This dissertation investigates the impact of bromine on tropospheric ozone, OH, and mercury in the preindustrial and present-day atmosphere through use of modeling and observations from satellite. We developed bromine simulation capabilities coupled to oxidant-aerosol chemistry in the GEOS-Chem chemical transport model (CTM). Standard gas-phase mechanisms for bromine chemistry were unable to reproduce recent estimates of tropospheric BrO from satellite. Agreement was improved significantly after imposing HBr+HOBr heterogeneous chemistry in the model. Under present-day conditions, we find that bromine decreases ozone by 6.5%, < 1 – 8 ppb, and global mean OH by 4%. Most ozone loss is due to HOBr production and photolysis, with additional contributions from \(NO_x\) and ozone loss through \(BrNO_3\) hydrolysis. Simulations of the pre-industrial atmosphere are important as baselines for ozone air quality and radiative forcing calculations. However, standard models for the pre-industrial overestimate ozone observations taken a century ago at Montsouris and cannot reproduce the observed aseasonality. We find that bromine chemistry significantly improves this agreement. However, bromine chemistry has negligible impact on the ozone radiative forcing, as concentrations of BrO remain similar. Despite the small change in BrO concentrations, lower ozone in the preindustrial leads to a 40% greater Br mixing ratios. We estimate that this change may have increased the lifetime of atmospheric Hg(0) against oxidation to Hg(II) by 70% since the pre-industrial, making atmospheric mercury a more global pollutant. Additionally, we develop a retrieval algorithm for stratospheric profiles of BrO number density from SCIAMACHY limb near-UV observations. Zonal means of our BrO profile retrievals throughout April 2008 show common features expected from stratospheric photochemistry and dynamics. We apply simulated \([BrO]/[Br_y]\) ratios to the BrO profile retrievals and estimate a stratospheric loading of \(23.5 \pm 6 ppt Br_y\). This supports the 23 ppt stratospheric \(Br_y\) assumed in the satellite-derived climatology of tropospheric BrO that we used to evaluate our GEOS-Chem simulation. Our results imply \(7 \pm 6 ppt\) Br from short-lived bromocarbons, at the higher end of the 3 – 8 ppt range suggested by observations. / Engineering and Applied Sciences

Implementing oxygen isotopes (H218O, H216O) in coupled climate models provides both an important test of the individual model's hydrological cycle, and a powerful tool to mechanistically explore past climate changes while producing results directly comparable to isotope proxy records. The addition of oxygen isotopes in the University of Victoria Earth System Climate Model (UVic ESCM) is described. Equilibrium simulations are performed for preindustrial and Last Glacial Maximum (LGM) conditions. The oxygen isotope content in the model's preindustrial climate is compared against observations for precipitation and seawater. The distribution of oxygen isotopes during the LGM is compared against available paleo-reconstructions. Records of temporal variability in the oxygen isotopic composition of biogenic carbonates from ocean sediment cores inform our understanding of past continental ice volume and ocean temperatures. Interpretation of biogenic carbonate d18O variability typically neglects changes due to factors other than ice volume and temperature, equivalent to assuming constant local seawater isotopic composition. This investigation focuses on whether sea ice, which fractionates seawater during its formation, could shift the isotopic value of seawater during distinct climates. Glacial and interglacial states are simulated with the isotope-enabled UVic ESCM, and a global analysis is performed. Results indicate that interglacial-glacial sea ice variability produces as much as a 0.13 permil shift in local seawater, which corresponds to a potential error in local paleotemperature reconstruction of approximately 0.5 C. Isotopic shifts due to sea ice variability are concentrated in the Northern Hemisphere, specifically in the Labrador Sea and northeastern North Atlantic. / Graduate

La question de la rationalité socioéconomique propre aux paysans canadiens-français occupe dans l'historiographie canadienne du Québec rural préindustriel une place de choix, ayant été invoquée tour à tour pour glorifier ou condamner une population aux pratiques jugées à bien des égards différentes de celles des société anglo-saxonnes nord-américaines. Néanmoins, aussi importante soit-elle, cette problématique a rarement été abordée de front par les historiens, qui ont plutôt choisi de l'inclure en filigrane d'interprétations plus ciblées de réalités connexes. Dans cette optique, nous nous proposions dans ce mémoire de dégager, par le biais de l'analyse critique d'un échantillon de productions historiques représentatives des courants plus généraux dont elles sont issues, les principales représentations de la rationalité socioéconomique paysanne véhiculées par les historiens canadiens (tant francophones qu'anglophones) depuis 1960, de les expliquer à la lumière des particularités des contextes dans lesquels elles ont été produites ainsi que d'en retracer le parcours historiographique. Cette démarche nous a permis de constater clairement l'existence de trois paradigmes interprétatifs ayant successivement dominé le discours historique sur la question depuis 1960. Cette évolution, si elle s'accorde bel et bien au rythme du progrès méthodologique de la science historique, présente toutefois plusieurs originalités fermement ancrées dans les particularités du contexte dans lequel elle s'est déroulée, dont les principales sont la question nationale, la dichotomie ethnolinguistique de l'historiographie canadienne et la portée sociale significative des interprétations proposées. / The issue of French-Canadian peasants' socio-economic rationality holds a place of choice in the Canadian historiography of rural Quebec, having been used both to glorify and condemn the behavior of a population considered to be in many respects different from its Anglo-Saxon neighbors. However, as important as it may be, this subject has rarely been addressed directly by historians, who instead chose to study it indirectly as part of more targeted interpretations of its related realities. We therefore aim in this study to identify, through the critical analysis of a number of historical productions we believe to be representative of the broader currents from which they derived, the main representations of the French-Canadian peasants' socio-economic rationality conveyed by Canadian historians (both anglophones and francophones) since 1960, to explain them in the light of the particular contexts in which they were produced , as well as to trace their historiographical fate. This approach allow us to clearly see the existence of three interpretative paradigms that have successively dominated the historical discourse on the issue since 1960. This trend, even though it indeed follows the rhythm of methodological progress in history, is also firmly rooted in the peculiarities of the context in which it took place, the main ones being the omnipresence of the national debate, the ethnolinguistic dichotomy of Canadian historiography and the significant social impact of the proposed interpretations.

Floodplains represent a global hotspot of sensitive socioenvironmental changes and early human forcing mechanisms. In this review, we focus on the environmental conditions of preindustrial floodplains in Central Europe and the fluvial societies that operated there. Due to their high land-use capacity and the simultaneous necessity of land reclamation and risk minimisation, societies have radically restructured the Central European floodplains. According to the current scientific consensus, up to 95% of Central European floodplains have been extensively restructured or destroyed. Therefore, question arises as to whether or when it is justified to understand Central European floodplains as a ‘Fluvial Anthroposphere’. The case studies available to date show that human-induced impacts on floodplain morphologies and environments and the formation of specific fluvial societies reveal fundamental changes in the medieval and preindustrial modern periods. We aim to contribute to disentangling the questions of when and why humans became a significant controlling factor in Central European floodplain formation, and how humans in interaction with natural processes and other chains of effects have modified floodplains. As a conclusion, we superimpose emerging fields of research concerning the onset of the Fluvial Anthroposphere and provide 10 specific thematic objectives for future multidisciplinary work.