Palaeogeography, Palaeoclimatology, Palaeoecology 270 (2008) 5963

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Palaeogeography, Palaeoclimatology, Palaeoecology

j o u r n a l h o m e p a g e : w w w. e l s e v i e r. c o m / l o c a t e / p a l a e o

A 130-ka reconstruction of precipitation on the Chinese Loess Plateau from organic carbon isotopes
Ning Youfeng a,b, Liu Weiguo a,c,, An Zhisheng a
a b c

State Key Laboratory of Loess and Quaternary Geology, Institute of Earth Environment, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Xi'an 710075, China Northwest Key Laboratory of Water Resource and Environment Ecology, Ministry of Education, Xi'an University of Technology, Xi'an 710048, China School of Human Settlement and Civil Engineering, Xi'an Jiaotong University, Xi'an 710049, China

a r t i c l e

i n f o

a b s t r a c t
We study the relationship between organic carbon isotopes (13CTOC) in soil and mean annual precipitation (MAP) in the East Asian monsoon area by combining the results of carbon isotope studies of plants, C4/C3 ratios, and precipitation in the modern ecosystem of the Chinese Loess Plateau. Based on this relationship, we estimate the amount of paleoprecipitation that has occurred in the southeastern part of the Loess Plateau since the last interglacial stage using the carbon isotopic compositions of the soil organic matter (SOM). The results show that the annual precipitation in that region was high during the interglacial stages, with a maximum value of 850 mm, and that it decreased during the last glacial stage to a minimum value of 350 mm. We suggest that the use of organic carbon isotopic composition in paleosol sediments is a reliable method for reconstructing paleoprecipitation due to the clear relationships between soil 13CTOC, C4/C3 abundance, and precipitation in modern ecosystems. 2008 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Article history: Received 5 May 2008 Received in revised form 29 August 2008 Accepted 29 August 2008 Keywords: Precipitation Soil carbon isotope C4/C3 plant Loess Plateau

1. Introduction Several methods have been applied toward the quantitative reconstruction of paleoprecipitation in the Chinese Loess Plateau, including magnetic susceptibility, geochemical transfer function, and opal phytoliths (Maher et al., 1994; Wu et al., 1994; Maher and Thompson, 1995; Lu et al., 1996; Sun et al., 1999). Based on relationships between rainfall and the pedogenic magnetic susceptibility of the modern soil in the Loess Plateau, researchers have reconstructed the paleoprecipitation for that region using the magnetic susceptibility of the loess-paleosol sequences (Maher and Thompson, 1995; Lu et al., 1996). Sun et al. (1999) reconstructed the paleotemperature and paleoprecipitation of the past 13 ka in the Weinan section of the Loess Plateau using geochemical transfer functions (free Fe2O3, total Fe and carbonate). Wu et al. (1994) established an opal phytolith climatic factor transfer function using 162 surface soil samples, and also reconstructed the paleoclimate in the Weinan section. However, the manners in which these methods correspond to precipitation are not very clear; for example, the viability of using the variations in magnetic susceptibility is still being debated (Heller and Liu, 1982; Kukla et al., 1988; Kletestschka and Banerjee, 1995; Meng et al., 1997; Lu et al., 2000). This restricts the

Corresponding author. Institute of Earth Environment, Chinese Academy of Science, Xi'an, 710075, China. Fax: +86 29 88320456. E-mail addresses: liuwg@loess.llqg.ac.cn, liuxg419@hotmail.com (L. Weiguo). 0031-0182/$ see front matter 2008 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved. doi:10.1016/j.palaeo.2008.08.015

interpretation of loess magnetic susceptibility as an indicator of paleoprecipitation. Soil organic matter (SOM) is derived directly from the plant communities of a given area, and the response of soil organic carbon isotopes to climatic change is relatively clear. Precipitation affects plant 13C values (Stewart et al., 1995; Schulze et al., 1996; Wang et al., 2003; Liu et al., 2005a) in a way that is well understood (Farquhar et al., 1982). According to eight hypotheses, Hatte et al. (1998, 2001) set a simplied relationship between 13C and rainfall, and quantitatively reconstructed the paleoprecipitation of the last glaciation in Nussloch. However, only C3 plants grew in the cooler high latitudes in the sites they studied. In low and middle latitudes, such as those of the Chinese Loess Plateau, C4 plants have grown, and C4/C3 plant ratios could also affect the soil carbon isotopes because of the different 13C values of these two plant types (Liu et al., 2005b). The inuence of precipitation on both C3 and C4 plants and C4/C3 ratios and therefore on soil organic carbon isotopes should be considered in reconstructing paleoprecipitation in Chinese loess-paleosol sediments. There has been much research on soil carbon isotopes on the Chinese Loess Plateau, most of which has been focused on paleovegetation reconstruction using C4/C3 plant ratios (Gu et al., 2003; Vidic and Montaez, 2004; Liu et al., 2005c). The goal of the present study is to estimate the amounts of paleoprecipitation in the Loess Plateau. Our research is comprised of the following steps: (1) we collected additional plant samples based on earlier research (Liu et al., 2005b) to further assess the relationship between plant carbon isotopes and mean annual precipitation in the Loess Plateau; (2) utilizing the

