ARCHIVED CONTENT: In December 2020, the CZO program was succeeded by the Critical Zone Collaborative Network (CZ Net) ×

CZ themed issue of NAGT’s In the Trenches

31 Oct 2017
News Source: NAGT

This issue of In the Trenches explores the richly interdisciplinary concept of the Critical Zone (CZ).

In the Trenches - October 2017
Exploring the Critical Zone, Earth's Outer Skin
Volume 7, Number 4

This issue of In the Trenches explores the richly interdisciplinary concept of the Critical Zone (CZ). Earth's Critical Zone extends from the top of the tree canopy to the base of the groundwater lens. Nearly all terrestrial life inhabits the CZ. It is a zone of important physical and chemical transformations, the place where rainwater becomes drinking water, and the source of the overwhelming majority of our food. The NSF-funded Critical Zone Observatories (CZOs) have engaged in multidisciplinary study of the CZ for nearly a decade.

A NAGT membership is required to access most of full articles in this issue:

Web Features

Critical Zone Science InTeGrate Course»
This 15-week, seven-module course from InTeGrate, also featured on the Teach the Earth portal, introduces and examines the Critical Zone (CZ), Earth's permeable layer that extends from the top of vegetation to the bottom of the fresh groundwater zone. This course makes use of authentic and credible geoscience data such as CZO data and Ameriflux network data. It also promotes systems thinking by incorporating examples and activities that demonstrate the connection between water, air, soil, and organisms in biogeochemical processes within the CZ.

Teaching Activity: Integrated Critical Zone Project »
This teaching activity, developed by participants in an On the Cutting Edge workshop, offers a way to assemble information about geology, hydrogeology, and soils into a coherent whole in a way that may otherwise not happen in any one class. The "critical zone" concept ties the pieces together.

How to read elemental soil profiles to investigate the biogeochemical processes in Critical Zone»
In this teaching activity, developed by participants in an On the Cutting Edge workshop, students use elemental chemistry data in a soil profile to explore major biogeochemical processes that dominate in critical zone. Data will be provided, and students calculate and graph the mass transfer coefficients as a function of depth using Excel. Based on these plots, student make generalized statements about how different elements behave in this soil profile and what processes dominate, e.g., depletion by rock-water interaction, addition by dust inputs, elemental loading by human activities, etc.

In the Trenches - October 2017


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News Category:
EDUCATION/OUTREACH


People Involved

CZO
Non-CZO

Sharon Dykhoff - Former CZO RET, Dominion Christian School

Jonathan Pollak - Consortium of Universities for the Advancement of Hydrologic Science, Inc

Jane F. Rice - Roanoke College

Noelia Báez Rodríguez - Luquillo LTER Schoolyard program, Puerto Rico

Christopher Roemmele - West Chester University

Steven Smith - Purdue University


Discipline Tags and CZOs

All Disciplines

National

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