Collaborative Research: US GEOTRACES Sampling Systems and Intercalibration

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Oceanic trace elements and their isotopes can function as nutrients, contaminants, and tracers or proxies of various oceanographic processes. The GEOTRACES program was developed as an international initiative designed to determine the processes that control the global distributions and biogeochemical cycles of key trace elements and their isotopes (TEI) throughout the ocean. Laboratories and institutions from around the world will be involved in completing sampling transects across ocean basins to achieve the scientific objectives of GEOTRACES. However, before performing ocean transects, intercalibration of sampling, analytical, and modeling techniques must be completed to attain the best precision and accuracy for the GEOTRACES program. Oceanographers from Old Dominion University, the University of California in Santa Cruz, and Rutgers University proposed to provide the infrastructure and organization required to support the participation by as many U.S. and international scientists as possible. The principle investigators specifically propose to address the U.S. GEOTRACES intercalibration through development and testing of the U.S. GEOTRACES sampling systems and procedures for TEIs. Using these systems, the principle investigators intend to conduct a thorough intercalibration for the dissolved and particulate phases of the GEOTRACES TEIs and establish GEOTRACES Baseline Stations in the western North Atlantic and eastern North Pacific Oceans. These results would be documented and utilized to create the "US GEOTRACES Users Manuals and Procedures" for future US-sponsored GEOTRACES cruises. The development of a GEOTRACES infrastructure is significant in impact to both the oceanographic and public community. The development of users' manuals will be invaluable to scientists in the US and to those in less-developed countries with few resources to devote to basic oceanographic research. By completing the first phase of the GEOTRACES initiative, the oceanographic community will have a better understanding of the processes involved in oceanic trace-element cycles and their sensitivity to changing environmental conditions.