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Fig. 1. Correlations between the 13C values of plants and annual precipitation (a is Bothriochloa ischaemum, a C4 plant, R2 = 0.588; df = 36; p b 0.001; b is Stipa bungeana, a C3 plant, R2 = 0.415; df = 45; p b 0.001).

relation between the C4/C3 ratios and annual precipitation published by An et al. (2005), we constructed a mathematical model of the relationship between the annual precipitation and soil organic carbon isotopes; (3) we used the above-mentioned model to reconstruct the paleoprecipitation patterns of the southeastern part of the Loess Plateau over the past 130 ka. 2. Methods Fresh samples of modern plants were collected in the eastern part of the Chinese Loess Plateau. Living plants were collected during their growing season, because rainfall is concentrated in the period from May to October in the Loess Plateau. The samples were taken from the open loess surface or gentle slopes on which the plants can receive abundant light. Furthermore, the sampling sites were restricted to natural environments without irrigation or farming, so that the carbon isotope compositions of the plants would reect natural climatic conditions (environmental humidity).

The native C4 and C3 grasses of the Loess Plateau are mainly dominated by Bothriochloa ischaemum and Stipa bungeana, respectively, which are widely distributed in the natural ecosystem. We therefore selected these two species for studying the variation of the carbon isotopes in the plants of this area. Based on earlier reported results (Liu et al., 2005b), the present study further assesses the relationship between the carbon isotopes of modern plants and the mean annual precipitation throughout most of the Loess Plateau. The mean annual precipitation of the study area has varied between 240 mm and 700 mm during the past ten years. We measured the soil organic carbon isotopic composition of a loesspaleosol sequence (10912E, 3412N) in the Lantian area of the Shaanxi Province, where the mean annual temperature and precipitation are 13.0 C and 673 mm, respectively. The age model for the loess-paleosol prole was established by comparing magnetic susceptibility data with marine isotope stages (Porter and An,1995). The basis for this correlation is that the loess and paleosol sequences recorded cycles of glacial interglacial paleoclimate, which can be reected in magnetic susceptibility

Fig. 2. Variation of soil 13CTOC and mean annual precipitation (MAP) in the Lantian and Weinan sections during the past 130 ka. (a is the Lantian section, b is the Weinan section; solid dots and hollow triangles indicate the MAP and soil 13CTOC value, respectively).

