Cosmogenic Be-7 in air : A complex mixture of production and transport

• The long-time series of Be-7 activity in surface air have been studied with the wavelet analysis technique in order to find coherence between Be-7 activity, theoretical production in the troposphere and climatic indices. The Be-7 activity were obtained from five different locations, Angra in the tropics in Brazil, Skane in mid-latitudes in Southern Sweden, Kiruna in Polar region in Northern Sweden, Loviisa in Southern Finland and Rovaniemi in polar region in Northern Finland. The Be-7 data from the Northern hemisphere sites where tested for coherence with theoretical production of the isotope in troposphere and with the North Atlantic Oscillation index. In the Southern hemisphere separate theoretical production was calculated in order to describe local production and Southern Annular Mode was used as the climatic index. Consistent and significant coherence were found with theoretical production at Skane, Kiruna and Loviisa at time-scales of four years or longer. At Angra and Rovaniemi sites, no coherence was detected between Be-7 theoretical tropospheric production and measured activity at ground level. The coherence between Be-7 data from Skane and Angra and climatic indices is insignificant while data from Northern and Eastern Scandinavia show clear coherence with climatic indices at time-scales of four years or longer. Additionally, significant coherence was found between the cosmic ray induced production and NAO at the time band of 8-12 years whereas the coherence between cosmic ray induced production and SAM was insignificant. This feature implies that the ground level Be-7 activity contain mixed information on both production and transport. This conclusion means that further evaluation through models which enable accurate realistic models that will be investigated in future studies.

Ämnesord

NATURVETENSKAP  -- Fysik (hsv//swe)

NATURAL SCIENCES  -- Physical Sciences (hsv//eng)

Nyckelord

Cosmogenic isotopes

Cosmic rays

Atmosphere

Be-7

NAO

SAM

Physics

Fysik

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