Wildfire smoke is usually discussed as an airborne pollutant and a threat to human health. But when smoke and rain coincide, nutrients released by burned landscapes rain back down.
Wildfire smoke is usually discussed as an airborne pollutant and a threat to human health. But when smoke and rain coincide, nutrients released by burned landscapes rain back down.
A new study finds that smoke-rain events can deliver large bursts of nitrogen, phosphorus and potassium—three nutrients essential to life—across ecosystems in the United States. As wildfires become more frequent, these nutrient pulses could become an increasingly important, and largely overlooked, ecological consequence of fire.
“It’s important to remember that what goes up must come down,” said lead author Alexandra Ponette-González, urban ecologist at the University of Utah (U) and Natural History Museum of Utah. “There’s so much focus on what goes up and how that affects human health. We’re interested in everything that falls out of the atmosphere and lands on ecosystems, and what that means for our environment.”
Read More: University of Utah
Particles filtered from rainwater samples collected at sites across the National Atmospheric Deposition Program. (Photo Credit: Fito Torres/Natural History Museum of Utah)