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and correlated with dated marine isotope stages. The organic carbon isotopic results of the Weinan prole (Liu et al., 2005d) are also utilized in the present study. The Weinan prole (10929E, 3420N) is located about 50 km northeast of the Lantian prole, and has mean annual temperature and precipitation of 13.6 C and 623 mm, respectively. The plant and soil samples were treated with 2 M HCl to exclude the inorganic carbon. Organic carbon from dried soil samples was combusted for 4 h at 860 C in an evacuated sealed quartz tube in the presence of Ag foil, cupric oxide, and Cu foil. The puried carbon oxide was then analyzed for carbon isotopes, using a MAT-251 mass spectrometer with a dual inlet system. The 13C/12C ratio is expressed as the parts per thousand deviations (per mil) from the V-PDB (Vienna Peedee Belemnite) standard, and analytical precision was 0.2. 3. Results The carbon isotopic data from thirty-seven Bothriochloa ischaemum samples and forty-eight Stipa bungeana samples are considered in the present study, in addition to utilizing the earlier work of Liu et al. (2005a) and some supplementary plant data. The 13C values of the Bothriochloa ischaemum samples vary from 13.50 to 11.85, with a mean value of 12.42 (Fig. 1a), while the 13C values of Stipa bungeana samples vary from 28.97 to 24.29, with a mean value of 26.93 (Fig. 1b). The 13C values of the soil organic matter vary from 23.0 to 16.9 for the period since the last interglacial stage, with the maximum in S1 and the minimum in L1 in the Lantian prole (Fig. 2a). The carbon isotopic data of the period since the last interglacial stage in the Weinan prole are taken from a previously published paper (Liu et al., 2005d). These 13C values are more positive, varying from 23.1 to 16, but also have their maximum in S1 and their minimum in L1 (Fig. 2b). 4. Discussion 4.1. Mathematical model of the 13C values and precipitation in the modern ecosystem 4.1.1. The basic principles Farquhar (Farquhar et al., 1982; Farquhar, 1983; Farquhar et al., 1989) studied carbon isotopic fractionation in leaves, and considered that this process is inuenced by climatic factors such as temperature, moisture, light, and atmospheric CO2. They established the following model of carbon isotopic fractionation in leaves: In C3 plants: p a a b3 aCi =Ca In C4 plants: p a a b4 b3 a Ci =Ca where p is the carbon isotopic composition of the plants (); a is the composition () of the CO2 in the environment; a is the fractionation factor () caused by diffusion; b3 is the fractionation factor () caused by ribulose bisphosphate (RuP2) carboxylation; b4 is the fractionation factor () caused by phosphoenolpyruvate (PEP) carboxylation; is the proportion of carbon xed by PEP carboxylation, which subsequently leaks out of the bundle sheath; and Ci and Ca are the intercellular and ambient partial pressures of CO2, respectively. The availability of water has a marked inuence on carbon isotopic fractionation. A shortage of water would induce the plant to close its stoma, and thus would reduce the intercellular partial pressures of CO2 (Ci). According to Farquar's theory (Farquhar et al., 1982; Farquhar, 1983; Farquhar et al., 1989), if Ci decreases, the p value will be larger. That the absence of water can increase the 13C value of a plant has been conrmed by many researchers (Stewart et al., 1995; Wang et al., 2003; Liu et al., 2005a). Temperature, however, exercises an uncertain inuence on the carbon isotopic composition of plants. Research has shown that a

variety of relationships can exist between temperature and the isotopic composition of carbon in plants (Francey et al., 1985; Schleser and Helle, 1999; Wang et al., 2002; Ning et al., 2002). Schleser and Helle (1999) demonstrated that the 13C data from ve trees of the southern Black Forest give temperature coefcients between +0.1 to +0.13/C.Wang et al. (2002) have also investigated the variation of the 13C values of four C3 plant species, and the correspondence of those values to the mean annual temperature in northern China. Their results showed that the 13C values of all four plant species decreased with increasing mean annual temperature, but with different coefcients (ranging from 0.13/C to 0.51/C).Their results also demonstrated the opposite relationship between plant 13C and temperature. In the Chinese Loess Plateau, rainfall is the dominant factor limiting plant growth and contributing to the carbon isotopic compositions of plants. Because of the uncertain relations between plant 13C and temperature, we do not consider temperature variations in the present study. The 13C values of atmospheric CO2 could directly affect plant carbon isotopic composition, as the carbon in plants is derived from atmospheric CO2. Hatte et al. (2001) have reconstructed the 13C values of atmospheric CO2 for the period from 72 to 16 ka, and shown that they dene a narrow range from 6.5 to 7.0. Leuenberger et al. (1992) measured the carbon isotope composition of atmospheric CO2 for the period from the last ice age to the pre-industrial age using Antarctic ice cores, the results of which showed similar variations in 13C values to the results of Hatte et al. (2001). We have therefore not considered the variations in the 13C values of atmospheric CO2 in our model. A further way in which the concentrations of atmospheric CO2 could affect the 13C values of plants is through atmospheric CO2 providing the raw material for plant photosynthesis. O'Leary (1981) concluded that the 13C values of plants could be positive at low atmospheric CO2 concentrations due to the accumulation of heavy carbon isotopes. Other researchers have reported negative relationships between atmospheric CO2 concentration and the 13C values of wood (Krishnamurthy and Epstein, 1990; Van de Water et al., 1994; Feng and Epstein, 1995). Feng and Epstein (1995) quantied the relationship between the 13C of tree leaves and pCO2 as follows: for every decrease of 100 ppm in atmospheric CO2 concentrations, the 13C values become heavier by 2.0. Most of these investigations were focused on the 13C values of wood, and the relationship between the 13C values of grasses and pCO2 may be different. Some studies have also suggested that the 13C values of C4 plants are not affected by atmospheric CO2 concentration (Farquhar, 1983; Marino and McElroy, 1991). The vegetation system in the Chinese Loess Plateau has been comprised of a mixture of grasses and shrubs since the last interglacial stage. We do not consider the inuence of atmospheric CO2 concentrations on the 13C values of grasses due to the uncertain relations between them. 4.1.2. Sensitivity of plant 13C response to annual precipitation Much research has been devoted to studying the relations between plant carbon isotopes and rainfall. In eastern Australia, the 13C values of the vegetation have been found to respond to precipitation within the full rainfall range from 300 to 1700 mm, with a coefcient of 0.33 per 100 mm increase in annual precipitation (Stewart et al., 1995). In contrast, the response of plant 13C value to precipitation in northern Australia is limited to the precipitation range from 200 to 450 mm, with 13C values remaining constant over the range from 450 to 1800 mm (Schulze et al., 1996). Wang et al. (2003) concluded that mean 13C values decrease 0.49 if the annual precipitation increases by 100 mm in the Chinese Loess Plateau. To eliminate the inuences of other species, Liu et al. (2005a) investigated the relationship between the 13C values of the dominant C3 (Stipa bungeana, and Heteropappus less) and C4 plants (Bothriochloa ischaemum), and the amount of precipitation in northwest China along a monsoon rainfall gradient.

