New Publication: Ramped Oxidation and Fine-Scale ¹⁴C Analyses of Saltmarsh Soils
C‑BLUES is pleased to highlight a new publication by Alex Houston, Mark Garnett, and William Austin, recently published in Radiocarbon. The study investigates how advanced radiocarbon techniques can improve our understanding of carbon storage and cycling in saltmarsh soils.
The paper, "Ramped oxidation and fine scale serial ¹⁴C analyses of saltmarsh soils", investigates how different carbon pools within saltmarsh soils can be identified using a combination of ramped oxidation and radiocarbon (RO‑¹⁴C) analysis.
The researchers performed RO‑¹⁴C analyses on surface saltmarsh soils and dated narrow temperature intervals produced during the ramped oxidation process. They then compared these measurements with the radiocarbon content of CO₂ respired from the same soils.
The study found that no modern (post-bomb) ¹⁴C contents were resolved in the thermal fractions analysed. The authors also found that the most biologically available organic carbon was younger than any of the thermal fractions identified in the surface soils.
Based on these results, the authors conclude that ramped oxidation alone was not able to isolate both the youngest and most biologically available organic carbon pools in the saltmarsh soils examined. The paper suggests that combining RO‑¹⁴C analyses with measurements of the ¹⁴C content of respired CO₂ may provide additional insights into carbon cycling processes.
The publication forms part of ongoing research supported through C‑BLUES on carbon cycling in coastal ecosystems.
📖 Read the paper:
https://doi.org/10.1017/RDC.2026.10245