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GEOTRACES inter-calibration of the stable silicon isotope composition of dissolved silicic acid in seawater

  • Patricia Grasse*
  • , Mark A. Brzezinski
  • , Damien Cardinal
  • , Gregory F. De Souza
  • , Per Andersson
  • , Ivia Closset
  • , Zhimian Cao
  • , Minhan Dai
  • , Claudia Ehlert
  • , Nicolas Estrade
  • , Roger François
  • , Martin Frank
  • , Guibin Jiang
  • , Janice L. Jones
  • , Ellen Kooijman
  • , Qian Liu
  • , Dawei Lu
  • , Katharina Pahnke
  • , Emanuel Ponzevera
  • , Melanie Schmitt
  • Xiaole Sun, Jill N. Sutton, François Thil, Dominique Weis, Florian Wetzel, Anyu Zhang, Jing Zhang, Zhouling Zhang
*Corresponding author for this work
  • Helmholtz Centre for Ocean Research Kiel
  • University of California at Santa Barbara
  • Sorbonne Université
  • Swiss Federal Institute of Technology Zurich
  • Swedish Museum of Natural History
  • Xiamen University
  • University of Oldenburg
  • University of British Columbia
  • CNRS/LEGOS
  • CAS - Research Center for Eco-Environmental Sciences
  • Institut français de recherche pour l'exploitation de la mer
  • Stockholm University
  • Université de Bretagne Occidentale
  • Commissariat à l’énergie atomique et aux énergies alternatives
  • East China Normal University

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

Abstract

The first inter-calibration study of the stable silicon isotope composition of dissolved silicic acid in seawater, δ30Si(OH)4, is presented as a contribution to the international GEOTRACES program. Eleven laboratories from seven countries analyzed two seawater samples from the North Pacific subtropical gyre (Station ALOHA) collected at 300 m and at 1000 m water depth. Sampling depths were chosen to obtain samples with a relatively low (9 μmol L-1, 300 m) and a relatively high (113 μmol L-1, 1000 m) silicic acid concentration as sample preparation differs for low- and high-concentration samples. Data for the 1000 m water sample were not normally distributed so the median is used to represent the central tendency for the two samples. Median δ30Si(OH)4 values of +1.66‰ for the low-concentration sample and +1.25‰ for the high-concentration sample were obtained. Agreement among laboratories is overall considered very good; however, small but statistically significant differences among the mean isotope values obtained by different laboratories were detected, likely reflecting inter-laboratory differences in chemical preparation including pre-concentration and purification methods together with different volumes of seawater analyzed, and the use of different mass spectrometers including the Neptune MC-ICP-MS (Thermo Fisher™, Germany), the Nu Plasma MC-ICP-MS (Nu Instruments™, Wrexham, UK), and the Finnigan™ (now Thermo Fisher™, Germany) MAT 252 IRMS. Future studies analyzing δ30Si(OH)4 in seawater should also analyze and report values for these same two reference waters in order to facilitate comparison of data generated among and within laboratories over time.

Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)562-578
Number of pages17
JournalJournal of Analytical Atomic Spectrometry
Volume32
Issue number3
DOIs
StatePublished - Mar 2017
Externally publishedYes

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