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Their results show that the sensitivity of the 13C response to precipitation is 1.1/100 mm for the C3 plants and 0.61/ 100 mm for the C4 plant. Previous studies have showed that the Loess Plateau has been covered by grassland vegetation and no extensive forest coverage has been existed during the past 130 ka even under the most suitable conditions for forest development. (Sun et al.,1997; Jiang and Ding, 2005; Liu et al., 2005b) We selected Bothriochloa ischaemum and Stipa bungeana for the present study because they are typical species with wide distributions in the Loess Plateau. The 13C values of both vary negatively with the mean annual precipitation, which can be expressed as follows: y1 0:0044x 10:307 y2 0:00916x 22:902 1 2

where R is the annual precipitation (mm); and a1, a2, b1 and b2 are various constants. An et al. (2005) have demonstrated the linear relation between the C4/C3 ratios of soils and annual precipitation in modern ecosystems by the following equation: F a3 R b3 6

where a3 and b3 are constants. By combining Eqs.(3)(6), the relations between soil organic carbon isotopes (13CTOC) and annual precipitation (R) can be expressed as follows: 13 CTOC a3 R b3 a1 R b1 1a3 Rb3 a2 R b2 7

where y1 and y2 are the 13C values of Bothriochloa ischaemum and Stipa bungeana, respectively (); and x is the mean annual precipitation (mm). The correlations indicate the 13C values of both species increase with decreasing rainfall from the southeast to the northwest in the research zone. If the annual precipitation increases by 100 mm, the 13C values will decrease 0.44 for Bothriochloa ischaemum and 0.92 for Stipa bungeana. The 13C values of C4 plants are thereby seen to vary less than those of C3 plants (see Fig. 1). 4.1.3. Sensitivity of soil 13CTOC responses to annual precipitation in modern ecosystem The carbon isotopic fractionation that occurs during the conversion of plant material into soil organic matter (SOM) is not yet clearly understood. However, this process is inuenced by the ecological conditions of the environments in which the plants live, and on the photosynthetic types (C3 or C4) of plants that occur there. Krull et al. (2005) have shown that the 13C values of the SOM were all increased relative to those of the above growing vegetation in three zones (grassland zone, transition zone and tree zone) in central Queensland, and the 13C values increased rapidly in the uppermost 15 cm depth, stabilized to a depth of 60 cm, and then returned to slightly 13C-depleted values at 85 cm depth. However, carbon isotopic fractionation during the conversion from plant material to SOM has been considered minor based on a number of studies (Melillo et al., 1989; Wedin, 1995; Balesdent and Mariotti, 1996; Cerling et al., 1997; Wei et al., 1998; Connin, 2001). The 13C value of the SOM from the Chinese Loess Plateau can be expressed as follows: 13 CTOC F13 C4 1F 13 C3 3

In accordance with data from modern ecosystems (involving Eqs. (1) and (2)) and utilizing the linear relation between the C4/C3 ratios and annual precipitation established by An et al. (2005), we obtained the following relation between soil organic carbon isotopes (13CTOC) and annual precipitation (R): h   i   R SQRT 7:17 102 25:7 13 CTOC 6:60 = 1:29 102 8

