Upgrade of Carbonate Preparation System, Stable Isotope Laboratory, University of Massachusetts

这笔奖金将用于为马萨诸塞大学地球科学系稳定同位素实验室购买科学设备。这种名为GasBitchII的设备将允许对各种地质材料的氧和碳稳定同位素比率进行快速、自动化的分析。该设备将主要支持古气候研究，重点是更好地了解过去几个冰川周期中热带水文学的变化。重建过去的气候变异性对于将最近气候变化的幅度置于更广泛的地质背景中至关重要；对于了解未来气候对全球平均气温上升的反应；以及提供用于评估全球环流模型在不同边界条件下和仪器记录之外的时间尺度上准确模拟气候的信息至关重要。该项目将促进旨在更好地了解在年际时间尺度上经历严重干旱和洪涝的区域的热带水文变化的原因的研究，这将对当地社会产生重要影响。这些设备还将发挥重要的教育作用，通过五学院地质联盟支持史密斯学院、霍利奥克山学院、汉姆郡学院和阿默斯特学院的本科生研究项目。史密斯学院和Mt.霍利约克学院是该国两所主要的女子学院。将购买的仪器将支持墨西哥尤卡坦地区和马达加斯加热带古气候学的持续研究。尤卡坦半岛长、高分辨率、年代准确的古气候记录对于将水文变化与该区域(玛雅人和玛雅人以前的)古代人口的复杂历史进行比较、更好地了解与热带辐合带有关但可能不是由与热带辐合带有关的降水引起的热带气候制度的变化、以及在从年度到轨道的时间尺度上量化北美热带的水文变化率至关重要。对马达加斯加热带水文变化的研究将提供来自南半球热带的重要新数据，从而有助于确定南半球与北半球印度季风在轨道和千年时间尺度上的变化时间。它们还将有助于确定是什么驱动了降雨量的年际变化及其与印度洋纬向模式的关系。

This award will be used to purchase scientific equipment for the Stable Isotope Laboratory in the Department of Geosciences, University of Massachusetts. The equipment, a GasBench II, will allow rapid, automated analyses of the oxygen and carbon stable isotope ratios of a variety of geologic material. The equipment will primarily support paleoclimate research focused on better understanding changes in tropical hydrology over the past several glacial cycles. Reconstructing past climate variability is critical to placing the amplitude of recent climate change into a broader, geological context; to understanding the response of future climate to the rise in global mean temperature; and providing information used to evaluate how accurately global circulation models simulate climate under different boundary conditions and on timescales beyond the instrumental record. This project will facilitate research seeks to better understand the causes of tropical hydrologic variability in regions that experiences severe drought and flooding on inter-annual time scales, with important repercussions for local societies. The equipment will also play an important educational role, supporting undergraduate research projects at Smith College, Mt Holyoke College, Hamshire College and Amherst College though the Five College Geology Consortium. Smith College and Mt. Holyoke College are two of the premier women's colleges in the country.The instrumentation to be purchased will support continued investigations in tropical paleoclimatology in the Yucatan region of Mexico and in Madagascar. Long, high-resolution well-dated paleoclimate records from the Yucatan are crucial to compare hydrologic change to with the complex history of ancient human populations in the region (Maya and pre-Maya), to better understand changes in tropical climate regimes that correlate with but may not be caused by precipitation related to the Inter-tropical Convergence Zone, and to quantify rates of hydrological change in tropical North America on time scales from annual to orbital. Studies of changes in tropical hydrology in Madagascar will provide important new data from the Southern Hemisphere tropics and thereby help establish the timing of changes in the Indian Monsoon in the Southern vs Northern Hemispheres on orbital and millennial timescales. They will also help determine what drives interannual variability in rainfall and its relationship to the Indian Ocean Zonal Mode.