Stable isotopic evidence for high microbial nitrate throughput in a High Arctic glacial catchment

Abstract

During summer, streams in the Arctic redistribute and export the solute derived from snowpack (accumulated by atmospheric deposition) melting and sediment weathering in its flowpath. The redistribution of dissolved nitrogen undergoes biogeochemical processing (nitrate production and consumption in flowpath). To assess the quantitative impact of these processing, NO 3 ‾-N, NH 4 + -N, total dissolved nitrogen (TDN) and stable isotope composition of the snowpacks was compared with the subglacial and proglacial stream waters.