Ecosystem fluxes of carbonyl sulfide in an old-growth forest: temporal dynamics and responses to diffuse radiation and heat waves

Carbonyl sulfide (OCS) has recently emerged as a tracer for terrestrial carbon uptake. While physiological studies relating OCS fluxes to leaf stomatal dynamics have been established at leaf and branch scales and incorporated into global carbon cycle models, the quantity of data from ecosystem-scale field studies remains limited. In this study, we employ established theoretical relationships to infer ecosystem-scale plant OCS uptake from mixing ratio measurements. OCS fluxes showed a pronounced diurnal cycle, with maximum uptake at midday. OCS uptake was found to scale with independent measurements of inline-formulaCO₂ fluxes over a 60 m tall old-growth forest in the Pacific Northwest of the US (45inline-formula^∘49inline-formula^′13.76inline-formula $M4inlinescrollmathml{}^{\prime \prime }$ 8pt6ptsvg-formulamathimg72877009115e133fe632a10b0040889b bg-15-7127-2018-ie00001.svg8pt6ptbg-15-7127-2018-ie00001.png  N, 121inline-formula^∘57inline-formula^′06.88inline-formula $M7inlinescrollmathml{}^{\prime \prime }$ 8pt6ptsvg-formulamathimg9162d003e0ed94af8b7d2b4a38708019 bg-15-7127-2018-ie00002.svg8pt6ptbg-15-7127-2018-ie00002.png  W) at daily and monthly timescales under mid–high light conditions across the growing season in 2015. OCS fluxes were strongly influenced by the fraction of downwelling diffuse light. Finally, we examine the effect of sequential heat waves on fluxes of OCS, inline-formulaCO₂, and inline-formulaH₂O. Our results bolster previous evidence that ecosystem OCS uptake is strongly related to stomatal dynamics, and measuring this gas improves constraints on estimating photosynthetic rates at the ecosystem scale.