Review of pre-processing technologies for ice cores
High-resolution ice core records covering long time spans enable reconstruction of the past climatic and environmental conditions allowing the investigation of the earth system's evolution. Preprocessing of ice cores has direct impacts on the data quality control for further analysis since the...
| Published in: | Journal of Mountain Science |
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| Main Authors: | , , , , , , |
| Format: | Article in Journal/Newspaper |
| Language: | English |
| Published: |
2018
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| Subjects: | |
| Online Access: | http://ir.imde.ac.cn/handle/131551/46304 https://doi.org/10.1007/s11629-017-4679-2 |
| Summary: | High-resolution ice core records covering long time spans enable reconstruction of the past climatic and environmental conditions allowing the investigation of the earth system's evolution. Preprocessing of ice cores has direct impacts on the data quality control for further analysis since the conventional ice core processing is time-consuming, produces qualitative data, leads to ice mass loss, and leads to risks of potential secondary pollution. However, over the past several decades, preprocessing of ice cores has received less attention than the improvement of ice drilling, the analytical methodology of various indices, and the researches on the climatic and environmental significance of ice core records. Therefore, this papers reviews the development of the processing for ice cores including framework, design as well as materials, analyzes the technical advantages and disadvantages of the different systems. In the past, continuous flow analysis (CFA) has been successfully applied to process the polar ice cores. However, it is not suitable for ice cores outside polar region because of high level of particles, the memory effect between samples, and the filtration before injection. Ice core processing is a subtle and professional operation due to the fragility of the nonmetallic materials and the random distribution of particles and air bubbles in ice cores, which aggravates uncertainty in the measurements. The future developments of CFA are discussed in preprocessing, memory effect, challenge for brittle ice, coupling with real-time analysis and optimization of CFA in the field. Furthermore, non-polluting cutters with many different configurations could be designed to cut and scrape in multiple directions and to separate inner and outer portions of the core. This system also needs to be coupled with streamlined operation of packaging, coding, and stacking that can be implemented at high resolution and rate, avoiding manual intervention. At the same time, information of the longitudinal sections could be ... |
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