A global dataset of atmospheric ⁷Be and ²¹⁰Pb measurements: annual air concentration and depositional flux

Abstract

7Be and 210Pb air concentration and depositional flux data provide key information on the origins and movements of air masses, as well as atmospheric deposition processes and residence time of aerosols. After their deposition onto the Earth's surface, they are utilized for tracing soil redistribution processes on land, particle dynamics in aquatic systems, and mixing processes in open ocean. Here we present a global dataset of air concentration and depositional flux measurements of atmospheric 7Be and 210Pb made by a large number of global research communities. Data were collected from published papers between 1955 and early 2020. It includes the annual surface air concentration data of 7Be from 367 sites and 210Pb from 270 sites, the annual depositional flux data of 7Be from 279 sites and 210Pb from 602 sites. When available, appropriate metadata have also been summarized, including geographic location, sampling date, methodology, annual precipitation, and references. The dataset is archived at https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.4785136 (Zhang et al., 2021) and is freely available for the scientific community. The purpose of this paper is to provide an overview of the scope and nature of this dataset and its potential utility as baseline data for future research.