Effects of changes in moisture source and the upstream rainout on stable isotopes in precipitation – a case study in Nanjing, eastern China

Tang, Y.; Pang, H.; Zhang, W.; Li, Y.; Wu, S.; Hou, S.

doi:https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-19-4293-2015

Articles | Volume 19, issue 10

https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-19-4293-2015

© Author(s) 2015. This work is distributed under
the Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 License.

https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-19-4293-2015

© Author(s) 2015. This work is distributed under
the Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 License.

Articles | Volume 19, issue 10

Research article

|

22 Oct 2015

Research article |

| 22 Oct 2015

Effects of changes in moisture source and the upstream rainout on stable isotopes in precipitation – a case study in Nanjing, eastern China

Y. Tang, H. Pang, W. Zhang, Y. Li, S. Wu, and S. Hou

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Final revised paper (published on 22 Oct 2015)
Preprint (discussion started on 15 Apr 2015)

Interactive discussion

Status: closed

AC: Author comment | RC: Referee comment | SC: Short comment | EC: Editor comment

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- Supplement

RC C1579: 'hess-2015-64 Review', Anonymous Referee #1, 18 May 2015
- AC C2770: 'Replies to hessd-12-C1579-2015', Shugui Hou, 22 Jul 2015
RC C2046: 'Interactive comment on “Effects of changes in moisture source and the upstream rainout on stable isotopes in summer precipitation – a case study in Nanjing, East China” by Y. Tang et al.', Anonymous Referee #2, 11 Jun 2015
AC C2771: 'Replies to hessd-12-C2046-2015', Shugui Hou, 22 Jul 2015
AC C2772: 'hess-2-15-64-manuscript-version2 - revision', Shugui Hou, 22 Jul 2015

Peer-review completion

AR: Author's response | RR: Referee report | ED: Editor decision

ED: Reconsider after major revisions (22 Jul 2015) by Lixin Wang

AR by Shugui Hou on behalf of the Authors (25 Aug 2015) Author's response Manuscript

ED: Referee Nomination & Report Request started (25 Aug 2015) by Lixin Wang

RR by Anonymous Referee #2 (10 Sep 2015)

RR by Anonymous Referee #1 (29 Sep 2015)

Suggestions for revision or reasons for rejection

Summary

The revised paper is much improved from the original draft. Non-monsoon season precipitation is better dealt with, but future work, perhaps in another paper, could be done to assess the integrated signal produced by both monsoon and non-monsoon precipitation. The major concerns I had with the initial manuscript have largely been addressed and the manuscript is close to publication quality. The primary questions that remain surround the cluster analysis of the HYSPLIT back trajectory data. I would like to see a more detailed explanation of how the cluster analysis was conducted. Frist, is this a feature of the HYSPLIT model, or were back trajectories exported and analyzed separately with different statistical software, like MATLAB? If the analysis was performed outside of HYSPLIT, what software was used. How was the total spatial variance calculated/derived? For the cluster analysis, of the back trajectories, were points along each trajectory included, or just the initial starting point for each trajectory?
Aside from these questions surrounding the HYSPLIT model, the manuscript is in good shape. More specific comments are detailed below. Once these are addressed, the manuscript will be fit for acceptance and publication.

Specific Comment:

Line 28 Change “put forward” to “proposed”

Line 35 Change to “influenced”

Line 48 Change to “but are instead linked to rainout processes”

Line 67 Change “indicate” to “were related to”

Line 93 Delete “hereafter”

Line 94 Change “could” to “can”

Line 97 Change to “amounts”

Line 107 Change =”were” to “are”

Line 116 Change to “In the winter, air masses”

Line 152 Delete “source”

Line 173 Add “(Fig. 3)” after “season.” Delete “The simulated trajectories are presented in Fig. 3.

Line 183 How was evaporation prevented and/or reduced? Was there a top of some sort? Was the container left out for 24 hours at a time? A little more detail about the collection of individual precip events would be good.

Line 186 Change “for storage in a freezer” to “and frozen”

Line 198 How was instrument drift accounted for on the Picarro?

Line 208 Delete “In detail”

Line 231 -233. This sentence is confusing and should be re written.

Line 235 -236 How does the Meiyu have different start dates? Do you mean just periods when the Meiyu is active?

Line 301 Insert “the” between “with” and “ITCZ”

Line 327 Does local here refer to Nanjing?

Line 355 Change “from” to “transport to”

Line 357 Insert “This is consistent with…” at the start of the sentence.

Line 372 Change “no” to “not”

Line 377 Change “in the” to “within”

Line 377. It’s not just convection in the moisture source, but changes in which region is the moisture source is also an important factor controlling changes in δ18Oprecip. This should be clearly stated since it is clearly one of the findings here.

Line 379 Delete “Results are shown in Fig. 10.” Sentences like this should be avoided.

Line 386 Change “confirms” to “supports”

Line 408 Again, changes in the moisture source, not just convection, appear to be important in controlling δ18Oprecip.

Line 430 Delete “the” after “How”

Line 443 Change “Anyhow” to “Regardless”

Line 448 Do not begin a paragraph with “As a result”

Line 460 Can you include the figure as a supplemental figure? This sentence also need to be rewritten for clarity and grammar.

Line 470 Incorrect use of “emphatically”

Line 472. It seems like changes in moisture source and convection in moisture sources were found to be the primary drivers of δ18Oprecip, not as much ITCZ.

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ED: Publish subject to minor revisions (Editor review) (29 Sep 2015) by Lixin Wang

AR by Shugui Hou on behalf of the Authors (08 Oct 2015) Author's response Manuscript

ED: Publish as is (13 Oct 2015) by Lixin Wang

AR by Shugui Hou on behalf of the Authors (14 Oct 2015)

Short summary

We examined the variability of daily stable isotopic composition in precipitation in Nanjing, eastern China. We found that both the upstream rainout effect on stable isotopes related to changes in the Asian summer monsoon and the temperature effect of precipitation stable isotopes associated with the Asian winter monsoon should be taken into account when interpreting the stable isotopic composition of speleothems in the Asian monsoon region.