RAPID: Characterizing the Chemical and Physical Signature of the 2015-16 El Nino in the Quelccaya Ice Cap Snow and Ice to Calibrate Past ENSO Reconstructions

该奖项在快速反应研究（RAPID）概念的支持下使用资金，从秘鲁南部的Quelccaya冰帽（QIC）挖掘三个新的雪坑并收集两个新的十米长的冰芯。 将对来自这些坑和芯的样品进行物理和化学分析，以解决沉积后特征（例如，熔化特征）和干沉积痕量物质的浓度升高（例如，黑碳、尘埃、铵）为过去的厄尔尼诺-南方涛动（ENSO）事件提供了新的可靠标志，也有助于量化事件的强度。 这些新的标志也将应用于从过去四十年收集的大量热带冰芯档案中获得的南安第斯山脉的其他冰芯，过去厄尔尼诺事件的化学和物理特征保存在安第斯冰川的冰芯中，特别是QIC，并提供了量化过去区域厄尔尼诺/南方涛动变化的可能性。 QIC先前的同位素（δ 18-氧）记录提供了太平洋海面温度（SST）变化的长期年度解析历史（1，800年）。然而，QIC上的δ 18-O也受到其他内部变化的气候系统过程的影响（例如，南美洲季风，ITCZ位置）。 因此，需要有更多的厄尔尼诺代用指标，以减少过去厄尔尼诺现象再现时所固有的不确定性，并帮助更准确地预测强度和频率。第一章厄尔尼诺现象引起的积雪融化和渗透在前一年的雪层中是可以识别的，并且可以根据厄尔尼诺现象的强度进行校准。温度和辐射强迫;（2）在冰的更深处，生物和碳酸盐物种的浓度和共同联系将得到增强和检测，从而揭示过去的厄尔尼诺频率，潜在的更广泛的影响包括在真实的时间内捕获现代厄尔尼诺事件的化学和物理特征，这可能有助于评估冰芯中保存的过去ENSO变化，以及评估太阳强迫在气候中的作用。这项研究将有助于支持一名早期职业女性科学家，研究结果将以适合公众的短视频片段形式传播。

This award uses funds, under the auspices of the Rapid Response Research (RAPID) concept, to dig three new snow pits and collect two new ten-meter long cores from the Quelccaya ice cap (QIC) in southern Peru. Samples from these pits and cores will be physically and chemically analyzed to address the hypotheses that post-depositional features (e.g., melt features) and elevated concentrations of dry deposited trace species (e.g., black carbon, dust, ammonium) provide new and reliable markers of past El Niño-Southern Oscillation (ENSO) events and also help facilitate the quantification of the event's intensity. These new markers will be also applied to other ice cores from the southern Andes that exist from extended tropical ice core archives collected over the last forty years.The chemical and physical fingerprints of past El Niño events are preserved in ice cores from Andean glaciers, particularly the QIC, and offer the potential to quantify past regional ENSO variability. Previous isotopic (delta 18-Oxygen) records from the QIC provided a long annually resolved history (1,800 years) of Pacific sea surface temperature (SST) variations. However, delta 18-O on the QIC is also influenced by other internally varying climate system processes (e.g., South American Monsoon, ITCZ position). Consequently, additional El Niño proxies are needed to reduce the uncertainties inherent in past El Niño reconstructions and to help facilitate more accurate projections of intensity and frequency.The new data that could result from the research is aimed at testing two hypotheses: 1) the snow melt and percolation induced by El Niño is identifiable in the prior year's snow layer and can be calibrated to the El Niño's strength in terms of temperature and radiative forcing; and 2) the concentration and co-association of biogenic and evaporitic species will be enhanced and detectable deeper in the ice and thereby reveal past El Niño frequency.The potential broader impacts include capturing the chemical and physical signatures of a modern El Niño event in real time that could help evaluate past ENSO variability preserved in ice cores as well as assessing the role of solar forcing in climate. The research will help support an early career female scientist and the research results will be disseminated in short video segments appropriate for the public.