Perspectives of XRF and XANES Applications in Cryospheric Sciences Using Chinese SR Facilities

Abstract

As an important part of the climate system, the cryosphere, can be studied with a variety of techniques based on laboratory-based or field-portable equipment in order to accumulate data for a better understanding of this portion of the Earth’s surface. The advent of synchrotron radiation (SR) facilities as large scientific interdisciplinary infrastructures has reshaped the scenario of these investigations and, in particular, of condensed matters researches. Many spectroscopic methods allow for characterizing the structure or electronic structure of samples, while the scattering/diffraction methods enable the determination of crystalline structures of either organic or inorganic systems. Moreover, imaging methods offer an unprecedented spatial resolution of samples, revealing their inner structure and morphology. In this contribution, we briefly introduce the SR facilities now available in mainland China, and the perspectives of SR-based methods suitable to investigate ice, snow, aerosols, dust, and other samples of cryospheric origin from deep ice cores, permafrost, filters, etc. The goal is to deepen the understanding in cryospheric sciences through an increased collaboration between the synchrotron radiation community and the scientists working in polar areas or involved in correlated environmental problems.

Condensed Matter Researches in Cryospheric Science

“…Moreover, imaging methods offer an unprecedented spatial resolution of samples, revealing their morphology and even their inner structure. In this issue, Xu et al [14] introduce the synchrotron radiation facilities now available in mainland China, and the perspectives of synchrotron radiation-based methods suitable for investigating ice, snow, aerosols, dust, and other samples of cryospheric origin, i.e., deep ice cores, permafrost, filters, etc. The goal is to deepen the understanding of cryospheric sciences through increased collaboration between the synchrotron radiation community and scientists working in polar areas or involved in correlated environmental problems.…”

MAP2XANES: a Jupyter interactive notebook for elemental mapping and XANES speciation

“…The high flux, focus and energy tunability of synchrotron light has opened up the possibility of coupling m-XRF to micro X-ray absorption spectroscopy (m-XAS) (Farfan et al, 2018;Xu et al, 2018;Marini et al, 2019).…”