We determined the δ15N and δ13C values of individual amino acids (AAs) isolated from chick blood of 4 penguin species that forage in different oceanic regions (from the subtropics of the Indian Ocean to Antarctica) to test if: (1) the δ15N values of phenylalanine (δNphe) revealed different foraging areas among the species; (2) the difference between glutamic acid and phenylalanine δ15N values (...

the environmental and ecological issues in the flow-reduced river reach are very serious and arereceiving increasingly attention. in this study, we investigate the temporal and spatial changes in δ13c and δ15n of periphyton and isotopic relationship between periphyton and the endangered fish (ayu, plecoglossusaltivelis) in a flow-reduced river reach in japan. much of the spatial and temporal va...

Background Reliance on self-reported dietary intake methods is a commonly cited research limitation, and dietary misreporting is a particular problem in children and adolescents. Objective indicators of dietary intake, such as dietary biomarkers, are needed to overcome this research limitation. The added sugar (AS) biomarker δ13C, which measures the relative abundance of 13C to 12C, has demonst...

Although herbaceous species generally show little within plant variation in δ13C, trees show large spatial and temporal differences. We found that the aspect of exposure and branch length accounted for up to 6‰ δ13C difference within the foliage of individual trees of Pinus radiata D. Don. The foliage on branches 0.5 m in length was as much as 4‰ more depleted in 13C than foliage on 10-m long b...

A tunable laser absorption spectrometer (TLAS) was developed for the simultaneous measurement of δ13C and δD values of methane (CH₄). A mid-infrared interband cascade laser (ICL) emitting around 3.27 µm was used to measure the absorption of the three most abundant isotopologues in CH₄ with a single, mode-hop free current sweep. The instrument was validated against methane samples of fossil and ...

We examined stable carbon and nitrogen isotope ratios for a large variety of consumers in intertidal and subtidal habitats, and their potential primary food sources [i.e., microphytobenthos (MPB), phytoplankton, and Phragmites australis] in a coastal bay system, Yeoja Bay of Korea, to test the hypothesis that the transfer of intertidal MPB-derived organic carbon to the subtidal food web can be ...

The major components of human diet both past and present may be estimated by measuring the carbon and nitrogen isotope ratios (δ13C and δ15N) of the collagenous proteins in bone and tooth dentine. However, the results from these two tissues differ substantially: bone collagen records a multi-year average whilst primary dentine records and retains time-bound isotope ratios deriving from the peri...

We examine here the carbon and nitrogen isotopic compositions of bulk soils (8 topsoil and 7 subsoils, including two soil profiles) and five different plant parts of 79 C3 plants from two main functional groups: herbs and shrubs/subshrubs, from 18 different locations in grasslands of southern Yukon Territory, Canada (eastern shoreline of Kluane Lake and Whitehorse area). The Kluane Lake region ...

Understanding reproductive performance in ecologically impoverished vs. more sustained anthropogenic habitats is critical to assess population health status and to develop land use and conservation management strategies. We compared resourcebased maternal effects, reproductive performance, and offspring quality in a model migratory passerine bird, the European starling (Sturnus vulgaris). We as...

C4 plants (e.g. maize, millet), part of our current diet, are only endemic of reduced areas in South-Europe due to their need of warm climates. Since the first vestiges of agriculture in Europe remains of C4 plants were recorded but their overall proportion in the human diet remains unknown. Therefore, isotopic (δ13C and δ15N) composition of bone collagen from the skeletal remains (human and an...