MICADAS

To support climate change and air quality research, the KCCAMS facility is expanding its analytical capabilities, including the detection of microgram-sized radiocarbon samples in a wide range of materials, with the addition of a MIni CArbon DAting System (MICADAS). The MICADAS will be accompanied by multiple devices to support the direct injection of CO2 samples to the spectrometer and the production of graphite targets.

The acquisition of the MICADAS is a collaboration of researchers at UC Irvine (Drs. C Czimczik, J. Randerson, and G. Santos), UC Riverside (Dr. F. Hopkins), and NASA-JPL (Dr. C. Miller) and supported by the U.S. National Science Foundation (MRI-2117635, 9/01/21-8/31/24, $2,199,429) and the University of California, Irvine and its School of Physical Sciences. The MICADAS is currently being built and is expected to be operating at the KCCAMS in 2023. 

Human activities and changes to land ecosystems cause emissions of long-lived greenhouse gases (CO2, CH4) and short-lived carbonaceous aerosol that contribute to climate change and air pollution. Measurements of the radiocarbon signature of these different emission sources are an effective tool for differentiating these sources and developing and evaluating mitigation strategies.