where the SQRT means square root. Based on Eq. (8), we can estimate annual precipitation using the 13C values of the soil organic matter in Chinese loess-paleosol sediments. 5. Reconstructing paleoprecipitation As the 13CTOC values in the Lantian and Weinan loess-paleosol sediments are known, we were able to calculate the amounts of annual precipitation since the last interglacial stage in both areas by using Eq. (8) (see Fig. 2). The results show that the annual precipitation has varied between 360 mm and 792 mm at the Lantian site since the last interglacial stage, with the maximum occurring in S1 and the minimum in L1. Rainfall was more abundant in S1 than in S0 in the Lantian area, with maximum annual precipitation of 792 mm and 693 mm, respectively (see Fig. 2). The annual precipitation at the Weinan site has varied between 348 mm and 845 mm since the last interglacial stage, and the maximum annual precipitation for this area is higher than that of the Lantian. Nonetheless, in common with the Lantian site, the rainfall at the Weinan site was more abundant in S1 than in S0, with maximum annual precipitation of 845 mm and 714 mm, respectively (see Fig. 2). Many climatic studies involving the loess-paleosol sequence have been applied toward discerning variations in the East Asian summer monsoons or paleoprecipitation (Maher et al., 1994; Wu et al., 1994; Maher and Thompson, 1995; Lu et al., 1996; Sun et al., 1999). Though Sun et al. (1999) have indicated that the annual precipitation in the Weinan area has varied from less than 200 mm up to 700 mm since the last interglacial stage, the amounts of precipitation calculated in the present study exceed their results. A variety of geological materials can be used to reconstruct paleoprecipitation, and the results from diverse methods can differ signicantly. Which methods are best remains an open question. The correlations between soil carbon isotopes, vegetation biomass, and climate are quite clear: the soil carbon isotopes reect variations in the vegetation type and corresponding climate because the soil organic matter is derived from the vegetation itself. We suggest that the reconstruction of paleoprecipitation using the carbon isotopes of the soil organic matter in the Chinese Loess Plateau is a viable method. 6. Conclusions We accumulated data concerning the relations between mean annual precipitation, vegetation type, and plant carbon isotopes in the

where 13CTOC is the 13C value of the SOM (); 13C4 and 13C3 are the 13C values of C4 plants (Bothriochloa ischaemum) and C3 plants (Stipa bungeana), respectively (); and F is the proportion of C4 plants in a given ecosystem. Most previous studies (Gu et al., 2003; Vidic and Montaez, 2004; Liu et al., 2005c) have not considered the effects of precipitation on variations in plant 13C values, and the 13C4 and 13C3 values were kept constant with the mean 13C values of the C4 and C3 plants. Eq.(3) was simplied to express the linear relation between the 13CSOM values and the C4/C3 ratios. The C4/C3 ratios can be simply estimated by the 13CSOM values in an ecosystem. Our study of the modern ecosystem of the Loess Plateau has revealed that the 13C values of plants do respond to annual precipitation (An et al., 2005). The correlation between plant 13C and precipitation can be expressed as follows: 13 C4 a1 R b1 13 C3 a2 R b2 4 5

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modern ecosystem of the Chinese Loess Plateau, and constructed a mathematical model to express the relations between the mean annual precipitation and carbon isotopes of the soil organic matter (Eq. (8)). Furthermore, we reconstructed paleoprecipitation values combining the soil organic carbon isotopic records in loess-paleosol sediments in the southeastern part of the Loess Plateau. Our results indicate that rainfall was most abundant in the S1 and S0 stages, with a maximum annual precipitation of about 850 mm, and that the rainfall decreased during the L1 stage, showing a minimum annual precipitation of about 350 mm. Our study constitutes a rst attempt to reconstruct the paleoprecipitation quantitatively using the soil carbon isotopic signal of the paleosol on middle latitudes, where the soil organic carbon isotope values derived from the natural ecosystem are mainly controlled by both precipitation and C4/C3 ratios. Other factors, such as temperature, the concentrations of atmospheric CO2, and carbon isotopic fractionation during the conversion from plant material to the SOM, were not considered in the present study. Although the effect of these factors on carbon isotopes is less than that of precipitation, the simplication of these relations could have an inuence on the accuracy of our paleoprecipitation calculations. However, the relative change shown in our reconstruction of the paleoprecipitation should be reliable for the Chinese Loess Plateau because of the clear relations between soil TOC 13C, C4/C3 abundance, and the amount of precipitation in the modern ecosystem. Acknowledgements This work was supported by National Natural Sciences Foundation (No. 40673012, 40599422, 40523002), National Key Funds of China (No. 2004CB720200), the foundation for the Authors of National Excellent Doctoral Dissertations of the People's Republic of China, and the foundation of State Key Laboratory of Loess and Quaternary Geology (No. SKLLQG 06110). The manuscript has been improved by the comments of two anonymous reviewers. References
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