0000000000299588
AUTHOR
Janusz Dominik
Mapping Sediment Accumulation Rate by using Volume magnetic Susceptibility Core Correlation in a contaminated Bay (Lake Geneva, Switzerland)
The Bay of Vidy is the most contaminated area of Lake Geneva: contamination is caused by the effluent of the sewage treatment plant (STP) of the City of Lausanne. The implementation of a chemical stage in the treatment plant to remove phosphorus using FeC13 in 1971 is indirectly recorded in the lake sediments by a strong and sharp increase in the volume magnetic susceptibility (VMS) signal. A total of 43 sediment cores have been retrieved and measured for VMS. The synchronism of the VMS signal increase and its relation to the implementation of the P-removal stage in the STP has been shown in seven 137Cs-dated sediment cores. The VMS signal has been used to date by stratigraphie correlation …
Cinq millénaires de métallurgie en montagne basque. Les apports d'une démarche intégrée alliant palynologie et géochimie isotopique du plomb
Five thousand years of metallurgy in the basque mountains : the contributions of an integrated process mixing palynology and the isotopic chemistry of lead. An interdisciplinary research combining palyno- logy and lead isotopic geochemistry was performed in a peat bog of the Basque Country, in an area recognized as being an old metallurgical centre. These various analyses make it possible to reconstitute mining and metallurgical activities and to appreciate the impact on forest during last five millennia. Several phases are attested between late Neolithic and modern times (Middle Bronze age, Late Bronze age, Antiquity and finally modern time). Most of these phases are clearly related to for…
Noise identification and sampling frequency determination for precise Pb isotopic measurements by quadrupole-based Inductively Coupled Plasma Mass Spectrometry
Analytical precision of the isotope ratios measured by quadrupole-based ICP-MS is drastically controlled by the low- frequency noises which originate from nebulisation and vaporisation processes, and from sample introduction systems. The unde- sirable influence of these latter can be however reduced by choosing efficiently the operating parameters. In the present study , the choice of the stabilisation time necessary in peak jump mode, and the one of the number of sweeps are discussed in the light of noise power spectra obtained with various speeds of the peristaltic pump used as sample introduction system. Obviously, the settings proposed are probably efficient only on our own ICP-MS, but …
Origin of atmospheric lead in Johannesburg, South Africa
International audience; The origin of lead in the atmosphere of Johannesburg, South Africa was investigated on the basis of elemental and lead isotopic analyses of coals, mine dumps, gasoline, and about 30 epiphytic lichen samples. Lead predominantly comes from automotive exhausts in urban and suburban areas, as leaded antiknock additives were still in use in South Africa at the time of the study. Although dust emissions from the numerous mine-tailing dumps were expected to contribute significantly to the heavy metal budget, the southern townships that are surrounded by the dumps (such as Soweto and other historically Black residential areas) do not appear to be more than partially influenc…
Modeling of 137Cs migration in soils using an 80-year soil archive: role of fertilizers and agricultural amendments
An 80-year soil archive, the 42-plot experimental design at the INRA in Versailles (France), is used here to study long-term contamination by 137Cs atmospheric deposition and the fate of this radioisotope when associated with various agricultural practices: fallow land, KCl, NH4(NO3), superphosphate fertilizers, horse manure and lime amendments. The pertinence of a simple box model, where radiocaesium is supposed to move downward by convectional mechanisms, is checked using samples from control plots which had been neither amended, nor cultivated since 1928. This simple model presents the advantage of depending on only two parameters: α, a proportional factor allowing the historical atmosph…
Geochemical records of limestone façades exposed to urban atmospheric contamination as monitoring tools?
International audience; Magnetic susceptibility, surface rock soiling, elemental composition and lead isotope ratios were measured in surface stone samples collected at different heights of a late 19th century building in Dijon, France. We targeted four limestone facades that differ in orientation and proximity to car traffic. It seems that zinc, copper, sulphur and cadmium are present as diffuse pollutants in urban atmosphere, at least at the scale of the building studied. In contrast, lead and arsenic exhibit point sources: automotive traffic and past coal-burning fly-ash emissions; both coherent with lead isotopic composition measurements. Parameter variations primarily result from expos…
History and Environmental Impact of Mining Activity in Celtic Aeduan Territory Recorded in a Peat Bog (Morvan, France)
The present study aims to document historical mining and smelting activities by means of geochemical and pollen analyses performed in a peat bog core collected around the Bibracte oppidum (Morvan, France), the largest settlement of the great Aeduan Celtic tribe (ca. 180 B.C. to 25 A.D.). The anthropogenic Pb profile indicates local mining operations starting from the Late Bronze Age, ca. cal. 1300 B.C. Lead inputs peaked at the height of Aeduan civilization and then decreased after the Roman conquest of Gaul, when the site was abandoned. Other phases of mining are recognized from the 11th century to modern times. They have all led to modifications in plant cover, probably related in part to…