Rose, Neil L; Ruppel, Meri; (2015) Environmental Archives of Contaminant Particles. In: Blais, Jules M and Rosen, Michael R and Smol, John P, (eds.) Environmental Contaminants: Using natural archives to track sources and long-term trends of pollution. (pp. 187-221). Springer: Dordrecht, Netherlands.

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Abstract

Particulates in the environment may be contaminants or pollutants. They may affect climate through: the absorption of energy in the atmosphere and by reducing the albedo of ice and snow surfaces; may enhance the transfer and distribution of pollutants such as trace metals and persistent organic pollutants via absorption and adsorption to their surfaces; may adversely impact the health of aquatic life and consequently other biota that depend upon it; in the atmosphere they may have direct effects on human health via respiratory disease and the transfer of substances deep into the respiratory system. Therefore, it is important to be able to determine temporal trends in particulate emissions and deposition. Natural archives such as ice, sediment and peat cores can provide well-resolved records, but research has mainly focussed on a few particle types, and predominantly black carbon. In this chapter we review the environmental records of black carbon and other industrially-derived particles, their analysis, interpretation and relative strengths and weaknesses. Finally we consider two emerging particle types: microplastics and nanoparticles. These latter groups have, so far, received little attention from palaeoecological perspectives but their direct impacts on aquatic biota and ability to transport pollutants within the atmosphere and aquatic ecosystems is becoming increasingly apparent in the literature and are predicted to further increase in coming decades.

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