Carbon pools and fluxes measured during a field campaign conducted in 2010 on the Tibetan Plateau at Kema

The Tibetan highlands host the largest alpine grassland ecosystems worldwide, bearing soils that store substantial stocks of carbon (C) that are very sensitive to land use changes. This study focuses on the cycling of photoassimilated C within a Kobresia pygmaea pasture, the dominating ecosystems on the Tibetan highlands. We investigated short-term effects of grazing cessation and the role of the characteristic Kobresia root turf on C fluxes and belowground C turnover. By combining eddy-covariance measurements with 13CO2 pulse labeling we applied a powerful new approach to measure absolute fluxes of assimilates within and between various pools of the plant-soil-atmosphere system. The roots and soil each store roughly 50% of the overall C in the system (76 Mg C/ha), with only a minor contribution from shoots, which is also expressed in the root:shoot ratio of 90. During June and July the pasture acted as a weak C sink with a strong uptake of approximately 2 g C/m**2/ in the first half of July. The root turf was the main compartment for the turnover of photoassimilates, with a subset of highly dynamic roots (mean residence time 20 days), and plays a key role for the C cycling and C storage in this ecosystem. The short-term grazing cessation only affected aboveground biomass but not ecosystem scale C exchange or assimilate allocation into roots and soil.

Alpine permafrost index map

The objective of this study is the production of an Alpine Permafrost Index Map (APIM) covering the entire European Alps. A unified statistical model that is based on Alpine-wide permafrost observations is used for debris and bedrock surfaces across the entire Alps. The explanatory variables of the model are mean annual air temperatures, potential incoming solar radiation and precipitation. Offset terms were applied to make model predictions for topographic and geomorphic conditions that differ from the terrain features used for model fitting. These offsets are based on literature review and involve some degree of subjective choice during model building. The assessment of the APIM is challenging because limited independent test data are available for comparison and these observations represent point information in a spatially highly variable topography. The APIM provides an index that describes the spatial distribution of permafrost and comes together with an interpretation key that helps to assess map uncertainties and to relate map contents to their actual expression in terrain. The map can be used as a first resource to estimate permafrost conditions at any given location in the European Alps in a variety of contexts such as research and spatial planning. Results show that Switzerland likely is the country with the largest permafrost area in the Alps, followed by Italy, Austria, France and Germany. Slovenia and Liechtenstein may have marginal permafrost areas. In all countries the permafrost area is expected to be larger than the glacier-covered area.

Miocene palaeoclimate reconstructions from the North Alpine Foreland Basin in Germany

Early- and Middle-Miocene sediments of the North Alpine Foreland Basin (NAFB) in Southern Germany contain one of the world richest regional records of silicified wood. Here we analyze over 1,000 identifiable samples, belonging to 80 wood anatomical taxa from 61 stratigraphically well-dated localities using principally the Coexistence Approach. The samples investigated originate from fluvial sediments representing periods of intensified surface runoff in the NAFB and therefore represent and provide information pertaining to the wet end-member of the fluctuating climate system. The dry end of the climate system is represented in the profiles either by hiatuses or palaeosoils. The dataset is split into four xylofloras: (I) the Ortenburg xyloflora (Late Ottnangian; ~17.5 to 17.3 Ma) originating from a paratropical evergreen Carapoxylon (Xylocarpus) forest; (II) the Southern Franconian Alb xyloflora (Late Karpatian; 17.0 to ~16.3 Ma) originating from a subtropical semideciduous limestone forest; (III) the upper Older Series xyloflora (Early Badenian; ~16.3 to ~15.3 Ma) originating from a subtropical oak-laurel forest; and (IV) the upper Middle Series xyloflora (Middle Badenian; 14.3 to ~13.8 Ma) originating from a subtropical dry deciduous forest.

Position measurements at five permanent GPS stations in the Bavarian Alps as part of the Geodetic Alpine Integrated Network (GAIN) of the ALPS-GPSQUAKENET project

In the frame of the transnational ALPS-GPSQUAKENET project, a component of the Alpine Space Programme of the European Community Initiative Programme (CIP) INTERREG III B, the Deutsches Geodätisches Forschungsinstitut (DGFI) in Munich, Germany, installed in 2005 five continuously operating permanent GPS stations located along the northern Alps boundary in Bavaria. The main objective of the ALPS-GPSQUAKENET project was to build-up a high-performance transnational space geodetic network of Global Positioning System (GPS) receivers in the Alpine region (the so-called Geodetic Alpine Integrated Network, GAIN). Data from this network allows for studying crustal deformations in near real-time to monitor Earthquake hazard and improve natural disaster prevention. The five GPS stations operatied by DGFI are mounted on concrete pillars attached to solid rock. The names of the stations are (from west to east) Hochgrat (HGRA), Breitenberg (BREI), Fahrenberg (FAHR), Hochries (HRIE) and Wartsteinkopf (WART). The provided data series start from October 7, 2005. Data are stored with a temporal spacing of 15 seconds in daily RINEX files.