The aliphatic hydrocarbon distributions of terrestrial plants around an alpine lake: a pilot study from Lake Ximencuo, Eastern Qinghai-Tibet Plateau

doi:10.1007/s11707-017-0685-5

Front. Earth Sci.

2018, Vol. 12

Issue (3) : 600-610 https://doi.org/10.1007/s11707-017-0685-5

RESEARCH ARTICLE

The aliphatic hydrocarbon distributions of terrestrial plants around an alpine lake: a pilot study from Lake Ximencuo, Eastern Qinghai-Tibet Plateau

Yang PU(

), Jihong JIA, Jicheng CAO

School of Geographical Sciences, Nanjing University of Information Science & Technology, Nanjing 210044, China

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Abstract

As part of an investigation of the sources of aliphatic hydrocarbons to the sediments of alpine Lake Ximencuo, leaves of the eight dominant vascular plants were collected and their hydrocarbon contents were analyzed. A series of unsaturated aliphatic hydrocarbons were identified in the plant leaves; in particular, Festuca sp. contain a series of n-alkadienes that have rarely been reported in previous studies. The comparison of n-alkane proxies (ACL_27–33, ACL_T, P_aq, and CPI) and d¹³C_org among plant leaves, surface soils, and lake sediments suggests that organic proxies have been altered to varying degrees during the transport and burial process of organic materials. It is believed that microbial reworking and source changes have great impacts on organic proxies in the alpine lake system. In addition, the cluster analysis for plant leaves depending on n-alkane compositions and the ACL_T proxy generates similar results. Accordingly, we postulate that the average chain length of plant waxes might be a potential indicator of plant classification in regions such as the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau.

Keywords plant leaves alpine lake n-alkanes n-alkadienes Qinghai-Tibet Plateau (QTP)

Corresponding Author(s): Yang PU

Just Accepted Date: 07 December 2017 Online First Date: 05 January 2018 Issue Date: 05 September 2018

Cite this article:

Yang PU,Jihong JIA,Jicheng CAO. The aliphatic hydrocarbon distributions of terrestrial plants around an alpine lake: a pilot study from Lake Ximencuo, Eastern Qinghai-Tibet Plateau[J]. Front. Earth Sci., 2018, 12(3): 600-610.

URL:

https://academic.hep.com.cn/fesci/EN/10.1007/s11707-017-0685-5
https://academic.hep.com.cn/fesci/EN/Y2018/V12/I3/600

Fig.1 Location of the Nianbaoyeze area on the eastern Qinghai-Tibet (a) Plateau and the setting of Lake Ximencuo (b). The extensive areas west and north of the Plateau are dominated by westerlies and the summer monsoons, including the East Asia monsoon and Indian monsoon.

Tab.1 Detailed information about the 8 terrestrial plants collected from the Ximencuo region

Fig.2 Distributions of the n-alkanes in the leaves of eight dominant plants around Lake Ximencuo (the gray bars emphasize the dominant carbon numbers).

Fig.3 Chromatograms of the n-alkene and n-alkadiene distributions in leaves of Festuca sp.

Fig.4 Mass spectra of the n-alkadiene series identified in leaves of Festuca sp.

Tab.2 General information of the unsaturated hydrocarbon series identified in eight plant leaves

Fig.5 The comparison of n-alkane indexes (CPI, ACL_T, ACL_27–33, P_aq, and d¹³C_org) between plant leaves, surface soils, and lake sediments. The dotted lines denote the monotonic trend of organic proxies.

Fig.6 Cluster analysis showing affinities between the eight terrestrial plants in this study, presented in terms of squared Euclidean distances that depended on their leaf wax n-alkane compositions (a) and ACL_T (b).

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