Abstract
Carbon flux rates are widely understood to be substrate controlled; however, characterizing substrate quality continues to be a challenge. We suggest that, while optical measurements have their place, they are not the only, or the best, tool for characterizing organic matter quality. Nominal oxidation state of the carbon provides a thermodynamically relevant measure, which could be used as a metric of organic matter quality. Calculating nominal oxidation state of the carbon requires a suite of advanced complementary analysis but is then trivial to calculate from the resulting data sets.
Original language | English (US) |
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Pages (from-to) | 1790-1795 |
Number of pages | 6 |
Journal | Journal of Geophysical Research: Biogeosciences |
Volume | 123 |
Issue number | 6 |
DOIs |
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State | Published - Jun 2018 |
Externally published | Yes |
Keywords
- FTICRMS
- OM quality
- dissolved organic matter
- humics
- optical measurements
ASJC Scopus subject areas
- Soil Science
- Forestry
- Water Science and Technology
- Palaeontology
- Atmospheric Science
- Aquatic Science
- Ecology