Wednesday, 13 February 2013

Sunlight stimulates release of carbon dioxide from permafrost

Ann Arbor MI (SPX) Feb 14, 2013



Ancient carbon trapped in Arctic permafrost is extremely sensitive to sunlight and, if exposed to the surface when long-frozen soils melt and collapse, can release climate-warming carbon dioxide gas into the atmosphere much faster than previously thought.

University of Michigan ecologist and aquatic biogeochemist George Kling and his colleagues studied places in Arctic Alaska where permafrost ....