Deciphering local and regional hydroclimate resolves contradicting evidence on the Asian monsoon evolution.

The winter and summer monsoons in Southeast Asia are important but highly variable sources of rainfall. Current understanding of the winter monsoon is limited by conflicting proxy observations, resulting from the decoupling of regional atmospheric circulation patterns and local rainfall dynamics. These signals are difficult to decipher in paleoclimate reconstructions. Here, we present a winter monsoon speleothem record from Southeast Asia covering the Holocene and find that winter and summer rainfall changed synchronously, forced by changes in the Pacific and Indian Oceans. In contrast, regional atmospheric circulation shows an inverse relation between winter and summer controlled by seasonal insolation over the Northern Hemisphere. We show that disentangling the local and regional signal in paleoclimate reconstructions is crucial in understanding and projecting winter and summer monsoon variability in Southeast Asia.

Interpretation of anthropogenic impacts (agriculture and urbanization) on tropical deltaic river network through the spatio-temporal variation of stable (N, O) isotopes of NO(-)3.

For the first time, the dual isotope approach was applied to trace the sources of impacts and to identify the governing biogeochemical processes in a river network in the tropical deltaic region of the Red River (Vietnam). Our long term surveys concluded that water in this river network was severely impacted by anthropogenic activities. Analysis has shown strong spatio-temporal variation of nitrate isotopes; ranges of δ(15)N-[Formula: see text] and δ(18)O-[Formula: see text] were from -5 to 15 ‰ and from -10 to 10 ‰, respectively. Average values of δ(15)N-[Formula: see text] and δ(18)O-[Formula: see text] in the dry season, when fertilizer is applied, were 3.54 and 3.15 ‰, respectively. In the rainy season, the values changed to 6.41 and -2.23 ‰, respectively. Denitrification and biological assimilation were active throughout the year, but were especially enhanced during fertilization time. Mineralization of domestic organic matter and consequent nitrification of mineralized [Formula: see text] were the dominant processes, particularly during the rainy period.

Speciation of arsenic in environmental samples of the Nha Trang Harbor, Vietnam, using HPLC coupled HG-AAS.

A coupled high performance liquid chromatography-hydride generation-atomic absorption spectroscopy system was used to determine the speciation of arsenic in samples from the Nha Trang Harbor, Vietnam. Concentrations of arsenic in seawater, pore water, suspended solid, and sediment were 4.12-9.81 µg/L, 13.10-24.32 µg/L, 1.87-6.42 µg/g, and 3.37-9.06 µg/g, respectively. Extraction using H(3)PO(4) + NH(2)OH·HCl and ultrasonic digestion was optimized to yield a 76-85% of total arsenic. Arsenic (III) was the most abundant species in suspended solids and sediments whereas arsenic (V) represented for 30-50% of arsenic (III) concentration. Monomethylarsonic acid and dimethylarsinic acid species were undetectable.