Objectives

BRAISE has four objectives:

create the first dataset of microcharcoal accumulation in marine samples of modern ages
identify spatial patterns in the distribution of microcharcoal accumulation in a given area, construct hypotheses about its processes and determine local and/or regional scale correction factors affecting this distribution (from source area charcoal production to sedimentation in the marine realm).
develop statistical models linking microcharcoal accumulation to fire regime metrics
explore the model’s predictive performance over the past centuries by comparing predicted theoretical charcoal accumulation with observed charcoal accumulation time series obtained during the project.

With our new data and tools, BRAISE will address the following research questions:

what are the most important processes determining CHAR in marine sediments?
how does CHAR relate to fire regime metrics?
what are the uncertainties and limitations associated with the spatio-temporal distribution of CHAR in marine sediments?

Thanks to different collaborators, we anticipate to analyse about 500 sediment interface samples of modern ages (white dots)

Example of pre-scheme traducing the relationships between the measured explanatory variables and charcoal accumulation that could be used to build a model.