During this year’s American Geophysical Union meeting in San Francisco, California, on 9-13 December, Jason Gulley, Matt Covington, and Corinne Wong will host an important session: Critical Zone Processes in Carbonates.

Carbonate rocks cover 20% of Earth’s ice-free land and are modified by hydrological, biological and geochemical processes in the critical zone. Congruent dissolution and high solubility of carbonate rocks should lead to Critical Zone processes that are different than those occurring in siliciclastic rocks, which are dominated by incongruent weathering. Caves, an extreme endmember of critical zone processes in carbonates, provide efficient pathways for oxygen and carbon into the subsurface, resulting in complex subsurface chemical and gas gradients that do not occur in siliciclastic systems. This session solicits abstracts dealing hydrological, biological or geochemical processes operating in the carbonate critical zone, broadly defined.

 For more information and to submit an abstract (deadline is 6 August 2013), visit the meeting website.