RAPID: Time Series Sampling for Radionuclide and Biogeochemical Fluxes at F1 Time-series Station, Offshore Fukushima Dai-ichi Nuclear Power Facility

2011年日本东北地震引发的海啸严重破坏了福岛第一核电站。使用海水紧急冷却，以应对设备过热？美国1号、2号和3号反应堆机组以及未密封的乏燃料池，导致受污染的水流入邻近的太平洋，这些水的累积量比海啸前的水平高出1万，超过了切尔诺贝利事故向海洋环境释放的放射性核素。在快速反应研究基金的资助下，伍兹霍尔海洋研究所的一个研究小组将参加2011年6月至7月由jamstec领导的一次巡航，并在日本海岸80公里外的一个站点部署一个时间序列沉积物捕集器。具体目标是在接下来的几周和几个月里收集沉降的放射性核素颗粒物质，直到2012年5月预定的一次恢复系泊的巡航。通过在500米和1000米处设置捕集器，该小组将拦截从上层海洋沉降的粒子附着的放射性核素，并评估它们进入深海内部的通量。在整个采样期间，他们大约每两周在每个深度收集一次新鲜样本，以补充快照。采样将在部署期开始和结束时在JAMSTEC巡航上进行。该小组还将与WHOI的Ken Buessler博士密切合作（已单独资助，包括NSF-RAPID的一个补充项目），后者将负责颗粒样品的放射性核素分析，本提案无需额外费用。该项目将处理时序沉积物捕集器系泊的准备、部署和回收，以及初步的样品分离、样品生物地球化学特性表征和样品存档。目前主要关注的放射性核素包括137Cs、134Cs、106Ru、144Ce和147Pm；其他种类（例如Pu同位素）也可能在部署的生命周期内被证明是感兴趣的。因此，该项目的一个重要部分也将是随时准备在未来根据需要向美国，日本和其他感兴趣的国际研究小组提供这些特征良好的样品的进一步分裂。更广泛的影响：正如在切尔诺贝利事故后所吸取的教训，在释放后尽快确定环境中存在的放射性核素的分布和活动，对于了解已经发生的释放的严重程度及其对公众健康的影响，以及建立“零时间”条件，以便更广泛的海洋学界随后能够追踪长寿（保守和生物地球化学活性）放射性核素的命运非常重要。除了已经为该项目建立的强有力的国际（WHOI-JAMSTEC）合作外，该团队还将与更广泛的国家和国际科学界和公众分享这项工作收集的所有数据（存储在伍兹霍尔的BCO-DMO）和样本。

The 2011 Tohoku earthquake off Japan resulted in a tsunami that severely damaged the Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear power facility. Emergency cooling using seawater, in response to overheating of the facility?s reactor units 1, 2 and 3 and uncontained spent fuel pools, has led to run-off of contaminated waters to the adjacent Pacific Ocean that, cumulatively, measure 10,000 higher than pre-tsunami levels and exceed the release of radionuclides to the marine environment from Chernobyl accident. With funding through this Grant for Rapid Response Research (RAPID), a research team at the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution will participate in a JAMSTEC-led cruise in June-July 2011, and deploy a time-series sediment trap mooring at a station 80km off the coast of Japan. The specific goal will be to collect settling particulate radionuclide matter over the coming weeks and months through to an already-scheduled cruise to recover the moorings in May, 2012. By deploying traps at 500m and 1000m, the team will intercept particle-attached radionuclide settling out of the upper ocean and assess their fluxes into the deep ocean interior. They will collect fresh samples approximately every 2 weeks at each depth throughout the sampling period to complement ?snap-shot? sampling that will be conducted aboard the JAMSTEC cruise at the start and end of the deployment period.The team will also collaborate closely with Dr. Ken Buessler at WHOI (already funded separately, including a complementary NSF-RAPID project) who will be responsible for radionuclide analyses of particulate samples at no additional cost to this proposal. This project will handle preparation, deployment and recovery of the time-series sediment trap mooring as well as preliminary sample splitting, characterization of samples for biogeochemical properties and sample archiving. Radionuclides of primary interest at this time include 137Cs, 134Cs, 106Ru, 144Ce and 147Pm; other species (e.g. Pu isotopes) may also prove to be of interest within the lifetime of the deployment. Thus an important part of the project will also be to stand ready to provide further splits of these well characterized samples to US, Japanese and other interested international research groups in the future, as need arises. Broader Impacts: As learned in the aftermath of Chernobyl, establishing the distributions and activities of radionuclides present in the environment as soon as possible post-release is important to understanding the severity of the releases that have occurred, their implications for public health, and to establish "time zero" conditions against which the wider oceanographic community can subsequently track the fate of long-lived (conservative and biogeochemically-active) radionuclides. In addition to the strong international (WHOI-JAMSTEC) collaboration that has already been developed for this project, the team will share all data (banked with BCO-DMO at Woods Hole) and samples collected by this work with the wider national and international science community and public.