Project Grant 2148926

This National Science Foundation project grant of $328,355 will fund research into nitrogen isotope dynamics on the Amundsen Sea continental margin in Antarctica under the Geosciences program (CFDA 47.050). Trustees of Boston College, doing business as Boston College, will collect full water column profiles of nitrogen and oxygen isotope ratios in nitrate along with isotope ratios of total dissolved nitrogen at select stations during the U.S. GEOTRACES GP17-ANT expedition. Suspended particle nitrogen isotope ratios will also be measured from high-volume pump samples to investigate regeneration. Isotope ratios will be obtained from surface sediments to ground-truth paleoceanographic reconstructions. This research aims to determine major sources and sinks of biological productivity on the Amundsen Sea shelf, a region susceptible to climate change, and provide baseline data to reconstruct past changes. The project also supports graduate and undergraduate student training and one early career postdoctoral researcher.