Department of Earth System Science

Radiocarbon was measured in atmospheric CO2 from La Jolla, California and in living organic materials from six sites in the northern hemisphere. Atmospheric CO2 &C values from La Jolla agreed with those previously published records from China Lake, California (Berger et a1.1987) and Vermunt, Austria (Levin et a1.1985). &4C values of fruit and grain samples that grew during 1980 agreed with the atmospheric CO2 &4C measurements. Most of the A14C results of fruit and corn samples stored since the 1940s agreed with tree-ring &4C values for the same time period. In general, agreement was found between the atmospheric CO2 or tree-ring &4C records available for the Northern Hemisphere and the &4C signatures of rapidly exchanging organic matter pools examined in this study. Exceptions were the i 4C values of carbonate from egg shells and that of organic carbon from egg insides, which demonstrate that bicarbonate and organic carbon within the egg follow different biochemical pathways.