 h^?1. Hg continued to be emitted from an underground coal seam, even if there were no phenomena, such as vents, cracks, and smog, of coal fire on the soil surface. This phenomenon occurred in all area types, i.e., coal-fire area, no coal-fire area, and backfilling area, which is universal in Wuda coalfield. Considering that many coalfields in northern China are similar to Wuda coalfield, they may be large sources of atmospheric Hg. The correlations of Hg emission flux with influence factors, such as sunlight intensity, soil surface temperature, and atmospheric Hg content, were also investigated for Wuda coalfield.

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江苏省水质全要素代表性监测体系的设计

为了评价并进行城市水环境质量考核排名,介绍了江苏省组织开展涵盖地表水、饮用水、地下水、近岸海域和城市内河5种类型"全要素、代表性"水质监测断面(点位)体系建设工作的情况以及全要素断面设置的基本原则和做法。分苏南、苏北、苏中3个区域,对全省地表水监测代表性进行了量化计算,结果表明,调整后全省水质综合指数极差从41.07降至7.17,标准差从3.16降为0.49;采用德尔斐层次分析法分析,设计了水质代表性指数,含1项一级指标、5项二级指标、12项三级指标,计算表明,调整前全省水质代表性指数得分为69.1分,调整后为88.7分。将调整结果进行论证后再与各市环保主管部门交换意见,取得最终一致后正式实施。     

江苏省2014-2016年臭氧污染区域特征分析

分析2014—2016年江苏省O₃污染状况,以及苏北、苏中和苏南3个典型区域O₃年度、季度、日变化和频度占比等分布特征。结果表明,江苏省的O₃空间分布呈现北低南高,2014—2016年的O₃超标占比由18.4%上升至34.9%;2016年苏北、苏中和苏南地区O₃-8h第90百分位数与2014年相比,上升2.7%,21.8%和3.3%;3个区域夏季O₃-8h均值最高,春、秋2季次之,冬季最低;O₃-1h日变化呈单峰状态,最低值出现在06:00—07:00,最高值出现在15:00—16:00;2016年3个地区的O₃频度占比均呈正态分布,主要集中在40~80 μg/m³,所占比例均>15%;苏中和苏南区域2016和2014年相比O₃频率占比的变化幅度较大,苏北地区变化幅度不大。指出,江苏省的O₃污染程度在逐年提高,污染范围从苏南逐渐往中部和北部城市扩大。     

WRF模式参数化方案对江西山地风电场的风模拟研究

在WRF模式中选取不同的陆面过程、边界层以及近地面层参数化方案,设计了6种不同的参数化方案组合,模拟江西省某高山风电场测风塔2016年1月和2017年1月逐时风速、风向,并与同期实测数据进行比较,选出MRF边界层参数、WSM3微物理过程参数和Noah陆面过程参数作为最优参数化组合方案。对最优参数化组合方案的模拟结果进行整一年的逐时模拟效果检验,结果表明：最优参数化组合方案对全年风速模拟效果较好,模拟结果风速日变化趋势及风速段（0~24时）分布与实测基本一致,模拟的风速峰值及概率偏大,主要是由于模式的精度不足以准确描述山地风场复杂下垫面造成的。模式最优参数化方案对风向模拟与实测主导风向分布一致且风向频率相似     

基于DMSP-OLS夜间灯光数据的长江经济带城镇体系空间格局演变（1992～2013）

研究长江经济带城镇体系空间格局演变,对于透视长江经济带城镇体系空间格局演变特征和规律以及促进长江经济带城镇体系空间格局优化发展有着重要意义。利用多时相同期Landsat卫星数据以及运用聚类分析方法对长江经济带夜间灯光数据进行校正,并采用其他辅助数据法对比分析获取城镇建成区面积的阈值,在此阈值基础之上选取景观总面积、总斑块数量和聚集度指数等总共8个典型景观格局指标, 继而使用FRAG-STATS 4.2 软件对1992~2013年间长江经济带城镇发展的空间格局变化进行计算分析。研究结果表明：(1）1992~2013年间,长江经济带城镇化快速扩展,城镇建成区面积增加了9.68倍,斑块数量增加了2.39倍,斑块密度也得到较大的增加,反映出长江经济带城镇数量不断增加和城镇建成区面积不断扩大;（2）景观斑块形状复杂度逐渐上升,中小城市不断壮大,同时出现了较多的新兴小城镇,总边界长度和平均边界密度的年均增长速度分别为21.56%和21.58%,体现了长江经济带城镇间聚集度越来越高,相互影响也越来越大;(3）最大斑块指数和聚集度指数两个指标在整体上呈现出逐年下降的态势,但是景观总面积、总斑块数量和斑块密度等8个指标在演变过程中均存在一定的波动和无序化,反映出长江经济带在城镇化过程中呈现出不规则和无序化的特征。     

Larval and Juvenile Fish Assemblage Structure of Inshore Habitats in the Middle Reaches of Li River,China: Spatial and Temporal Patterns in Relation to Abiotic Factors

To evaluate the effect of abiotic factors on larval and juvenile fish assemblage in shallow waters of middle reaches of Li River, Guilin, China. Samplings were taken monthly at 7 stations in the mainstream and 2 stations in 3 tributaries from May 2014 to April 2015. Synchronously, temperature, pH, turbidity, conductivity, dissolved oxygen rainfall and discharge were obtained. In all, 11.886 larval and juvenile fish from 18 species belonging to 8 families, 16 genera was captured. Principal Component Analysis (PCA) showed obvious significant difference between the environmental variables across sampling areas and months. The results of Canonical Correspondence Analysis (CCA) indicated that water temperature, turbidity, discharge and rainfall were dominant factors on larval and juvenile fish assemblage.     

生物难降解有机污染物的治理对策

针对废水中难降解化学合成有机污染物的种类和数量不断增加，生物处理出水达标困难的现状，总结了国内外的经验和研究成果，对现有处理装置改造提出了若干建议，并介绍了几种国外废水处理新技术。